Out In The Two-Timing Femme Fatale 1950s Crime Noir Night- “Armored Car Robbery”- A Review

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for the crime noir film Armored Car Robbery.

DVD Review

Armored Car Robbery, starring Charles McGraw, William Talman, Adele Jurgens, RKO Radio Pictures, 1950

Forget what I ever said about the classic two-timing femme fatales. And who knows maybe three-timing, or more. Once you go down that road what is to stop a dame, any dame , and why, at any small number when you are looking, forever looking, to step up in class, to latch onto the big dough guys who will take you out of the dime-a-dance scene you are mired in. So forget frails like Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon who was ready to make any guy, any two guys for that matter, take the fall as long as she got her damn bird, and the stuff of dreams. With dough enough to keep her in style, and the small-time grifters off her back. Forget Rita Hayworth in The Lady From Shang-hai who had half the male world, the smart guys too, lining up to take the fall, and just ask where to take it until in the end even the smart guys cried “uncle.” Forget Jane Greer in Out Of The Past twisting up every guy in California, some smart guys too, and guys who supposedly knew what was what wound up hiding out until the coast was clear, maybe for about a century hiding out nursing their wounds , once she got done with them. And forget one more, just one more, that no femme list is complete without, Ava Garner trying to get some guy, her everlovin’ husband no less, some supposedly badass guy, to take the fall for her on his deathbed in the film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s The Killers. Ya, forget them all as just slightly nervous misunderstood frills that had a couple of bad breaks along the way. Sweet little Yvonne (played by Adele Jurgens. Ya, I know, the name doesn’t exactly ring bells in the fatale world, good or bad)in this sleeper of a crime noir under review, Armored Car Robbery (Ya, I know as well, they seemed to have run out of interesting titles on this one) puts them all to shame. I might be over- touting the thing but hear me out.

Naturally no femme fatale worth her salt is driven by anything but the desire, the very strong desire, to get out from under whatever menial labor she is stuck doing, from serving them off the arm in some hash house to beating drunks for drinks and donuts in some two bit-bar fly scene. Yvonne here is strictly an independent operator working her fanny off (no pun intended) as a stripper ( maybe today the more politically correct term would be a sex worker, or some other more exotic description, although I am willing to stand corrected on that) in a low-rent Chicago burlesque house. Naturally such places, as Damon Runyon, Studs Terkel, and a few other guys have informed us, do not draw serious high-rollers or serious smart guys. So, through this and that, Yvonne winds up married, unhappily married as it turns out, to Benny who is nothing but a small-time grafter down on his uppers as the film opens. Strictly from Jump Street and strictly a guy who takes orders, not gives them.

And that is where this film gets interesting because while Bennie is nothing a but small-time hood he knows a certain smart guy, Dave Purvis (played by William Talman, probably better known as the ever-losing District Attorney in the 1950s Perry Mason television series and not a classic ladies’ man by any means which means he too has to keep grabbing dough), who has a plan, a big heist plan, which the reader can figure out from the title of the film, involves robbing, well, an armored car. Why? As the late old time yegg Willie Sutton has often been quoted as saying in all kinds of contexts –“that’s where the money is.” Big half a million dollar dough (big 1950s dough, now just tip money for the big guys). Bennie (and a couple of his confederates) are in, in to get under from under in the Yvonne department, to keep her in style, some style anyway. But here is the beauty of the thing, and what puts Yvonne right up there with the more well-known fatales, she is running around, married to Benny or not, running around no questions asked, with one Dave Purvis. See Yvonne knows what every true-blue two-timing femme fatale knows-go with the brains of the operation. And so her fate is set.

Of course even a kid wet behind the ears knows that the magic mantra behind every crime noir is that crime, well, crime doesn’t pay. The only difference usually is in what manner it doesn’t pay (and how bad the femme fatale makes some guy, or guys, fall). Here the heist gets blown by a simple call to the police by a witness. The stick-up (at a ball park during baseball season which is probably a separate chargeable crime itself ) is blown but not before a fatal shoot-out of a police officer in pursuit. Benny also gets shot-up in the melee. And that is where Lieutenant Cordell (played by ruggedly handsome, jut-jawed, and straight-as-an-arrow Charles McGraw with the perfect police officer’s face) comes in to see some rough-hewn justice is served. See the officer killed was his longtime partner and as we already know from detective Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon a guy has to do something about the murder of his partner, private or public cop. From there it is only time before Dave and Yvonne, once Benny expires from his wounds, are cornered in a dramatic airfield shoot-out. But here is the clincher- when Dave earlier , dough in hand, told Yvonne that Benny had gone to his just rewards she showed all the emotion of one who heard that a fly had been swatted dead. Didn’t I tell you she was poison? Ya, I did.

