Noir Alley

[Hibi]

Yeah, has its good points and bad........

[misswonderly3]

Noir, schmoir.  I just wanna have fun.

[Sgt_Markoff]

They need me as host. Unfortunately, my face was made for a career in RADIO

[ElCid]

4 hours ago, speedracer5 said:

For me, the Sunday Noir Alley is on at 7am! If I was awake at that time, 7am is not a very "noir-ish" time in my opinion.  The Saturday 9pm timeslot works much better for me.

For me, Saturday is Midnight and I am asleep by then.  So if I don't record it, 10:00 AM on Sunday is not too bad.

One of Eddie's promos showing him trying to decide between Midnight and hard liquor or Sunday AM and coffee.  He pours the liquor into the coffee cup.

[ElCid]

2 hours ago, Hepburn Fan said:

Okay, I could put a Cindi Lauper link here. Nah. But I have to agree. I don't rate movies with numbers or popcorn kernels, or rotten tomatoes, or whatever. I never finish watching a movie and say, what a great musical.

Kinda curious how Noir Alley got to have a special place, with two different times, and no other category does? Just what makes Eddie an expert? My nickers would be in a twist if I were Alicia or Dave.

From my previous post that you may have missed.

As for Muller, I am sure part of the deal with TCM is that he gets to pick the movies.  After all, TCM went to him to do the program as he is one of the top "experts" on Noir.  For those who may not know, he is the founder of the Film Noir Foundation.   http://filmnoirfoundation.org/home.html

This has been discussed before, but it is shown twice because people wanted to see it at different times.  Considering how many other movies TCM shows repeatedly, two airings of one Noir is not so much.

One time slot works well for East Coast and other one works well for West Coast.

 

[Hibi]

Why would Alicia and Dave care? They are on more than Eddie is even with the repeat.

[Hibi]

1 hour ago, TheCid said:

For me, Saturday is Midnight and I am asleep by then.  So if I don't record it, 10:00 AM on Sunday is not too bad.

One of Eddie's promos showing him trying to decide between Midnight and hard liquor or Sunday AM and coffee.  He pours the liquor into the coffee cup.

I hadnt seen that promo! I'm never in bed at midnight. (I'm barely there during the week). I'm a night owl.

[cigarjoe]

A heads up Panic In The Streets on at Noon. A great Noir no matter what Sgt_Markoff thinks, 

[LornaHansonForbes]

50 minutes ago, cigarjoe said:

A heads up Panic In The Streets on at Noon. A great Noir no matter what Sgt_Markoff thinks, 

FYI, husband and wife screenwriter team EDNA and EDWARD ANHALT wrote the screenplays for both PANIC IN THE STREETS and THE SNIPER, they won an Oscar for the first and were nominated for the second.

[sagebrush]

On 10/31/2018 at 2:53 PM, Hepburn Fan said:

Me too. Funky fading in and out long distance AM, in the dark of night.

I love radio faces. It's fun to imagine how the face may or may not match the voice!

[cigarjoe]

Well anybody watch it? I was out with a trip and will have to wait until it pops up on demand. Whaja think?

[misswonderly3]

Well, I'm pretty familiar with The Sniper. I've seen it two or three times, and in fact own a copy ( it's included in a Columbia noir boxed set I've got.) I missed it this weekend as I was away and did not get a chance to watch it. But I watched it earlier this year, so it's still pretty fresh in my mind.

This is not a "fun" noir. Some noirs are fun to me; they tend to include glamourous nightclub scenes, witty dialogue, atmospheric settings, things like that. The Sniper is not like that at all. It's very serious, and actually quite depressing. Depressing not only as a story in its own right, but also because, sadly, these kinds of people seem to be around acting out their horrible obsessions more than ever today, much more so than in 1952.

