O innocent victims of Cupid, Remember this terse little verse: To let a fool kiss you is stupid, To let a kiss fool you is worse.
Fine photography here by Musuraca. If you want a splendid example of "low key lighting" check out the scene in which Greer and Mitchum have their first serious conversation at night on the Acapulco beach, her face in shadow, but still her expressions discernible, her hair backlighted and its curls edged with a kind of mellow glow. His face more sharply defined, starkly creased with black and highlights. The rest of the film lives up to that scene, although it is notably lacking in day-lit shots of wide-open spaces. (There's really only one, in a death scene that takes place on a tumultuous river.)
Tourneur's direction is efficient. He moves the figures around evocatively, from Tahoe to San Francisco to Los Angeles to small towns in the Sierras. There are two "sex scenes" that he has to deal with. In the first, which occurs after the beach conversation, there is a conventional cut from a kiss to the surf rolling onto the sand. But in the second, when the lovers run into "her place" for the first time, they are wet from the rain. Mitchum dries her hair by rubbing it harshly then tosses the towel onto the "one light burning in the place," the lamp tumbles to the floor, the door is blown open by the wind, and there is a cut to the torrential downpour on the tropical plants outside. A tour de force of symbolic imagery. Did he laugh while planning it?
And that, I fear, is about it for me. I know it's considered a classic example of film noir, and it makes me wonder about why film noir is so highly regarded. Greer, of course, is a beautiful woman, which is nice, and as competent a performer as Mitchum. Except that Mitchum couldn't be described as beautiful. The icons are here -- trench coat, speeding cars, florid dialog, short-barreled black revolvers, hotels in the big city, lots of makeup, fedora hats, neon signs. Kirk Douglas is the most interesting actor. He oozes more insincerity than anyone else in the film, which is saying a lot since absolutely nobody is totally believable.
But I've seen this movie about three times over the course of the past decade and simply can't get with it. Mitchum seems tough but dumb. Nobody else is sympathetic. The plot line is twisted, hard to follow, and equally hard to believe. I found myself hoping Mitchum would wind up with the "nice girl" at the end, but didn't really care much. It wasn't really tragic when Mitchum and Greer are speeding along the dark road, Greer sees the roadblock, sneers "You dirty stinking rat," and plugs him during the struggle. I kept wondering while watching it, why I found myself comparing it to "The Maltese Falcon" and finding it wanting. I couldn't figure it out, really. It seemed disjointed and dull.
That's not to say it's trash. There is, after all, the photography and the direction, plus Douglas at his phoniest, in only his second movie. And it's also worth seeing for historical reasons. Everybody says it's a classic example of film noir, so see it and make your own judgment.
Fine photography here by Musuraca. If you want a splendid example of "low key lighting" check out the scene in which Greer and Mitchum have their first serious conversation at night on the Acapulco beach, her face in shadow, but still her expressions discernible, her hair backlighted and its curls edged with a kind of mellow glow. His face more sharply defined, starkly creased with black and highlights. The rest of the film lives up to that scene, although it is notably lacking in day-lit shots of wide-open spaces. (There's really only one, in a death scene that takes place on a tumultuous river.)
Tourneur's direction is efficient. He moves the figures around evocatively, from Tahoe to San Francisco to Los Angeles to small towns in the Sierras. There are two "sex scenes" that he has to deal with. In the first, which occurs after the beach conversation, there is a conventional cut from a kiss to the surf rolling onto the sand. But in the second, when the lovers run into "her place" for the first time, they are wet from the rain. Mitchum dries her hair by rubbing it harshly then tosses the towel onto the "one light burning in the place," the lamp tumbles to the floor, the door is blown open by the wind, and there is a cut to the torrential downpour on the tropical plants outside. A tour de force of symbolic imagery. Did he laugh while planning it?
And that, I fear, is about it for me. I know it's considered a classic example of film noir, and it makes me wonder about why film noir is so highly regarded. Greer, of course, is a beautiful woman, which is nice, and as competent a performer as Mitchum. Except that Mitchum couldn't be described as beautiful. The icons are here -- trench coat, speeding cars, florid dialog, short-barreled black revolvers, hotels in the big city, lots of makeup, fedora hats, neon signs. Kirk Douglas is the most interesting actor. He oozes more insincerity than anyone else in the film, which is saying a lot since absolutely nobody is totally believable.
But I've seen this movie about three times over the course of the past decade and simply can't get with it. Mitchum seems tough but dumb. Nobody else is sympathetic. The plot line is twisted, hard to follow, and equally hard to believe. I found myself hoping Mitchum would wind up with the "nice girl" at the end, but didn't really care much. It wasn't really tragic when Mitchum and Greer are speeding along the dark road, Greer sees the roadblock, sneers "You dirty stinking rat," and plugs him during the struggle. I kept wondering while watching it, why I found myself comparing it to "The Maltese Falcon" and finding it wanting. I couldn't figure it out, really. It seemed disjointed and dull.
That's not to say it's trash. There is, after all, the photography and the direction, plus Douglas at his phoniest, in only his second movie. And it's also worth seeing for historical reasons. Everybody says it's a classic example of film noir, so see it and make your own judgment.