Out In The 1950s Crime Noir Night- Robert Mitchum Watch Out For Berserk Femme Fatales, Will You- Angel Face- A Review

Click on the headline to link to Wikipedia entry for the crime noir, Angel Face.

DVD Review

Angel Face, starring Robert Mitchum, Jean Simmons, directed by Otto Preminger, RKO Pictures, 1952

Some guys never learn, never learn to leave well enough alone, and stay away, far away from femme fatales that have that slightly mad look in their eyes and lust in their hearts, as here in the Otto Preminger-directed crime noir, Angel Face, with Robert Mitchum. See, it is not like Brother Robert hadn’t been down that road before and had all the trouble he could handle and then some with femme fatale Jane Greer in Out Of The Past. Ms. Greer “took him for a ride” six ways to Sunday in that one. But you know when a guy gets heated up by a dame, well, lets’ just leave it at you know, okay. Needless to say Brother Robert is set to get “taken for a ride” six ways to Sunday here too, although the femme fatale here is a little younger, and maybe has better manners. Maybe. But that all goes for naught when the heat rises. Yes, we know, we know.

The plot here takes a little something from James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice. The “fair damsel” (played by a young dark-eyed, dark-haired piano-playing Jean Simmons who, before seeing this film I might have taken a run at her myself, in my dreams anyway. But see I know how to take a lesson), after she gets her hooks into Mitchum, furthers her plot to get rid of her dear stepmother so she can have her father to herself (take that anyway you want but you do not have to be a Freudian to know that she is seriously hung up on her novelist father, a probable cause for some of her youthful, ah, monomania). But unlike the femme in Postman she just “forgets” to tell him he is part of the plan. Of course when the foul deed is done (the old "wire cut on the steering wheel of the car and off the cliff you go, dearie" gag that has been around, well, been around since femmes figured out automobiles aren’t just for driving) the pair are the obvious suspects. But with some razzle-dazzle legal work, including marriage to evoke the jury’s sympathy, they get off. (Ya, I know on that one too. But those were more romantic times than ours, I guess. I want the name and e-mail of that lawyer, by the way, just in case.) Of course what guy in his right mind is going to stick around and see, well, what is in store for him and his lovely bride after the court battles are over? Like I said though, this is Robert Mitchum, the guy who can’t learn a lesson.

Note: Naturally with a hunky guy like Robert Mitchum, he of the broad shoulders to fend off the world’s troubles, or at least any women’s troubles, those smoldering eyes, and that glib world-wary cigarette and whiskey manner, the ladies will surely be flocking to his door. And not just femme fatales. In this film, as in Out Of The Past, there is the “good” girl waiting in wings. And Mitchum tries, tries like hell, to stay in that orbit but when those maddened eyes and ruby red lips call that speak to some dark adventure, well, what’s a man to do?

Out In The 1950s Crime Noir Night-Watch Out, Watch Way Out For Two-Timing Dames-“Human Desire”- A Film Review

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for the Fritz Lang-directed film, Human Desire.

DVD Review

Human Desire, starring Gloria Grahame, Broderick Crawford, based on a novel by Emil Zola, directed by Fritz Lang, Columbia Pictures, 1954

No question I am a film noir, especially a crime film noir, aficionado. Recently I have been on a tear reviewing various crime noir efforts and drawing comparisons between the ones that “speak” to me and those that, perhaps, should have been better left on the cutting room floor. The classics are easy and need no additional comment from me as their plot lines stand on their own merits. Others, because they have a fetching, or wicked, for that matter, as here femme fatale to muddy the waters also get a pass. Some, such as the film under review from 1954, Human Desire, offer both those and, additionally, the pedigree of a story-line based closely on the work of 19th century French writer, Emil Zola (he of Dreyfus case fame), and directed by German expressionist film director, Fritz Lang, with his flare for great and dramatic use of black and white cinematography. This film while not right up there with the top of the line Out Of The Past, Gilda and The Big Sleep, partially for chemistry factors between the lead characters and heaviness of plot line in places, is just a notch below. In other words you had better take an hour and a half and watch this thing.