It's what they called a "message movie" back then. Clearly the gun man is very sick, psychologically. We see him trying to contact the mental health professional who was trying to help him before he was released from hospital (evidently long before he should have been), but he cannot reach him. No one seems to notice how messed up he is, or care. The message of The Sniper is, we must detect mental illness in this kind of person and try to treat them, certainly keep them under observation, before they lose all control and end up killing innocent people. It is true, the final scene, where we see the killer waiting pathetically for the police to find and arrest him, is very effective. I simply do not know enough about this kind of mental illness to comment as to whether the plea this film seems to be making is the right way to deal with such people.

Anyway, just looking at it objectively and not as a social message movie,  The Sniper is well-made and well directed, in a "procedural" kind of way. I like Edward Dmtryk, and would expect nothing less than a taut,engrossing work from  him. I thought the actor who played the sniper, Arthur Franz, was quite good - it's a difficult role to play, a profoundly sick man with a compulsion to kill, who yet needs to convey at least a modicum of sympathy to the audience. I'd never heard of Arthur Franz before, yet when I looked him up, it seems he was quite a prolific actor, appearing in many movies, including The Caine Mutiny and Beyond a Reasonable Doubt.

Marie Windsor makes an appearance here. She's always good; it's too bad we don't get more of her in The Sniper; you feel genuinely shocked and sad when her character is shot by the killer.

I think I understand why so few people have posted here about this film today. First, as I said, good in its own way though it may be, it's not enjoyable, obviously because of its subject matter. Second,  coming just a week after the horrible massacre in Pittsburgh, the airing of The Sniper would be disturbing to many viewers, and I'm thinking a lot of people may have chosen to not watch the film at this time. Again, I can absolutely  understand that.

[LawrenceA]

I've seen The Sniper before, and I have a copy on that same Columbia noir set that you mention, MissW. I liked the film, and it's one of the few Arthur Franz performances I was impressed with. I didn't watch it this time as I was out most of the morning, but I did catch the tail end with Eddie's comments about Wally Cox and the future Mrs. Stanley Kramer.

[cigarjoe]

7 minutes ago, LawrenceA said:

I've seen The Sniper before, and I have a copy on that same Columbia noir set that you mention, MissW. 

Ditto I have the same set. Hope it pops up, I've just watched a film with Wally and it would be interesting to hear the comments.

[Vautrin]

Mommy did it. Mommy, mommy, mommy. I don't remember seeing this one before. Fairly

entertaining, though it gets a bit repetitious in the middle. Yeah, the nutso likes to go around

shooting women. We get it. I always love it when there is a short text introduction to a

movie that is basically an exploitation flick to make it seem as though it's really more of a

public service than a crime movie. Okayyyy. Some good visuals of the underbelly of SF

and whimsical ones of Eddie getting up close and personal with his rifle. Mommy. I thought

that might have been Wally Cox, though he wasn't in the scene very long. I suppose a

rat fink like Dmytryk was a bit of a sniper himself, targeting his former friends, though 

with less lethal results. 

 

 

 

 

[Brigid O'Shaughnessy]

Can't be 100% sure that was Wally Cox as one of the laundry pressers in The Sniper.  Not listed under cast and not on his IMDb list of movie credits.

[Janet0312]

14 hours ago, misswonderly3 said:

Well, I'm pretty familiar with The Sniper. I've seen it two or three times, and in fact own a copy ( it's included in a Columbia noir boxed set I've got.) I missed it this weekend as I was away and did not get a chance to watch it. But I watched it earlier this year, so it's still pretty fresh in my mind.

This is not a "fun" noir. Some noirs are fun to me; they tend to include glamourous nightclub scenes, witty dialogue, atmospheric settings, things like that. The Sniper is not like that at all. It's very serious, and actually quite depressing. Depressing not only as a story in its own right, but also because, sadly, these kinds of people seem to be around acting out their horrible obsessions more than ever today, much more so than in 1952.

It's what they called a "message movie" back then. Clearly the gun man is very sick, psychologically. We see him trying to contact the mental health professional who was trying to help him before he was released from hospital (evidently long before he should have been), but he cannot reach him. No one seems to notice how messed up he is, or care. The message of The Sniper is, we must detect mental illness in this kind of person and try to treat them, certainly keep them under observation, before they lose all control and end up killing innocent people. It is true, the final scene, where we see the killer waiting pathetically for the police to find and arrest him, is very effective. I simply do not know enough about this kind of mental illness to comment as to whether the plea this film seems to be making is the right way to deal with such people.

