COLUMBIA NOIR: THE LINEUP/PUSHOVER/THE BURGLAR

This is the third and final collective review of the Criterion Channel’s bundling of several films under the “Columbia Noir” tag--multiple examples of 1940s and ’50s crime pictures released by the Columbia studio. These films are only on the streaming service through the end of this month, so you’ll want to squeeze the good ones in fast. Here is my first selection, and here my second.

The Lineup: Stirling Silliphant sits behind the typewriter again, just as he did for Columbia on Nightfall in 1957. The Lineup came a year later, and was directed by tough-guy director Don Siegel, known for Riot in Cell Block 11 [review], the 1964 version of The Killers, and perhaps most famously Dirty Harry [review]. Like that Clint Eastwood vehicle, The Lineup takes place in San Francisco. The film is a dual procedural, focusing one side on the cops investigating a drug smuggling scheme, and on the other, the two hired killers collecting the heroin from unsuspecting mules who have had the contraband hidden in their souvenirs from foreign countries.

It’s this more salacious side that dominates The Lineup, mostly due to the razor-sharp, unsettling performance by Eli Wallace (The Misfits [review]). He plays Dancer, a cold-blooded fixer with a singular drive. Robert Keith (Written on the Wind [review]) works alongside him as Julian, the mentor and handler for Dancer. Together they thug their way through the Bay Area, picking up the smuggled packages and leaving a trail of dead bodies behind them. Wallach delivers a perfectly modulated performance, lacing Dancer’s precise actions and false pretenses with a callous indifference, the murderous impulse lingering just under the surface. It’s fantastic to watch, both riveting and menacing.

Siegel blends the drama with a more realistic shooting style, making a meal out of the San Francisco locales. This is especially noticeable in The Lineup’s climactic car chase, a crazy high-speed rush through the Presidio and beyond. It’s pretty exciting stuff, and closes the movie on a high note even while delivering the expected “crime doesn’t pay” messaging.

Pushover: Another Richard Quine effort (see previous review of Drive a Crooked Road), 1954’s Pushover begins by pinching its slugline from Double Indemnity, even going so far as to borrow one of its stars, before taking off in its own direction.

Indemnity’s Fred MacMurray shows up in Pushover as Paul Sheridan, a police detective who finds himself taken in by the femme fatale he’s been tasked to case. It’s no wonder, since Lona is played by Kim Novak (Vertigo [review]), here making her screen debut--though at this point more an alluring beauty than a capable actress. Ready to toss all caution and scruples to the wind for Lona, Paul attempts to discombobulate his own stakeout, leading to one colleague ending up dead and the other suspicious.

The screenplay by Roy Huggins, the writer behind the TV series The Fugitive, makes clever use of the limited cast and confined locations that a stakeout requires. Three cops: two in an apartment across the way from Lona’s and one in a car down on the street. In addition to Paul, there is Rick (Philip Carey, Mr. Roberts), a straight arrow, and Paddy (Allen Nourse, Odds Against Tomorrow), an older cop with a drinking problem, one step away from retirement but one stumble from losing his pension. Add to this dynamic whatever complications you can think of, but also factor in Rick developing a crush on Lona’s pretty neighbor (Dorothy Malone, perhaps most memorable as the sexy bookseller in The Big Sleep [review]). There are many collision courses of human behavior just waiting to explode.

Quine brings all the requisite shadowy cynicism to Pushover. It’s not quite as dark as Double Indemnity, but it’s fueled by a similar disappointment in the social contract. The plot is smart, but the dialogue isn’t very sharp, depriving Pushover of the sort of snappiness that could have nudged it into being a classic. That said, it’s still damn enjoyable, and worth it to see just how far MacMurray’s Paul will go to get the blonde.

