Kick-Back Friday: May 2010 Archives
The Naked City (1948): It'd be hard to believe that "Law & Order"'s Dick Wolf didn't get some kind of distant inspiration from director Jules Dassin (Rififi) and this homocide story, which was filmed entirely on location in New York City. The rapport between the very Irish Barry Fitzgerald (Going My Way), as the lead detective, and the boyish Don Taylor (Father of the Bride), as his green partner, lends a surprisingly light-hearted style to what is otherwise technically defined as a noir flick.
Murder by Contract (1958): Defined as noir, but heavily neorealistic or, even, New Wave in style—especially given the threadbare guitar score. A film hybrid in the spirit of a less frenzied Blast of Silence, with the low-budget creepiness of The Honeymoon Killers.
Claude (Vince Edwards—yes, Ben Casey) is a resolute* hit man whose dedication to job completion is shaken by a tough assignment: offing a protected female witness in a high-profile court case. It's not that he minds killing a woman, per se, he just finds it logistically difficult: women don't stand still; they're not dependable, he complains.
* But gun eschewing!
Vince Edwards prepares to kill in a still from Murder by Contract.
Eli Wallach's performance as a psychopathic killer is the first reason to watch The Lineup (1958), Don Seigel's cinematic take on the "Dragnet"-like TV show of the same name. The second reason is the hilarious dual commentary from the ever-informative Eddie Muller and the decidedly non-PC James Ellroy.* The third is the functional San Francisco travelogue provided by Seigel's on-site filming.
* Provided in the volume 1 set of Columbia Pictures Film Noir Classics.
Still from The Lineup, with Eli Wallach (right).
Lady in the Lake (1947): A unique (and I mean "unique," not just distinctive) adaptation of another Raymond Chandler-Philip Marlowe story of the same name. Director and star Robert Montgomery creates a sometimes dizzying, and always amusing, movie by shooting the detective story primarily from Marlowe's first-person perspective.* Try not to laugh out loud when cigarette smoke comes from your/Marlowe's/the camera's direction.
With a mugging Audrey Totter (The Set-Up) as Marlowe's editor and client and a young Lloyd Nolan as an underhanded cop.
* Montgomery also tosses in the occasional, creative mirror shot.