Anyway, just looking at it objectively and not as a social message movie,  The Sniper is well-made and well directed, in a "procedural" kind of way. I like Edward Dmtryk, and would expect nothing less than a taut,engrossing work from  him. I thought the actor who played the sniper, Arthur Franz, was quite good - it's a difficult role to play, a profoundly sick man with a compulsion to kill, who yet needs to convey at least a modicum of sympathy to the audience. I'd never heard of Arthur Franz before, yet when I looked him up, it seems he was quite a prolific actor, appearing in many movies, including The Caine Mutiny and Beyond a Reasonable Doubt.

Marie Windsor makes an appearance here. She's always good; it's too bad we don't get more of her in The Sniper; you feel genuinely shocked and sad when her character is shot by the killer.

I think I understand why so few people have posted here about this film today. First, as I said, good in its own way though it may be, it's not enjoyable, obviously because of its subject matter. Second,  coming just a week after the horrible massacre in Pittsburgh, the airing of The Sniper would be disturbing to many viewers, and I'm thinking a lot of people may have chosen to not watch the film at this time. Again, I can absolutely  understand that.

I agree wholeheartedly with your review. I thought the Sniper was excellent. The only other film I recall with Arthur Franz is Abbott & Costello Meet the Invisible Man. I thought Franz did a hell of a job in The Sniper. Two thumbs up for me. 

[Janet0312]

1 hour ago, Brigid O'Shaughnessy said:

Can't be 100% sure that was Wally Cox as one of the laundry pressers in The Sniper.  Not listed under cast and not on his IMDb list of movie credits.

I would say that was Wally Cox. Looked like him. I recognized his voice even before he closed the presser. 

[ElCid]

When the poster of Marie Windsor's character was shown I remembered having seen The Sniper many years ago.  Overall an above average movie and more than just another crime or police procedural.  MissWonderly already did a very good review.

Windsor always impresses me.  Of course not as much as in Swamp Women, but that is whole 'nother subject.  Actually her best role for me was in The Narrow Margin.

Enjoyed Eddie's recap of the SF scenes.  Also noted that Corliss Archer's and Dobbie Gillis' "fathers" (John Eldredge and Frank Faylen) had roles in this.

[ElCid]

Next up is The Threat (1949) with Charles McGraw in the lead (more or less), but as a criminal. Virginia Grey and Michael O'Shea are also in it.  I saw it several years ago and it is interesting and should hold your attention.

[Sgt_Markoff]

How about 'Born to Kill'?

[Sgt_Markoff]

p.s. What shooting in Pittsburgh? Meh, nvm, gave up keeping track of that kind of thing long ago

[Dargo]

17 hours ago, Sgt_Markoff said:

p.s. What shooting in Pittsburgh? Meh, nvm, gave up keeping track of that kind of thing long ago

Wow! Really Sarge?!

(...Well, I hope you at least know that there was an election yesterday, doncha?!)

[Sgt_Markoff]

Shootings every three months on average. Like I have time for that? 

All the 'official' press-release and town-hall verbiage is exactly the same sanctimonious, flowery, half-hearted, maudlin BS every time.

"The management and staff of (_x__campus, _ x__mall, _x__city) extends our deepest (alternately: 'most heartfelt') sympathies ...to the grieving families and loved-ones ...of the unfortunate victims of this shocking tragedy...now, however, is when we need to all pull together in a time for healing..."

("Hey! How about getting rid of handguns and assault weapons, Senator?")

"Next question, please..ah yes--you have your hand up --there in the back..."

 

[Sgt_Markoff]

LeBrand: It died in Pittsburgh.

Hadrian: Like a dog!

John L. Sullivan: Aw, what do they know in Pittsburgh...

Hadrian: They know what they like.

John L. Sullivan: If they knew what they liked, they wouldn't live in Pittsburgh!

 --Sullivan's Travels, 1941