A little summary of the plot line is in order to set the stage. Obviously Zola’s work was set in 19th century emerging bourgeois society France rather than 1950s post- World War II red scare America. But the tale he had to tell of thwarted love. love gone wrong, love never on the right track, and in the end, a cautionary tale of how far certain people will go, dare I say even to murder, sums up the range of human conditions, when the human body heat is up. And the body heat rising here is nothing less than sexual desire. Of course. Simply said a certain femme fatale, a certain speedy femme fatale as it turns out, played by 1950s B-movie fixture, Gloria Grahame, tired of trying to make do behind a cigarette counter does what any girl would do in the situation, marries a "big lug," a railroad middle-level management big lug guy who loves his booze, played by Broderick Crawford (he of All The King’s Men fame), in order to get out from under. But speedy femme fatales are not built for the slow, big lug life, especially when they have a little past, a little past as they always do, here as a former, maybe former, mistress of a Mayfair swell. Needless to say he, as the plot unrolls and big lug Crawford proves to be less a catch than anticipated, gets jealous when he finds out that said wifey has two-timed him. And big lugs know only one way, or seem to know only one way too deal with their two-timing wives, kill the lover, naturally, kill him here right in front of wifey and make her complicit in the murder, holding a certain piece of evidence to put the frame on her, put the frame on her big time, if she crosses him.

All of that is so much lead-up to the real story though. Two-timing femme fatales, whether they got their start behind a candy counter, a hat-check counter or cigarette counter, do not survive in this wicked old world without being primo man-traps. Man-traps that can wrap a guy, wrap a guy tight, very tight, and get him to do anything, anything at all, including, dare I say it, murder. Enter one returning Korean War GI, played by Glenn Ford, who on returning home to small-town Anytown, U.S.A. just wants to wash the grit of that experience off and continue his prior work as a railroad engineer moving goods and passengers along the quickly declining rails of 1950s America. And dream the dream of finding a good woman and grabbing a slice of the little white house with a picket fence, 2.2 kids and a dog, named Rover, probably. And, of course, she is there in the background.

But enter one two-timing femme fatale trying to get out from under a possible murder rap, out from under a loser husband, and who, well, looks like she might be a very nice little adventure, a very nice little adventure, indeed, especially once Glenn gets a whiff of that perfume, lights that cigarette, and takes dead aim at those ruby red lips (I assume they are ruby red, this is after all a black and white noir). Ya, she has him hook, line and sinker. Has him that is until “crunch time.” Then we shall see.

Naturally, in these crime noir melodramatic plots the need to put a big gap between good and evil is usually served up by there being a “good girl” counterposed to the femme fatale. That is the case here and is, in the end what stops old Glenn from going over the edge. But still I blame Glenn for most of the problems here. Yes, sure I wouldn’t have minded taking dead aim at those Grahame lips, who could blame a guy, a small town America guy, especially once she put on the full-court press with that cooing voice. Whee! But see Glenn has already been down this road before. He played Johnny to Rita Hayworth’s Gilda in the 1946 movie of the same name so he knows, or should be presumed to know, what happens when you take dead aim at those femme fatale lips. Here’s the “skinny” though- average joes, very average train engineer joes included, should keep fifty yards, no fifty miles, away from blonde (although they are not always blondes) femme fatales when they get that “come hither” look in their eyes. You have been warned.

Out In The 1940s Crime Noir Night-Brother, Build Them Gallows High - Robert Mitchum’s “Out of the Past”

Click on the headline to link to Wikipedia entry for the crime noir classic Out Of The Past.

DVD Review

Out Of the Past, Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Kirk Douglas, 1947

No question I am a film noir, especially a crime noir aficionado. Recently I have been on a tear reviewing various crime noir efforts and drawing comparisons between the ones that “speak” to me and those that, perhaps, should have been better left on the cutting room floor. The classics are easy and usually need no additional comment from me as their plot lines stand on their own merits. Others, because they have a fetching, or wicked, for that matter, femme fatale to muddy the waters also get a pass. Some, such as the film under review from 1947, Out Of The Past, get a double pass for the plot and for the femme fatale. And what a femme fatale.


A little summary of the plot line is in order to make my point. A young Robert Mitchum plays a not too choosey, just south of the shady-side but street smart, well street smart for a while, detective Jeff Markham (along with his gumshoe partner Fisher who enters into the scheme of things just a little, just like Miles Archer in The Maltese Falcon ) hired by mobster Whit (played by a young Kirk Douglas) to find his mistress, Kathy, (enter drop-dead beautiful Jane Greer) after she off-handedly shots him (and takes his dough, a lot of dough, although the amount to him is not the issue it is the fact of the taking that hurts his pride, hurts his pride big time). That mix, that flammable mix, of a malleable gumshoe, a touchy mobster, and drop-dead femme fatale who has the morals of an alley cat, maybe fewer, is what drives this one, especially the doings of that femme fatale. Well, a girl has to take care of herself in this wicked old world and the boys, well, the boys, can figure the angles for themselves, if they can ever think straight for a minute when she is within fifty yards of them.

