HOME AT SEVEN. British Lion Film Corp., 1952. Released in the US as Murder on Monday, 1953. Ralph Richardson, Margaret Leighton, Jack Hawkins, Campbell Singer, Michael Shepley, Margaret Withers. Based on a play by R.C. Sherriff. Director: Ralph Richardson.

   That scene toward the end of Interrupted Journey came strongly to mind as I watched another British Film, Home at Seven, the only film ever directed by Sir Ralph Richardson, and a pleasant surprise from start to finish.

   When Great Actors turn to Directing Fillums, they often get a bit mannered. Sometimes unbearably so. I’m reminded of Laurence Harvey’s awful The Ceremony and John Wayne’s ponderous The Alamo. Even films I rather enjoy, such as Olivier’s Hamlet and Brando’s One-Eyed Jacks suffer from a certain amount of self-conscious narcissism.

   Which is why I was so charmed by Home at Seven’s unpretentious spontaneity. From start to finish, it’s a quiet, workmanlike job of entertainment never flashy — boasting fine performances from Richardson (always a delight to watch) Margaret Leighton and Jack Hawkins.

   I can tell a little about the plot this time: Richardson plays a Bank Clerk who returns home from work one night — carrying the evening paper; promptly at Seven as usual — to find his wife in tears. His first impulse is to soothe her, of course, and when she tells him he’s been missing for the last 24 hours, he poohpoohs the notion, pointing out that he’s clean, shaved, his clothes not slept in, and carrying the Monday Paper: Hardly the appearance of a man who’s lost a day.

   Surely, he tells her, it must have been a dream she had while napping. Must stop working so hard, and all that. At which point he discovers that it’s Tuesday’s Paper he’s holding.

   It’s an intriguing notion to start a film with, and it gets better as Richardson discovers that money he was responsible for is missing and a close associate is dead. Very swiftly, the film becomes another paranoid nightmare, on the order of Interrupted Journey, but done with just a touch more realism and consideration to character.

   Unlike the characters in most thrillers, everyone in Home at Seven seems perfectly real and very likable: Richardson’s Average-Guy Hero, his fretful wife, Jack Hawkins’ sympathetic Doctor and even someone named Campbell Singer as an apologetic but insistent Police Inspector. One gets a real sense of ordinary people who’ve had some awful intrusion into their lives and can’t figure how to cope with it.

   There is a stunningly effective scene in Home at Seven where Richardson and his wife are at home and he thinks the Police are coming to arrest him for Murder. Sound familiar? I thought so too. But wait; Feeling the Long Arm of The Law at his back, Richardson sits down with his wife at the kitchen table and quietly begins to explain to her how to do the Accounts.

   It’s a moment all the more touching for its restraint with both of them trying hard not to cry as they deal with the commonplace aspects of a nightmare, and it shows a sensitivity and intelligence that are just too rare in the Film Thriller.

INTERRUPTED JOURNEY. British Lion, UK, 1949. Valerie Hobson, Richard Todd, Christine Norden, Tom Walls, Ralph Truman, Vida Hope, Alexander Gauge. Screenplay: Michael Pertwee. Director: Daniel Birt.

   Interrupted Journey is sort of a PG version of Fatal Attraction and a film I recommend to any man thinking of cheating on his wife.

   Richard Todd plays a struggling young writer whose wife wants him to get a job. He elects to run off with a wealthy married woman who flatters him, but as they’re preparing to leave he finds himself persecuted by doubts, nagging conscience, and the strange feeling they’re being followed.

   They board a train that happens to pass close by his house and, on impulse, he pulls the Emergency Cord, stops the train and flees back to his wife. But then…

   Well, again, it’s one of those films so full of surprising twists that I hate to tell any more. Suffice it to say that the screenwriters turn Todd’s aborted fling into a finely-honed paranoid nightmare, well-played by a bunch of folks I never heard of, and produced with that quiet, comfortable, sumptuous care typical of post-war British films at their best.

   There is, incidentally, a scene in Interrupted Journey that caught my attention for reasons I’ll discuss next time: It’s that moment that comes in about every third thriller ever made, where the Hero’s accused of Murder, the Police are coming for him, and he convinces the Heroine (in this case his doubting wife) to hide him.

