The Locket (1946)- 8/10 Got this for Mitchum, but as it turns out, he isn't in all that much of it. No matter, the film is terrific. It has a wacky flashback within a flashback within a flashback structure that somebody like the Coens could have a lot of fun with. But the central performance, by Laraine Day, is a wonder to behold. I've never really liked her--although the only other role of hers I know is as the love interest in Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent--but here she's just right as an apparent good girl who's actually a twisted schemer. As such, she joins the ranks of others of her ilk: Jane Greer in Out of the Past, Joan Fontaine in Born to be Bad, Olivia de Havilland in The Dark Mirror. I find this presentation of the femme fatale more interesting than the more obvious efforts supplied by the likes of Marie Windsor or Barbara Stanwyck, good as they are. Anyway, it's really a treat to watch Laraine Day lie, lie, lie and send a series of men to their destruction. Isn't that the very essence of so-called film noir? Too bad the film loses its nerve at the end and goes for an implausible happy ending. Up to that point, the film is hard edged and clean.
I don't quite see what Jenkins means by "an implausible happy ending". She's regressed to infantile level, and it's dubious if she can ever recover. And it's left open wether her (latest) husband will stand by her side or not.
Odd Man Out (1947) - 8/10Oh my, James Mason is beautiful in this! And he looks even better when suffering. And the athmosphere... perfect noirness.I loved all those weird supporting characters - they aren't seen in movies lately. But they were somehow there in the French poetic realist films too. It's very close to those.One thing that keeps it from 10: the ending could have been more dramatic if we'd actually see them on the ground from closer.
In a Hollywood film of the period, if you don't receive summary execution, you are meant to recover. And it's pretty clear, to me anyway, that sucker #4 is going to stand by her.
To me it appeared that she was as much a lost case as, say, Norman Bates at the end of Psycho or Norma Desmond at the end of Sunset Blvd.
The Set-Up (1949) The cinematography is outstanding we get are a lot of nice beautifully lit and composed facial closeups and boxing action with a juxtaposition of great 5 to 10 second cutaway vignettes of various members of the fight audience reactions that provide a wonderful cross section of humanity. Another 10/10 for me.
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film3/dvd_reviews53/rope_of_sand.htm
[Widmark is given a sneering hypochondriac villain who runs a boxing gym as a front for a gang
Barbara Lawrence is very cute.
The Set-Up (1949) Director Robert Wise, with Robert Ryan, Audrey Totter, George Tobias, Alan Baxter, and Wallace Ford. Great little boxing Film Noir with a lot and I mean of atmosphere. Robert Ryan, aging fighter, who has a room in the "Cozy Hotel" with his girl Audrey Totter, goes up against a young opponent with underworld connections, his manager doesn't tell him that he supposed to take a dive, for $50 bucks no less (hey, a hamburger and two beers tab came to $1.16 including the tax, lol). He finally finds this out during the fight but he was not going give up and beats the kid. Repercussions come. The cinematography is outstanding we get are a lot of nice beautifully lit and composed facial closeups and boxing action with a juxtaposition of great 5 to 10 second cutaway vignettes of various members of the fight audience reactions that provide a wonderful cross section of humanity. Another 10/10 for me.