Film Noir Friday–Sunday Matinee: The Dark Mirror

Welcome! The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open. Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat.

Today’s feature is THE DARK MIRROR [1946], directed by Robert Siodmak and starring Olivia De Havilland and Lew Ayres. 

Enjoy the movie!

TCM says:

A woman suspected of murdering her doctor boyfriend has an identical twin sister. When both twins have an alibi for the night of the murder, a psychiatrist is called in to assist a detective in solving the case. Through a series of tests, he discovers which twin actually committed the crime and in the course of his investigation he falls in love with the normal twin.

Who doesn’t enjoy a psychotic twin tale?

Film Noir Friday: I Was a Shoplifter! [1950]

Welcome! The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open! Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat. Today’s feature is I WAS A SHOPLIFTER! starring Scott Brady, Mona Freeman, Anthony Curtis (yep, Tony Curtis), and Rock Hudson.

Shoplifting seems hardly to raise an eyebrow these days, but in 1950 it appears to have been a gateway crime. Today, shoplifting, tomorrow, who knows?

I’ve never seen this one before either, so I’ll be watching with you.

Enjoy the movie!

TCM says:

In a large California department store, detectives spot attractive young kleptomaniac Faye Burton. Jeff Andrews, another shopper, warns Faye that she is being watched, but she pretends not to understand him and continues her thefts. Shortly afterward, she is apprehended by the detectives, and moments later, Jeff is also taken into custody for shoplifting. Faye, who is a judge’s daughter, swears that she will not steal again, and is released after she signs a confession. Before she leaves, the officials warn her that she will go to prison if she is caught stealing again.

Film Noir Friday: The Crooked Web

Welcome! The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open! Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat. Today’s feature is THE CROOKED WEB starring Frank Lovejoy, Mari Blanchard, and Richard Denning.

Enjoy the movie!

TCM says:

Former G.I. Stan Fabian runs a drive-in restaurant with his waitress girl friend, Joanie Daniel, who receives an unexpected visit from her brother Frank. Frank asks Joanie for a loan for a “deal” in Chicago, but she refuses. At dinner that evening, Stan reveals to Frank that he wants to marry Joanie, but she has declined, wary of his lack of financial security. Later, when Stan drives Frank back to his hotel, he inquires about his deal and Frank divulges that years earlier during the war, he and partner Ray Torres hid a sizeable amount of gold, but they have been unable to raise the money necessary to return to Germany to retrieve their treasure.

Film Noir Friday: Pitfall [1948]

Welcome! The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open. Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat.

Tonight’s feature is PITFALL [1948] starring Dick Powell, Lizabeth Scott, Jane Wyatt, and Raymond Burr.

Enjoy the movie!

TCM says:

Insurance agent John Forbes enjoys a comfortable, suburban home life in post World War II, Los Angeles with his wife Sue and son Tommy. He feels, however, that they should have accomplished more and expresses dissatisfaction with his work and social routine. Former policeman turned private investigator J. B. MacDonald has been investigating an embezzler, Bill Smiley, whom Forbes’ company, Olympic Mutual Insurance Co., had bonded. MacDonald reports that although the embezzler is in jail, he has traced presents bought with stolen funds to Smiley’s girl friend, May Co. model Mona Stevens.

Film Noir Friday: City of Fear [1959]

Welcome! The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open. Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat. Tonight’s feature is CITY OF FEAR starring Vince Edwards, John Archer, Patricia Blair, and Steven Ritch. In 1961 Vince Edwards hit the small screen as doctor Ben Casey.

Strictly speaking this isn’t a film noir (see below description from TCM). I think of this as apocalypse noir. Is that a thing? Anyway, that said, I don’t think you’ll mind too much. It is a wonderful copy, and there is some glorious footage of SoCal from the late 1950s.

Enjoy the movie!

TCM says:

A low-budget programmer from Columbia Pictures, the crime thriller City of Fear (1959) is sometimes classified as a Film Noir, although it is probably too conventionally executed and arrives a bit too late to be considered a part of the Noir cycle.

The plot is promising enough. At the San Quentin Federal Penitentiary, convict Vince Ryker (Vince Edwards) and a fellow inmate make an escape after stabbing a physician and stealing an ambulance. Upon his escape, Ryker grabs a metal container that he believes contains a large and valuable amount of heroin. In disguise and with a different car, Ryker approaches Los Angeles in hopes of selling the drugs. The police know that Ryker is in the city  he has killed his fellow escapee and the body has been discovered.

