Sat 6 Jun 2015
LARCENY. Universal International, 1948. John Payne, Joan Caulfield, Dan Duryea, Shelley Winters, Dorothy Hart, Percy Helton, Patricia Alphin, Don Wilson. Based on the novel The Velvet Fleece by Lois Eby & John Fleming. Director: George Sherman.
This little-known but still better than average film noir seems to have fallen through the cracks. With the huge popularity of genre, with any inconsequential black-and-white movie being swooped up and called a noir film, you’d think that someone would have recognized this as the real thing and put it out as something other than as an under the counter collector-to-collector DVD.
Which is how you can find this one, and the only way, if you go looking. While not a full-fledged masterpiece, it’s certainly worth the time to go searching for it. As you might expect, Dan Duryea is one of bad guys, and the ruggedly handsome John Payne is a member of his gang of con-men. Their favorite modus operandi is letting their marks persuade themselves into backing some sort of real estate venture, while Duryea and the others are there, ready and willing to make off with the funds.
In Larceny, Payne is the one who is elected to hustle a war widow (Joan Caulfield) into building a home for wayward boys as a memorial for her husband, killed in action in the war and for whom she is still mourning. And he’s so convincing as the dead man’s buddy that I think I would have believed him myself.
Complications? You shouldn’t doubt it for a minute. She is obviously falling in love with him. He for her? It is difficult to say, but it seems to be the road the story is taking. But messing things up completely is a brassy blonde named Tory (Shelley Winters) who is nominally Duryea’s girl but who has a yen for Payne. Amd he for her, all things considered.
And that’s not all. There are two other good-looking women in the tale who are more than willing to slip John Payne’s character their telephone numbers. I said ruggedly handsome, and I meant it.
And as in true noir fashion, things do not end well for all of the participants. Everyone seemed to be having a good time making it, and I enjoyed watching, never quite knowing which way it was heading.
June 6th, 2015 at 5:47 pm
Thank you for bringing this little-known film to our attention.
It sounds fun to watch.
The plot has some vague similarities to “Fallen Angel” (Otto Preminger, 1945).
George Sherman has become something of a cult director today.
June 6th, 2015 at 10:37 pm
Several books on film noir give this one credit as one Payne’s better noir outings, which is no small thing considering he’s in KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL and 99 RIVER STREET among others.
Maybe it was his good looks, but he always seemed his best in roles where he wasn’t entirely trustworthy and a bit on the shady side. He seemed to enjoy playing those roles both in westerns and other films.
June 7th, 2015 at 1:18 am
A better than good performance by John Payne, but that is in my view, undone, by the whining, cringe worthy work of Shelley Winters, auditioning for A Place In The Sun. What took him, Montgomery Clift, so long to drown her. Duryea’s work, accomplished but obvious. Everyone else just dead on. George Sherman may not have been innovative, but was consistently able to bring intelligence to any project, in this one, the final screen moment is cut way too tightly, and this I am certain has nothing to do with the director. All in all, good stuff.
June 7th, 2015 at 6:53 am
Another one for my want list. Thanks a lot, Steve!
June 7th, 2015 at 3:22 pm
Barry, Comment #3. As we’ve discovered a disagreement when it comes to the acting range of George Raft, at least in part, it looks as though we part ways again when it comes to Shelley Winters.
Here’s what the NEW YORK TIMES had to say, an opinion with which I concur:
“Joan Caulfield plays the languid widow to the point of weariness, but there is spirit and fire to the vulgar blonde moll whom Miss Winters portrays. She is a coarse, flashy, provocative dame and even though the scenarists have given her some flamboyant lines to speak in her big showdown scene with Payne, Miss Winters carries her role off remarkably well.”
It is, of course, all a matter of taste, and by no means do I disagree with yours.
Here’s a link to the rest of the review:
http://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9A06E6D6123FE23ABC4C53DFBF668383659EDE
June 7th, 2015 at 3:45 pm
Steve,
No disagreement regarding Raft’s acting range. Range is unimportant, only the moment on screen matters. Neither Clark Gable, or Cary Grant could not have pulled off playing a Chinese character. and if you look at some late thirties work, nor could Pau l Muni and Luise Rainer. later still Katharine Hepburn as a Chinese peasant, or Flora Robson as an Empress, do not work well. Movie stars may get dressed up, but range is not a requirement, command is what they bring to the enterprise. As for Shelly Winters, phooey. The New York Times does not always get it right, in hard news, or critical theory.
June 7th, 2015 at 4:19 pm
This will be the last time I use the NEW YORK TIMES to put words in my mouth, I promise!
June 7th, 2015 at 4:37 pm
Son of the Gods by Rex Beach, filmed in 1930 with Richard Barthelmess playing a Chinaman in love with a white girl, Constance Bennett, who turns out not to be Chinese after all but simply an adopted Caucasian — has to be seen and read to be believed. Initially I thought this insane, but Rex Beach was not crazy, or racist to my knowledge, but may have been making, in the guise of this naïve and antediluvian melodrama quite the opposite point. It does seem there was a fascination for miscegenation at this level. And no one could have played it. Including Shelly Winters, but as a vulgar harridan, to be done away with, or simply rejected, she held a unique niche.