   It’s done here with more intelligence than usual, and a real feeling for the poor wife’s tortured struggle with herself over how far she ought to trust her punic husband.

UNFORGOTTEN CRIME. Republic Pictures, 1942. Originally released as Affairs of Jimmy Valentine. Dennis O’Keefe, Ruth Terry, Gloria Dickson , Roman Bohnen, George E. Stone, Spencer Charters, Roscoe Ates. Based on the play Alias Jimmy Valentine by Paul Armstrong (1910). The play itself was based on O. Henry’s short story “A Retrieved Reformation,” Cosmopolitan, April 1903. Director: Bernard Vorhaus.

   Unforgotten Crime [the title under which it was shown on TV] is a rare gem, a film that takes all the standard elements of the “B” feature and works them into a surprisingly thoughtful new form.

   Dennis O’Keefe is the brassy radio reporter whose promotional scheme involves ferreting out the notorious Jimmy Valentine, a once-notorious cracksman now living under an assumed name in a small town (Roman Bohnen). When he offers a reward to the first one who finds Valentine, the town goes wild with outsiders in search of fortune vs. steady townsfolk suddenly suspicious of each other and consumed by their own greed.

   Through all of this, the old dependable B-movie types walk through their fusty paces with a familiarity that borders on contempt: Pretty Ingenue, Dumb Cop, Bumbling Sidekick, Wisecracking Female Reporter, Cute Kid, etc. etc, played by old dependable character actors like Ruth Terry, Roscoe Ates, George E. Stone and Gloria Dickson.

   Then something weird happens: They start acting like Real People; it’s like The Purple Rose of Cairo, where the characters abandon the story and start pursuing their own interests, and it makes for a fascinating bit of Cinemah.

   I should mention that Unforgotten Crime, the copy I have, suffers from more than a few continuity gaps and sudden jumps, the result of being cruelly cut from its initial running time (seventy-four minutes, rather lengthy for a “B,” to a convenient-for-TV 54 minutes) and never restored.

Editorial Comment:   There are two copies of this film offered for sale on Amazon, both under this title. One lists the running time as 52 minutes, the other doesn’t say, but since it’s the TV title, I suspect that it’s also the abbreviated version. (I recently purchased a copy offered by a collector-to-collector seller under the Jimmy Valentine title, but I have yet to watch it. Hopefully it is the longer version.)

MURDER BY INVITATION. Monogram, 1941. Wallace Ford, Marian Marsh, Sarah Padden, Gavin Gordon, George Guhl, Wallis Clark, Minerva Urecal, J. Arthur Young, Herbert Vigran. Director: Phil Rosen.

   This Monogram mystery (calling it a B movie would be kind) is another entry in the “dark old house” genre. Reporter Bob White (Wallace Ford) investigates a series of murders at a spooky old house full of secret passages, sliding pictures, greedy relatives, and eyes looking secretly into the room.

   I kept expecting to see Abbot and Costello walk through the door at any moment. Rich Aunt Cassandra’s relatives dragged her into court and tried to have her declared incompetent so that they could gain control of her fortune, but the judge found in her favor even though she likes vinegar on her apple pie.

   So she invites all her relatives spend a week with her at her country mansion so she can decide which one will get the bulk of her estate. But no sooner do they arrive at midnight than one of them is stabbed to death (“She must have seen The Cat and the Canary,” quips White’s secretary when she hears about the midnight invitation).

   When reporter White arrives with his secretary and photographer he is welcomed into the murder scene (yes, a fantasy film…). No sooner does he arrive than the body disappears and another one appears in its place, and then that one disappears also.

   (In an aside Wallace Ford addresses the audience and says that you know you are past the halfway point in a mystery movie when the bodies have disappeared — and this movie is more than half over).

   This is a really goofy movie, not to be taken seriously, but fun to watch. At the end as Bob White starts a long, long kiss with his secretary, the camera pans over to Eddie the photographer and he says something like “The Hays Office isn’t going to like this…”

Rating:   C minus.

THE RUNAROUND. Universal Pictures, 1946. Ella Raines, Rod Cameron, Broderick Crawford, Frank McHugh, George Cleveland, Joan Fulton, Samuel S. Hinds. Screenplay: Arthur T. Horman & Sam Hillman, based on a story by Arthur T. Horman & Walter Wise. Director: Charles Lamont.