Now no question if one had to think, and not think hard, of a 1940s movie star to play a detective who had to get his hands dirty, had to move his heft around, and take a few punches, if necessary, Robert Mitchum (along with Humphrey Bogart) would head the list. But he is strictly in over his head here, like all guys when it comes to tackling a dame. So naturally Jeff, while off-handedly chasing Kathy around Mexico on Whit’s dime, falls, falls hard for Kathy. Once he smells the perfume, eyes her shape, well let’s call a thing by its right name, once she gets under his skin he is a goner. And nobody could blame him really, life is short and how many times are you going to get a chance at a drop-dead beauty that, for the minute, is on the loose. Not me.

The problem is that Whit has his own sense of honor, or revenge, take your pick. And the fact of the matter is that Kathy has her tentacles into him as well, whatever mischief she may have done, whatever off-hand shot he might have to take when she is within fifty yards. So Whit will move might and main to get Kathy back, no questions asked, no quarter given. And Jeff, poor sap Jeff, will wind up behind the eight- ball. See, after another off-hand shooting by Kathy (this should have warned the boys off, a dame with a quick trigger finger should be given a wide berth, but what are you going to do when that perfume smell starts coming your way. Besides it’s a dangerous world anyway), this time fatal, against Jeff’s old detective partner Fisher who was now in the employ of Whit, Kathy winds up back under Whit’s wing.

Whit, with Kathy back in tow and no stranger to intrigue, plots to frame Jeff, plots hard, and frames him big time, while getting out from under some blackmail from an accountant that has the goods on him. That frame drives the last half of the movie, but what really drives the thing is the now “reformed” Jeff’s lingering taste for wildcat Kathy, although he has another honey, a non femme fatale honey, Ann, waiting for him in the wings. So like a moth to the flame when Kathy beckons Jeff is half-way there already.

And, no question, under ordinary circumstances, Jeff would have been able to get out from under but as he said in the course of trying to get out from under Kathy had “built those gallows high.” So the lesson is clear, stay clear of femme fatales, especially wicked ones. Unless of course you think you are smart enough to keep up with them. If you think so though, build those gallows high, brother, build them high. See this beauty, see it several times, I have.

Out In The 1950s Crime Noir Night-The Doctor Is Out- Robert Mitchum’s“Where Danger Lives”-A Film Review

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for Where Danger Lives.

DVD Review

Where Danger Lives, starring Robert Mitchum, Faith Domergue, Claude Rains, Paramount Pictures, 1950

No question I am a film noir, especially a crime film noir, aficionado. Recently I have been on a tear reviewing various crime noir efforts and drawing comparisons between the ones that “speak” to me and those that, perhaps, should have been left on the cutting room floor. The classics are easy: films like Out Of the Past, Gilda, The Lady From Shang-hai, and The Big Sleep need no additional comment from me as their plot lines stand on their own merits. Others, because they have a fetching, or wicked, for that matter, femme fatale to muddy the waters also get a pass, or as in Gilda a double nod for the plot and for the femme fatale. (Be still my heart, at the thought of Rita Hayworth, ah, dancing and singing, okay lip synching, and looking, well, fetching while doing those difficult tasks.). Having just mentioned the classic Out Of The Past allows me to segue into this 1950 crime noir vehicle, Where Danger Lives, another film starring Robert Mitchum.

No question jut-jawed, slightly hazy lazy-eyed, made for heavy-lifting, Robert Mitchum would make the top of any crime noir aficionados idea of guy that fits the bill in this genre. And he proved it out of box in Out Of The Past where he was “smitten” by classic bad girl, no, rotten, low-down femme fatale, Jane Greer, who, unfortunately, unfortunately for Mitchum was “owned” by a mobster (Kirk Douglas) a little further up the food chain. And paid the price for that indiscretion, paid big time. So we know two things about Robert Mitchum. He likes the lively ladies, the ones that come with bells and whistles and plenty of baggage, usually distressful baggage, and he can take care of himself in the clinches. Well almost. Actually we know three things about Brother Mitchum. He does not have enough sense to come in out of the rain, or any place else where danger lurks for that matter. Why? Well in this film he is at it again, back up against a two-timing femme fatale, although as they come in all sizes and shapes a dark-haired one this time (Faith Domegue).