The Burglar:  Though I have no memory of it, turns out I reviewed The Burglar back in 2014 and back then wasn’t impressed by its ragged style the way I was when watching it today. Notes I made during this viewing:

* jumpy editing, keeps a fast pace by cutting out connective tissue
* emotional extremities, psychological framing, the whole film has a feverish impatience spawned both from the pressure of guilt and sexual tension
* Duryea as a sweaty, repressed mess brings it all together. His restraint is juxtaposed by his henchman’s uncontrollable urges. The assault on Jayne Mansfield’s character is rough even now, but especially for 1957
* Police feel like they are in a different movie. The lackadaisical detective has more in common with Steven Geray in Columbia’s So Dark the Night [review]

Some of these thoughts are echoed in the longer piece, and though I’d be inclined to give The Burglar 3 stars instead of 2 nowadays, the rest of what I had to say still rings true. Read it for yourself:

The 1957 film noir The Burglar is the kind of film that I'm almost compelled to embrace and champion as a lost curiosity. Directed by Paul Wendkos, who went on from here to direct a ton of television, and adapted by David Goodis (Dark Passage) from his own novel, The Burglar is a bizarre, almost impressionistic take on the usual small-time heist drama. I say almost, as you'd be hard-pressed to make a case for its disjointed quirks being intentional. When it comes down to it, The Burglar is a bit of a mess.

Dan Duryea leads the low-rent vehicle as Nat, an equally low-rent crook who spies a wealthy woman's jeweled necklace in a newsreel. He and his crew track the lady down, and they send Gladden (Jayne Mansfield) to case her place. Once they know where the necklace is located and the lady's routines, the two other robbers (Peter Capell and Mickey Shaughnessy) stand on lookout while Nat climbs into the second-story window and cracks the woman's bedroom safe. Despite a narrow brush with the cops, the theft comes off. The high-profile target brings the heat, however, and Nat insists they lay low and wait to fence the ice until it's cooled off.

It's a smart plan, but a hard one to execute, particularly as the bad guys all start to go stir crazy rather quickly. Baylock (Capell) is wanted on other charges and is eager to get out of the country; Dohmer (Shaughnessy) is a mouth-breathing dope who can't keep his eyes--or hands--off of Gladden. Nat is protective of the girl, so he sends her away to Atlantic City to wait it out there. She ends up cavorting on the beach in her bikini (because, you know, she's Jayne Mansfield) and hooking up with a new fella (Stewart Bradley). Nat also winds up meeting a new lady, a tough gal on the make (Martha Vickers). As it turns out, neither of these lovers found each other by accident, and Nat and the boys have to race against the clock and dodge police barricades to get to Jersey before the whole plan goes kablooey.

If you think that sounds like a lot of story, well, it's actually kind of not. The Burglar has a rather small plot when it comes down to it, and Wendkos and crew spend a lot of time hanging around, mulling over the minor story points, repeating scenes and arguments until it's time to move on to the next set-up. It's all rather bizarre. Wendkos shares co-editing credit with Herta Horn, who apparently worked on no other movie before or after The Burglar. Together they whack at the narrative with what one would guess is a meat cleaver and gardening shears. The story jumps from scene to scene, often leaving out crucial connective details, though there is cause to wonder if they were ever there to begin with. A few sequences at the flophouse double up on each other, arguments between the batty burglars repeating as if it's the first time any of them had the same thought. Other story elements make little sense. Nat's sudden ability to roam the city, for instance, making it easy for his would-be girlfriend to find him even as the cops seem to have no clue as to where to look, while Baylock and Dohmer remain under house arrest, is an act of narrative convenience with no grounding in reality.

Yet, for as clumsy and ham-fisted as The Burglar can be, there are also daffy bravura moments, particularly in terms of visual approach. Cinematographer Don Malkames has a vivacious, unhinged filming style, developed as the cameraman on multiple musical revues, capturing live R&B and rock-and-roll. He is a master of artfully composed frames, preferring extreme angles and odd points of view. It's often hard to predict where his camera will end up. When Nat sends Gladden away, Malkames shoots from the ceiling, almost as if we were looking at footage from a security camera. In other sequences, he prefers odd perspectives--sitting in the driver's seat inside a car, peering out from the empty safe as the unsuspecting victim paces back and forth, taking a punch directly to the face. While the mis-en-scene doesn't always line up, it almost doesn't matter. Malkames has a command of both the beautiful and the grotesque.