   The Runaround is a mild screwball comedy in the vein of It Happened One Night, lifted above itself by the performances of Ella Raines, Rod Cameron, and Broderick Crawford, and solid direction from frequent Abbott and Costello director, Charles Lamont.

   The plot might have come right out of the pulps or the slicks of the period. Cameron is Eddie Kildane, a private eye who has started his own agency with partner Wally Quayle (Frank McHugh) after one to many run-ins with Louis Prentice (Broderick Crawford), the unscrupulous manager of the Continental Detective Agency, their former boss.

   Kildane quickly gets the upper hand, but Penelope is more than he counted on, and as he races across country with her, outwitting Prentice and dukeing it out with his men, the two unlikely love birds start to fall in love (to the recurring theme of “My Blue Heaven” sung and hummed by Cameron at first to annoy her and later by her to discomfort him, thanks to a canny Frank Skinner score).

   The film follows the usual pattern of the runaway heiress theme with some hard-boiled hi-jinks thrown in, and while only mildly screwball, it still falls into the genre. Cameron and Raines seem to relish the chance to play comedy and their scenes together have real snap, so that it is a shame neither of them got more chances to make these kinds of films.

   I don’t want to oversell this. It is not in the front rank of screwball comedy, but then it is better than many with better pedigrees (Love on the Run comes to mind). Cameron and Raines make an excellent team and the wisecracking script is both inventive and playful within both the screwball and private eye genres.

   On top of that, there is a final twist in the tail that allows for a more realistic happy ending than usual and gives it a touch of the mystery, although no crime is involved, save a few laws Cameron and Crawford break in their double crossing rivalry,

   The unusual cast makes the most of a chance to stretch and play outside their comfort zone. Raines is exceptionally attractive and appealing, Cameron charming and completely at ease, and Crawford ideally cast in the familiar role of a likable rat.

   If you have missed it, and have a taste for screwball, romantic comedy, and screen private eyes this one will both surprise and delight you. Everyone in the film may get the runaround, but not the audience.

STRANGE ILLUSION. PRC, 1945. James Lydon, Warren William, Sally Eilers, Regis Toomey. Director: Edgar G. Ulmer.

    Much better on all counts than Fear in the Night [reviewed here ] is Edgar Ulmer’s remarkable Strange Illusion, an ultra-cheapie from PRC with James Lydon, Sally Eilers, Warren William and Regis Toomey, that would have been a forgone Disaster in lesser hands.

    Ulmer could always dress up the most threadbare of tales in positively sardanapalean splendor, and here he turns a well-worn mystery plot into a Modern-Dress Hamlet, with Lydon getting a message from his recently-departed father to protect his mother from opportunists.

    Next thing he knows, Mom’s being swept off her feet by Warren William (clearly way past his prime here, and looking marvelously suited to his sleazy role) who, it turns out, may have caused Dad’s death. And the only way young Lydon can think of to prevent the nuptials is to feign insanity — which puts him in the hands of William’s Polonius-like understrapper, who runs a “Rest Home.”

    I mentioned once that Ulmer’s films sometimes amaze one by the very fact of their existence, and this is no exception. He can do more with L-shaped sets, inadequate actors and bad scripts than most filmmakers could manage with the cast and budget of Lawrence of Arabia.

    Here he plays off Lydon’s typecast callowness against William’s lethally seedy charm and even brings off a totally unexpected — and rather disturbing — ending, which I won’t reveal.

Editorial Note:   For Mike Grost’s in-depth commentary on this film, check out his website here.

[UPDATE] 02-15-11.   Every Tuesday on Todd Mason’s blog, he lists an assortment of “Overlooked Films” offered up as Prime Examples by other bloggers on their own
blogs. This week on Dan’s behalf I suggested Strange Illusion. For the rest of this Tuesday’s recommendations, please give Todd’s blog a look-see.

THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO. ( Män som hatar kvinnor, literally “Men Who Hate Women.”) Sweden, 2009. Michael Nyqvist, Noomi Rapace. Screenplay Niolaj Arcel, Rasmuss Heisterberg. Based on the novel by Stieg Larrson. Director: Niels Arden Opley.

