Fri 19 Dec 2025
NOCTURNE. RKO Radio Pictures, 1946. George Raft, Lynn Bari, Virginia Huston, Joseph Pevney, Myrna Dell. Screenplay: Jonahan Latimer. Director: Edwin L. Marin.
When the death of womanizing songwriter is ruled a suicide by the coroner, a stubborn police lieutenant refuses to quit investigating the case. His primary suspect, however, is a woman he could easily fall in love with (even take home to his mother).
Raft is as stiff an actor in this movie as he ever was. Even his love scenes with Lyn Bari lack any kind of spark. The bit players are what make this movie at all worth seeing – the mystery is only so-so, with the murderer essentially confessing to make it easy.
— Reprinted from Movie.File.2, April 1988.
December 20th, 2025 at 12:08 am
Latimer dresses up a fairly standard tec story about as well as it can be done, and Raft, if uninspiring, at least hits his marks like the dancer he was.
December 20th, 2025 at 12:08 pm
Raft stiff and uninspiring, huh? And a big star for decades. Change that to a powerful screen presence.
December 20th, 2025 at 2:32 pm
One the great mysteries of the universe. One sees what one sees, and the truth of the matter stays as elusive as ever.
December 20th, 2025 at 2:50 pm
Perhaps not so mysterious; he was a great if limited actor.
December 20th, 2025 at 8:38 pm
Raft, if limited, was often used to good effect by directors who understood his value on screen. He never had any illusions about himself as an actor, but he was careful not to take roles outside his comfort zone and often quite good within it.
December 23rd, 2025 at 12:52 pm
Raft displays some thespian range in YOU AND ME, a 1938 mixed theme and cinematic style oddity directed by Fritz Lang. George doesn’t always succeed in the heavy emotional scenes, but he’s in there pitching. An absolute treat, IMO, is Sylvia Sydney’s daydream movie within a movie scene as she envisions the lowdown lyrics sung by torch singer Carol Paige. Part romantic comedy/drama, social commentary and heist drama, the movie is well worth watching for supporting character portrayals. George’s heist crew, Runyonesque characters with some sharp edges, includes a young Robert Cummings. Sydney’s performance is the clue that holds it all together, IMO, and prevents the movie from being a hodgepodge.
Several videos available on YouTube, this being one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1dJEZvEnho
YOU AND ME was reviewed on this site ten years ago by some guy named Jonathan Lewis: https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=37627
December 23rd, 2025 at 1:36 pm
Thanks for the mini-review, Bill, one that proves that not all of George Raft’s movie work can be referred to as negative. The link to Jon’s review is also appreciated. I’d forgotten it myself. Of course, like many of the older posts on this blog, I had to clean the formatting up quite a bit, it having deteriorating badly over the years. It looks a lot better now, I think.
December 23rd, 2025 at 4:49 pm
Thanks for fixing it. I remember when the website changeover or whatever it was mangled a lot of your posts. Apparently whoever coded the software, or whatever, overestimated the demand for translations of English into Lower Umbalic.
February 2nd, 2026 at 2:47 pm
I highly recommend They Drive by Night, in which Raft—whom I always liked—is bolstered by the presence of the great Ann Sheridan as his love interest and Humphrey Bogart (my favorite actor) as his brother and fellow trucker. Ida Lupino gets to go spectacularly bonkers on the witness stand after she tries to frame Raft, who resisted her advances, for the murder of hubby Alan Hale.