A quick run through the plot line will bring us up to date on Brother Mitchum’s problem. Seems that in this one Mitchum plays a young doctor, a very good young doctor as such doctors go, but he makes the number one cardinal mistake in medical practice (he must have skipped that class in med school, the one about proper bedside manner, minus the bed)- don’t get involved personally with the patients. Especially drop-dead beautiful, alluring, capricious (yes, capricious), calculating ones who show up in the emergency room after attempted suicides. Yes, a big red flag should have been flying in Doc’s head

But see he is young, and she is drop-dead beautiful. Put those two together, and well, what is a man to do. Only problem is said drop-dead beauty is one, married, very married, to a wealthy, older, hell, ancient man, and maybe, tad bit jealous and protective (Claude Rains) and, two, is under some mental distress, hell, she is cuckoo, bonkers, crazy, okay, murderously crazy, if you really want to know. Well for me that would take a certain edge off that drop-dead beauty part but for Doc, no way, no way at all as he is well, let’s just call it smitten.

Of course the price of smitten, smitten to a crazy (sorry), married, very married woman can be very high and here is no exception. After a little bout/confrontation with hubby in which Doc got the worst of it, it seems that when Doc came to said hubby was dead, very dead. See here is where smitten gets you in trouble though. Doc is not going to be the fall guy, and he is not letting his paramour take the fall either. So they decide to high-tail it to Mexico, and freedom, or so they think like a million other people in a tight spot, although not all that crowd decide to high-tail it to Mexico. The trials and tribulations of this now on-the-run couple is what drives the rest of the film, even though Doc is pretty hazy about why he is running (except she is running), given his own medical condition. The rest you can figure out for yourself, just like, in the end Doc, had to figure things out. The hard way.

So you can see that I was not kidding about Brother Mitchum’s little femme fatale problem. But I blame the whole thing on Claude Rains. See there is no way an old guy, a wealthy old guy, or poor for that matter, is suppose to be hanging out with young, drop-dead beautiful women, crazy or not. And see worldly Claude Rains should know such stuff from back in the days when he was running around grabbing dough at Rick’s Place in Casablanca. So the next time you see a crime noir film like this one you will know what’s what.

Out Of The Be-Bop Film Noir Night- The Crime Noir “The Kiss of Death”

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for the film noir classic, Kiss of Death.

DVD Review

Kiss of Death, Victor Mature, Coleen Gray, Richard Widmark, directed by Henry Hathaway, 20th Century Fox, 1947

Sure I am an aficionado of film noir, especially those 1940s detective epics like the film adaptations of Dashiell Hammet’s Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon and Raymond Chandler’s Phillip Marlowe in The Big Sleep. Nothing like that gritty black and white film, ominous musical background and shadowy moments to stir the imagination. Others in the genre like Gilda, The Lady From Shang-hai, and Out Of The Past rate a nod because, in addition to those attributes mentioned above, they have classic femme fatales to add a little off-hand spice to the plot line, and, oh ya, they look nice too. Beyond those classics this period (say, roughly from the mid-1940s to mid-1950s) produced many black and white film noir set pieces, some good, some not so good. For plot line, and plot interest, the film under review, Kiss of Death, is under that latter category.

But hold on though. Although the plot line is thin, mainly about a middle level career con gone wrong once again who, to save his kids from a fatherless and motherless future (mother having committed suicide), decides to play ball with the law. Thus, chump Nick Bianco (played pretty well by Victor Mature, given what he had to work with) turned stoolie, rat, fink, turncoat and the other ten thousand names for such a wrong gee and the rest of the plot hangs on that idea. Say idea being that it is not good business (and for all I know, maybe, unethical, unethical in the criminal code of conduct, although my own very small youthful experience is that it is "every man for himself") to turn stoolie, especially if the price of “freedom” is to tangle, tango, or whatever with one Tommy Udo. No way, no how, not for anything.

And that is what saves this thing as a crime noir classic, the performance of Richard Widmark as psycho-killer for hire Tommy Udo. Everything about him from minute one says wrong gee, don’t mess. Although, needless to say, Nick will mess (Tommy has threatened his kids and his new honey after all). Yes, although I was only a babe then I will give a retroactive vote to Richard Widmark for that 1947 Oscar he won for best supporting actor. There have been a lot of scary psycho-killers that have come down the pike since then but I would not, and would not advise others, to tangle with this guy. And you would too. Kudos.