   I won’t go much into the complex plot of this international best selling thriller, the posthumous first of a trilogy by Swedish journalist Stieg Larrson. This Swedish film of the book, part of what is known as the Millennium Trilogy (The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest are the other two), introduces the protagonists Mikael Blomkvist, a journalist and publisher of Millennium, an expose magazine, and Lisbeth Salander, a gifted violent and almost feral computer researcher.

   To summarize the plot as simply as possible (and leaving a good deal out) Blomkvist faces ruin after a libel suit following his expose of a prominent industrialist’s criminal activities. While waiting a possible jail sentence and financial ruin he is commissioned by Henrik Vanger, the former CEO of Vanger Industries to find out what happened to his niece Harriet, who disappeared forty years earlier, under the guise of researching a history of the Vanger family. Vanger believes someone in the family murdered Harriet, and taunts him by sending him a framed flower every year on his birthday as Harriet once did.

   Vanger makes no bones about his family. They are a bad lot, but Harriet was one bright spot among the twisted monsters around her.

   Meanwhile unknown to Blomkvist, Vanger has him investigated, the research done by Lisbeth Salander, the girl of the title, a mysterious young woman with a photographic memory and rare skills in her field. Lisbeth is hostile, violent, paranoid, defensive, and dresses in semi Goth outfits, black jeans and pullovers (her nose is pierced too) and rides a motorcycle. She is being sexually extorted by the man who runs her trust fund, but after a brutal rape turns the tables on him.

   Lisbeth has dark secrets that Rapace echoes largely like a silent star, mostly with her eyes.

   Eventually Blomkvist discovers Lisbeth, and they join forces, uncovering a history of sexual abuse and murder — a possible serial killer — dating back forty years (the sins of the past that haunt the Vanger family could almost come from a Ross Macdonald novel). Their descent into Vanger family history becomes steadily more disturbing until Blomkvist faces torture and murder and is saved only by Lisbeth’s timely arrival.

   But the death of one killer is only the beginning, and there are dark secrets and the fate of Harriet Vanger still to be uncovered, nor is Lisbeth willing to leave Blomkvist to his fate.

   There is a good deal more than this going on. The book could easily be a cross between Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Andrew Vachss, Mickey Spillane, and a Swedish William Faulkner, with a bit of de Sade and Henry Miller thrown in to boot.

   There are enough literary analogies and references for a few dozen dissertations in it without even touching on the social, political, sexual, and psychological depths, but the film manages to capture the feel and the mood of the book even without the benefit of some of its more literary pleasures.

   The film version takes a bit to get started, being faithful to the novel with a 152 minute running time. You may find yourself confused how the two narrative tracks are going to join, or wonder when and if they are, but Nyqvist is well cast as the middle aged moral hero and Noomi Rapace is perfect as Lisbeth Salander, who has her own demons.

   It is a difficult role, physically and mentally demanding, a sort of female Mike Hammer with a tortured soul and Rapace’s large dark eyes staring out from the face of a child woman will stay with you long after the film ends. Few actresses expose themselves both physically and psychologically as naked as Rapace does in this film

   When the film does get going, it is uncompromising, violent, dark, and yet neither exploitative nor merely sensational. Director Opley’s hand is certain, even gifted, and the film is both stunningly shot and sharply written and staged.

   It can’t have been easy shaping Larrson’s unwieldy, in length anyway, very literary work into a taut film, but the effort pays off in a stunning film adaptation that is as good a translation of a big dense book to the screen as I’ve seen in many a year.

   This is not a feel good film, but it is satisfying, and surprisingly the hero and heroine come across as human and vulnerable when they could easily have been preachy and self-satisfied in light of the book and movie’s themes of corporate corruption, sexual violence against women, traces of Nazi fascism lingering in the underbelly of wealthy Swedish society, the darkness at the heart of a supposedly perfect society, and generations of sexual abuse and despair.

   That Blomkvist and Lisbeth emerge as people you actually care about is a tribute to both the script and the actors playing the roles.