Unfortunately, that's not enough to recommend The Burglar outright. The film was such a creative flop, it reportedly sat on the shelf for two years until Columbia saw an opportunity to capitalize on Mansfield's burgeoning fame. (Pete Kelly's Blues [review] was shot just before The Burglar , and 1957 also saw the release of Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? and Kiss Them For Me.) Mansfield is certainly beautiful here, though her looks are played down in comparison to the bombshell image that was being cultivated for her. Her acting chops are less impressive. Only Duryea is on point, finding a solid footing for his tough-guy character despite the imbalanced production. By the end, he looks about as confused as the rest of us.

RIOT IN CELL BLOCK 11 - #704

Don Siegel's Riot in Cell Block 11 is an interesting motion picture: seemingly simplistic exploitation that reveals itself to be a multi-faceted debate about crime and punishment that sneaks its message in by baldly adhering to the production code even as it pokes holes in every single one of the censors' anti-noir, "crime doesn't pay" strictures. Like 12 Angry Men [review] set inside a penitentiary, it offers a group of differing personalities brought together by a common goal. How to achieve it is something they will never agree on, even as the audience accepts certain outcomes as a foregone conclusion. The aim here is to use story to stir up all these ideas, to inspire different thinking, and to maybe vilify, if not an individual, then the system he represents. 

This is not a plot-heavy movie. Riot in Cell Block 11 does not hinge on a clever scheme or a last-act twist that reveals the ringleader had a different, selfish reason for leading the revolt all along. On the contrary, this is a movie that stays the course. Dunn (Neville Brand, Stalag 17) organizes the breakout with the other maximum-security prisoners because he believes change is necessary--the inmates, for instance, want mail and other pipelines to the outside world--and he doesn't waiver from the stated intention. The drama comes from how much his fellow prisoners agree with his methods, the bureaucratic reaction to what's going on, and how that tests Dunn's resolve and changes what he's willing to do to achieve the desired results.

The ruling counterpart to Dunn is the warden (Emile Meyer, Paths of Glory [review]), a good man strangled by budgets and regulations. He knows he could do better if  given more resources, but once the uprising occurs, his mission is to defuse the situation with as few casualties as possible. And nothing will dissuade him from his task, either. Of anyone, he's the most determined to avoid easy solutions if doing so ensures getting the right one. The deathblow for idealism may come at the end when it's revealed how much he really believes will happen in the aftermath--reality is a harsh beast--but  even then, did he not save lives all the same?

Siegel and writer Richard Collins stack their ensemble with counterpoints and opposites. The warden has Haskell (Frank Faylen, the dad on the The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis), a pencil-pusher sent by the mayor to mind the optics and watch the bottom line. He also has the wives of the guards taken hostage serving as his conscience, calling over the telephone to remind him what’s at stake, and a gaggle of reporters serving as Greek chorus, presenting the difficult truths fueling the conflict as so much exposition. On the other side, Dunn has Carnie (Leo Gordon, Buckskin), the muscle who would rather bust heads than negotiate, and the Colonel (Robert Osterloh, The Wild One [review]), an actual war veteran, put in prison through bad circumstance, who can see the outcome of this battle and doesn't care for the strategy or the eventual cost. Through these many voices, we surpass the surface conflict and delve deep into the more difficult nuance of the disagreement. This is about human dignity vs. public image, budget vs. empathy, and maybe kind of about how these guys did bad things even though maybe that shouldn’t matter when talking about their civil rights.

As sophisticated as it may sound, Riot in Cell Block 11 is a ragged B-movie. Siegel begins the picture as a docudrama, complete with newsreel narration, aided by the stark photography of Russell Harlan (Red River). This drops once the riot begins, and Siegel shifts into stoic melodrama. From the sob stories of the inmates--the prisoner with the sick child, the Colonel’s tale of vehicular manslaughter--to the exaggerated villainy of Haskell or Carnie’s mad-dog machinations, Riot in Cell Block 11 is pure pulp. It’s hard to tell if its social conscience is a cloak it wears to get away with showing violent beatings or if the lurid conflict is the capitulation to box office concerns. Both elements weigh equally in the final cut. Statistics may be shoehorned in by the gabby press men, but they are there all the same.

