Halfway through so far, exquisite noir beautifully directed by blacklisted Edward Dmytryk. Strong anti racist message. Gloria Grahame very youthfully tarty. The mise en scene and lighting are genius. Robert Young plays the antipode of Marcus Welby. Robert Ryan - psychotic.
Plays March 14th on US TCM. Click here to set a reminder via email to watch it. (on the right)
Okay - Finished it:
It was ...... clean. The economy of script and commensurate direction made it work. Nowadays there'd be a 20 minute fist fight between either Robert Young or Mitchum and Robert Ryan, with Robert Ryan ending up getting impaled on a Star of David on top of a synagogue after being knocked off a taller building by a crane operated by Gloria Grahame, who saves Mitchum/Young at the last minute.
Oh yeah and all that mise en scene stuff still goes. Dmytryk is like Michael Curtiz. Exquisite.
Yes - the novel is almost painful to read.
ReplyDeleteHuh. Whaddya know. Interesting.
ReplyDeleteOh, and just finished it.
ReplyDeleteWell - what did you think?
ReplyDeleteIt was ...... clean. The economy of script and commensurate direction made it work. Nowadays there'd be a 20 minute fist fight between either Robert Young or Mitchum and Robert Ryan, with Robert Ryan ending up getting impaled on a Star of David on top of a synagogue after being knocked off a taller building by a crane operated by Gloria Grahame, who saves Mitchum/Young at the last minute.
ReplyDeleteOh yeah and all that mise en scene stuff still goes. Dmytryk is like Michael Curtiz. Exquisite.
I'm gonna put this in the post body.