   I’ll be watching the sequel The Girl Who Played With Fire in a few days The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest has yet to be released on DVD, but I look forward to it, If they keep up this level of work it may prove the best such series of films since The Lord of the Rings and the Harry Potter films.

   The American version of the film is in production, but I don’t have high hopes for it. It could hardly look any better, and I can’t imagine an American actress exposing the same mix of vulnerability and toughness while maintaining a core of humanity as real as Rapace’s. No doubt we will get a kick ass Lisbeth much more conventionally pretty and glamorous, but not half as real as Salander.

   Even if you were indifferent to the book, or just have no urge to read it, see this film. Don’t wait for the American version — I can virtually assure you it won’t tackle half the subject matter or half as graphically. I do warn you, this is violent, sexually graphic, and certainly adult, but it is never sensational or exploitative, and the two characters at its heart prove to be someone you care for in a way rare to any thriller.

   The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is one of the best thrillers I’ve seen in ages — adult, complex, and uncompromising. I actually kept the NetFlix DVD an extra day and watched it again. It’s that good. The Girl Who Played With Fire is next in the queue and I look forward to it.

   See this one, but be prepared. It is visceral experience unlike any thriller I’ve seen in many years. It comes at you and refuses to be ignored or just watched, but insists on being experienced. You may well have the urge to pull away a few times while watching it, to distance yourself a bit, but when the credits roll I suspect you will have the same reaction I did.

   Damn good movie.

FEAR IN THE NIGHT. Paramount Pictures, 1947. Paul Kelly, DeForest Kelley, Ann Doran, Kay Scott, Charles Victor, Robert Emmett Keane. Screenplay: Maxwell Shane, based on the short story “Nightmare” by William Irish (Cornell Woolrich). Director: Maxwell Shane.

   A nicely-done ”B” with some good atmospherics buoying up so-so characterizations and an indifferent script, wrapped around a fine, dream-like plot.

   DeForest, haunted by nightmares that he’s killed someone in a make-believe room, confides in his Cop Brother-in-Law Paul, then finds that the room really exists and the murder actually occurred.

   With a little sharper writing, this could’ve been a much better film, but as it is, it just misses the mark. DeForest is written as a trepidant weakling, and Paul as a Tough Cop, and the two of them never manage to break out of the cardboard confines of their cliche’d characters (he alliterated.)

   Worse, writer/director Maxwell Shane seems perfectly content not to develop DeForest’s character, as if he never realized the Dramatic Potential in the story of a man trying to convince the World and himself that he’s not a Killer.

   Well, it’s at least noir-ish enough to keep it interesting.

Editorial Comment:   The movie in its entirety can be watched online here. (Follow the link.)

THE MAD MISS MANTON. RKO Pictures, 1938. Cast: Melsa Manton: Barbara Stanwyck, Peter Ames: Henry Fonda, Lt. Brent: Sam Levine, Sullivan: James Burke. Screenplay by Philip G. Epstein. Director: Leigh Jason.

   It is rare to find a comedy mystery with a strong enough mystery to equal the comedy. The Mad Miss Manton is screwball comedy mystery at its best.

   While walking her dogs at 3 am, debutant Melsa Manton discovers a dead body in an old house. She runs to notify the police, but when she returns with them the body is gone and the cops are convinced it is all a prank. Young newspaper editor Peter Ames uses the “prank” to ridicule Miss Manton and the idle rich lifestyle.

   Melsa enlists the help of her closest seven friends to help her clear her name. Eight determined debutantes out to find a killer. The cops, the press, even the killer are doomed.

   The murder mystery plot could stand on its own without the comedy and make a good typical RKO B-movie mystery. What follows Melsa’s discovery of the body is a mystery that will keep you guessing until Melsa finds the final clue. The story features a variety of suspects, all involved in one kind of relationship or another.

   In screwball comedy tradition, Peter and Melsa hate each other. Peter hates Melsa so much he falls in love with her. But whenever Melsa’s begins to weaken towards Peter the mystery interrupts, and Melsa’s feelings for him return to hate.

   Reacting to Peter and Melsa, two of the debutantes exchange comments that sums up the philosophy of all screwball comedies.

   Director Leigh Jason maintains the frantic pace of the screwball comedy without losing any of the tension of the mystery. He also effectively uses the entire cast, especially the pack of debutantes, giving each character their own identity.