Plus, even if we excise the social message, there is a morality play at the heart of all this. Siegel is looking at how communities function, how the have-nots feel beaten down by the haves, as well as how those same communities fall apart. 1950s politics being what they are, Dunn’s all-for-one speechifying seems a little suspect. While he wants all prisoners to be treated equally, it doesn’t take long before his lieutenants abuse the system he puts in place, or for others to push harder to earn their own advantage. Little is made of race, despite the integrated population; the only hint of any kind of class comes more from an ethical hierarchy. One prisoner is singled out by all others, black or white, as being beneath contempt, and though they don’t say it outright, the coded language suggests he’s some kind of sex offender. 

To be honest, Riot in Cell Block 11 could have used a little more of that inside knowledge to show how the prison really operates. The inmates are all a little too clean-cut. When picking his players, Siegel cast interesting faces, but these are still Hollywood hooligans. Neville Brand is tough without really being threatening. The lack of backstory makes his high-minded intentions seem a little forced. We have no reason to believe Dunn would have really emerged over any of the others as the man with the plan.

Still, Siegel’s production is a lot less earnest than many of the other message pictures of the era, giving it an edge over even work by Elia Kazan or Stanley Kramer. This must have felt like pretty rough stuff right about then, and its more lowbrow tendencies allow for Riot in Cell Block 11 to remain entertaining, even as its still-relevant preachiness threatens to bog it all down. Not to mention the downbeat revelations in the final scene, which all by themselves remind us that very little has changed, and America’s capitalist approach to incarceration just continues to get worse.

SIDELINE: MORE REVIEWS FOR 8/12

My reviews of non-Criterion movies from August.

IN THEATRES...

* 2 Days in New York, the new one from Julie Delpy. Really, if I were Chris Rock, I'd have tapped out after 12 hours.

* The Bourne Legacy, the underprivileged stepchild of the Bourne series still manages to be enjoyable despite some deficiencies.

* The Campaign, the Will Ferrell/Zach Galifianakis comedy is best at insult humor, not so much at political satire.

* Celeste and Jesse Forever, an almost-there down-to-earth rom-com, co-written by and starring Rashida Jones. I love her, but the script loses focus and eventually lost me.

* Dark Horse, Todd Solondz hates comedy almost as much as he hates you. And fat people. And everyyyyyyyyonnnnne!

* Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai, Miike remakes Kobayashi in 3D, but without any other added dimension.

* The Imposter, a twisted true crime documentary about a story that's so out there, you almost won't believe it.

* Killer Joe, a depraved new scorcher from William Friedkin, starring Matthew McConaughey his most finger-lickin' good role.

* Lawless, Nick Cave writes, John Hillcoat directs, and Tom Hardy stars. Mm-hmm.

* Oslo, August 31, a heartfelt new personal drama from the director of Reprise.

* Paranorman, the second effort from Laika suffers from some growing pains. Great animation, but an overly wordy script.

* Searching for Sugar Man, an amazing music documentary uncovering the secret history of the artist known as Rodriguez.

* Sleepwalk with Me, in which Mike Birbiglia tries to make friends and influence them to understand his problems.

ON BD/DVD...

* The Devil's Needle, and other Tales of Vice and Redemption, three silent films tackling the worst of Amercia's sins, ca. 1915.

* Fernando Di Leo's Madness, starring Joe Dallesandro as a human 2x4. It's neither mad nor is it any good. Discuss.

* Looney Tunes Mouse Chronicles: The Chuck Jones Collection, gathering the director's Sniffles and Hubie & Bertie cartoons under one cover.

* Misfits: Season One, a clever superpowers show from England.

* Monsieur Lazhar, a surprising example of quality feel-good cinema, adding a nice spin to the inspirational teacher genre.

* Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, an astonishing remodel of the police drama as existential parable. From Nuri Bilge Ceylan, the director of Climates. Best movie of this whole batch!

* Private Hell 36, a tightly wound noir with Ida Lupino. Directed by Don Siegel.

* Les Vampires, the 1915 silent crime serial from Louis Feuillade.