Chief Jensen (Lyle Talbot) and Lt. Mark Richards (John Archer) consult with Dr. John Wallace (Steven Ritch) about the stolen materials in the criminal’s possession. In a surprising revelation, Wallace identifies it as Cobalt 60 a deadly radioactive material that slowly poisons those who are exposed for long periods to the container, and that if the container were to be opened, thousands in the Los Angeles may die.

Film Noir Friday: Force of Evil [1948]

Welcome!  The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open! Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat.

Tonight’s feature is FORCE OF EVIL, starring John Garfield, Marie Windsor, and Beatrice Pearson. Enjoy the movie!

TCM says:

Joe Morse, an attorney for racketeer Ben Tucker, realizes that thousands of people select the number “776” in the lotteries on Independence day and conceives of a clever scheme to fix that as the winning number on the Fourth of July, thus bankrupting the numerous numbers banks operating in the city and enabling Tucker to gain a stranglehold on the racket. Joe is motivated by Tucker’s promise to consolidate the new syndicate under his brother Leo’s small-time numbers operation.

NOTE: Per YouTube, portions of this film are blocked due to copyright issues in some countries.

Film Noir Friday: Nancy Drew, Detective [1938]

Welcome!  The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open! Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat.

Tonight’s feature is NANCY DREW, DETECTIVE. Sometimes I need some good old-fashioned escapism, and this movie fits the bill. I fancied myself a girl detective back in the day. Honestly, I still have detective aspirations.

TCM says:

Wealthy, elderly Mary Eldredge plans to donate a large sum of money to her alma mater, the Brinwood School for Girls, at which teenager Nancy Drew is a student. She arranges to deliver the check to lawyer Carson Drew, Nancy’s father, at his office the following day, but she does not appear. Hollister, Miss Eldredge’s business manager, explains that she left town suddenly. Nancy, who does not believe that Miss Eldredge would act that way, determines to discover what happened.

Enjoy the movie!

Film Noir Friday: Convicted Woman [1940]

Welcome!  The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open! Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat.

Tonight’s feature is CONVICTED WOMAN starring, Rochelle Hudson, Frieda Inescort, June Lang, Lola Lane, Glenn Ford, and Iris Meredith.

TCM says:

Jobless Betty Andrews is arrested in a department store and wrongfully accused of theft. Although Mary Ellis, a prominent attorney and social worker, comes to Betty’s defense, she is unable to overcome the circumstantial evidence and Betty is sentenced to one year in the Curtiss Home of Correction. At the reformatory, Betty discovers that chief matron Miss Brackett rules with an iron hand, and that she is aided by inmates “The Duchess,” Frankie Mason, Nita Lavore and other stooges.

Enjoy the movie!

Film Noir Friday: The Letter [1929 & 1940]

Welcome!  The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open! Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat.

Tonight we’re going to take a deep dive into two movies based a story by W. Somerset Maugham. An actual murder in Kuala Lumpur in 1911, inspired Maugham to write THE LETTER. If you are interested in the crime that provided the inspiration, search for Ethel Proudlock.

First, we’ll check out Eddie Muller’s (the Czar of Noir), introduction to the 1940 version of the film for TCM’s Noir Alley.

The 1940 version stars Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall (who appeared in the 1929 version in the role of the lover). Directed by William Wyler, the movie opens with an unforgettable scene. The tension never lets up.

TCM says:

Leslie Crosbie, the wife of a British rubber planter in Malay, shoots and kills Jeff Hammond, and claims that she was defending her honor. To defend Leslie, her husband Robert sends for family friend and attorney Howard Joyce, who questions Leslie’s story.

The 1929 version of THE LETTER, stars Jeanne Eagels and Herbert Marshall. Jeanne Eagels’ life was tragically cut short by drug addiction. She was nominated posthumously for her work in THE LETTER.

TCM says:

Marooned on a rubber plantation in the East Indies, Leslie Crosbie turns to Geoffrey Hammond for the love and diversion that she does not find with her husband.

Film Noir Friday: Born to Kill [1947]

Welcome!  The lobby of the Deranged L.A. Crimes theater is open! Grab a bucket of popcorn, some Milk Duds and a Coke and find a seat. Tonight’s feature is BORN TO KILL, starring Claire Trevor, Lawrence Tierney, and Walter Slezak.

TCM says:

After he discovers that Laury Palmer, the owner of a Reno boardinghouse, was romancing him only to make her boyfriend Danny jealous, Sam Wilde, a seductive but violent drifter, kills both her and Danny. Cool, sophisticated Helen Brent finds the bodies in the boardinghouse, where she has been living during her divorce proceedings, but instead of notifying the police, she calmly boards the next train to San Francisco. 

Enjoy the movie!