   From the opening titles on, the film’s dark look creates an atmosphere fitting for the murder mystery, not letting the screwball comedy overwhelm the suspense. Cinematographer Nicholas Musuraca would later be the cinematographer for Out of the Past.

   The main attraction of The Mad Miss Manton is Philip G. Epstein’s (Casablanca, Arsenic & Old Lace) script in the hands of Barbara Stanwyck and Henry Fonda. The chemistry between Fonda and Stanwyck works as well for this film as it will later in Lady Eve.

   The comedy and mystery blends well in The Mad Miss Manton, each playing off the other. Peter is at the first murder scene where the debutantes left him bound and gagged. The young ladies find a second murder victim. Believing it to be another hoax, the police refuse to respond. So the women take the second body and leave it in the lobby of Peter’s newspaper.

   When asked why, Melsa explains, “I thought if you read it in the paper you’d believe us.”

   The screwball comedy genre is skilled at dealing with sexual attraction between characters. When Peter learns the killer has threatened Melsa, he runs to her rescue. Melsa is trying to sleep, but he insists he is spending the night there. Melsa mockingly congratulates Peter, of all the attempted subterfuge of others to remain in her bedroom, his is the best.

   The atmosphere, twists, and clues will appeal to those in search of a good B-movie murder mystery. Those looking for a funny screwball comedy will enjoy the non-stop wisecracks, gags, slapstick and wit. Unless you are one of the young men the debutantes dump without a word whenever the mystery surfaces, The Mad Miss Manton will prove entertaining.

   You can find more about this film, including the original trailer, at TCMdb.com. It is available on DVD from Warner Archive Collection.

SHE ASKED FOR IT. Paramount, 1937. William Gargan, Orien Heyward, Vivienne Osborne, Richard Carle, Roland Drew, Harry Beresford, Miki Morita. Director: Erle C. Kenton.

   William Gargan is well-known name to long-time classic movie fans, even though I remember him most (and first) as PI Martin Kane on the radio. The rest of the cast is all but unknown to me.

   Orien Hayward, for example, who’s married to William Gargan’s character at the beginning of the movie, if you ever expect to see her in a movie, it will have to be this one. Except for a small uncredited part in one other, Her Husand Lies (also Paramount, 1937), she never made another.

   I don’t know why. She’s a pert young blonde who more than holds her own as Penelope, the female half of the Stafford family. She’s married to Dwight Stafford (that’s Gargan), and a more profligate and wastrel couple you cannot imagine, living high in society solely on the basis of a monthly allowance from Dwight’s (very) rich uncle.

   When the check doesn’t arrive at the beginning of one month, they are in deep financial trouble. They rush over to the uncle’s home, only to find that he has just died, the victim of a hit-and-run accident, the other party unknown.

   Forced by bitter necessity to make a living on their own, his cousin having shut the horn of plenty (and their only flow of income) down on them, Dwight, a big fan of mystery fiction, decides to become an author. The first big twist in the tale is that he does, and in a big way. The second big twist is that after several successful books, Dwight tells Penelope he’d rather go fishing than write another book. (His literary muse is gone.)

   And so is Penny, off to Reno for a divorce. Dwight, on the other hand, decides to pose as his own character and go into the detective business, and after a considerable amount of muddling around, he solves the case, the first one that comes in the door.

   I’ve gone into more detail than I might for some movies for two reasons. First of all, it’s an interesting set-up, and secondly this is a relatively difficult movie to find. There’s a long synopsis on IMDB (one which will unfortunately tell you everything, and if you read it, you will absolutely never need to see this movie), but at this point in time, there isn’t a single comment that’s been left, nor an external link, except one to this blog, as soon as it can be done. (It usually takes a couple of days.)

   Should you go to a more than usual amount of effort to find this movie? My advice is no, don’t bother, unless I’ve made the set-up sound as interesting as I tried to. But when I said that the case itself is muddled, I meant it, and more: all the way through, the vibes are off.

   The Staffords’ problems, that of the lazy rich, are difficult to identify with, to put it politely but succinctly, and most of the other characters are only crudely drawn, with one of them being out-and-out repulsive.