THE BLOB - #91

In all honesty, I don't know what to think of The Blob. Just how seriously am I supposed to take the 1958 sci-fi horror teensploitation flick? Sure, by today's standards, it seems campy, but that doesn't mean it wasn't made with absolute earnestness. The Burt Bacharach-penned title song might make it seem like it's all supposed to be a goof, but then again, Paramount commissioned the tune to be a soft opening so that audiences wouldn't get creeped out too soon. I've read some theories that suggest that the Blob itself was meant to be a metaphor for communism, a creeping mass with a reddish hue that consumes everyone in its path, growing larger, erasing identities, and leaving no trace of the individuals it swallows. It also could be seen as 1950s conformity, and the teenagers who resist the alien monster are resisting assimilation into square culture.

Personally, I would lean more toward the Blob being adolescence itself, a quivering mess of hormones and lust, an icky and oily embodiment of teenage anxieties. It attacks the older generation first, leaving the juveniles to sound the alarm, but their twitchy slang makes it impossible to spread the word to an adult world that either can't or refuses to understand them.

That's what I'd likely say if I thought more of The Blob, but the truth is, I really don't think much of it at all. I like B-movies as much as the next guy, but The Blob is funnier in the abstract than it is in execution. I like that there is a silly movie like it out there, but I'm not necessarily all that eager to sit through it. As a horror movie, it's not that scary. It's a thriller without thrills, clumsily paced and poorly acted. Steve McQueen went on to better things from here, but he was nearly 30 when he made the movie and he's not very convincing as a teenager. His stuttering delivery is so overly method, even Stanislavski would blush. Put him in a red windbreaker and I'd believe he was parodying James Dean rather than delivering a legitimate performance.

The story here is simple: a meteor crashes in the mountains, and when it cracks open, a gelatinous substance emerges. It attaches itself to the old man who finds it, sticking to his hand. He runs from the site of impact in terror and nearly gets run over by Steve Andrews (McQueen) and his date for the evening, Jane Martin (Aneta Corsaut). They take him to the local doctor, but soon the substance takes over the old man's entire body before moving on to the doctor and his nurse, and then oozing into town, where it goes after all the tasty humans at the movie theatre, grocery store, and other places. Steve and Jane stand against it, alongside the few adults that believe them (notably, Lieutenant Dave of the local constabulary, played by Earl Rowe). Naturally, they succeed, as this isn't an apocalyptic picture, but I'll leave the how for you to discover, just in case you ever do watch The Blob. I'd rather not suck all the fun out of it--what little there is.

I'm a firm believer in B-movies as camouflage for more subversive cargo. I'm all for seeing sci-fi and horror as carrying greater social messages. In fact, all the theories above can also be applied to Don Siegel's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, made just two years later, and that movie has ribs the notions can stick to. I trust that Siegel was trying for something more meaningful with his flick, and it might just me being a snob, since Body Snatchers is so much better made than The Blob. There just isn't anything here that makes me think the producers wanted anything more than to try to pull in the kids and get them to empty their pockets, and that a big glop of Jell-O looked like the cheapest way to do it. This, too, would be fine, were that cheapness also fun or even remotely effective. I don't know how well the Blob worked back in the day, but I'm at a loss for how this featureless creature would freak anyone out. It never looks like it would be that hard to outrun. Then again, everything moves slow in The Blob. Just check that backwards drag race Steve and the guys get into. I could walk faster than they drive!

One of the more famous scenes in The Blob is when the monster invades the projection booth of the town movie theatre, snuffs out the projectionist, and then halts the midnight spook show everyone is watching before sending them running. It's meant to be self-reflexive, to make viewers wonder if maybe the theatre they are in is in danger. I find it self-reflexive in another way. The Blob certainly wouldn't be the last time a movie was built around a special effect, as if that alone was enough and story and other needless accoutrements could be left by the wayside. In these days of computer-generated high-concept celluloid, a metaphorical Blob fills up many a projection booth. In the long run, most of these movies will end up forgotten, and it baffles me why The Blob has managed to avoid the same fate. The Blob doesn't consume me with its chills, rather it just leaves me cold.