Classic Films in Focus: THE DARK CORNER (1946)

Henry Hathaway directed the very solid Fox noir, The Dark Corner (1946), which features genre standouts like Mark Stevens, William Bendix, and Clifton Webb, but most viewers will be drawn to the picture for Lucille Ball, an actress not normally known for noir roles but perfectly at home as the loyal heroine of this romantic detective mystery. The love story between the private eye and his secretary lightens the overall mood in a tale of betrayal, deception, and revenge, but we get plenty of hard-boiled action thanks to Stevens' scenes with Bendix, who knows how to make the most of a tough guy role. With plenty of double crosses and twists to keep the audience guessing, The Dark Corner has everything a noir fan could want, even if it doesn't spin as nasty a plot as some of the genre's darkest gems.

Mark Stevens stars as private detective Bradford Galt, who's trying to rebuild his life after a frame job by a crooked former partner in San Fransisco stuck him with a two year prison sentence. He's making good progress with his new office and his attractive secretary, Kathleen (Lucille Ball), at least until it looks like his old foe, Jardine (Kurt Kreuger), is back to torment him again. Galt's efforts to to learn the truth about his latest string of bad luck set him on the trail of Jardine, a shady henchman (William Bendix), and a wealthy art collector named Hardy Cathcart (Clifton Webb), whose beautiful wife is Jardine's latest conquest.

Stevens is well cast in the detective role, which requires him to shift between hard-boiled violence and budding romance with Ball. His good looks and jawline make him an attractive leading man, and he's equally capable of making eyes at his leading lady and throwing punches at his male costars. Ball, of course, already has that star power about her, and her Kathleen quickly emerges as a very compelling character, practical but good-hearted, and smart enough to be the detective herself. Too often noir detectives ignore Kathleen's type in favor of smoky-eyed femme fatales, but luckily for Kathleen she doesn't have any competition in that department. It's always fascinating to see Lucille Ball in her roles before TV stardom made her an icon; we think of her now as a goofy comedian, but she can be glamorous and serious when the role allows.

The supporting players spread out our attention between them fairly evenly, partly in order to keep us guessing about their motives and relationship to Galt's predicament. Kurt Kreuger is suitably smooth as the blackmailing serial adulterer who makes wealthy married women pay for falling in love with him, and Clifton Webb oozes his trademark sinister charm as the art lover who has acquired a much younger and very alluring wife. Cathcart's obsession with his wife, Mari (Cathy Downs), recalls that of Robert Browning's speaker in "My Last Duchess," particularly when we see him pull back a curtain to reveal a portrait whose subject looks remarkably like her. If Mari read more poetry she might know better than to tempt Cathcart's jealous wrath. Bendix enjoys a little more screen time than his fellow cast members because he handles the dirty work of persecuting Galt, but he's so good as a heavy that the audience can't complain. Reed Hadley drifts into the picture for a few scenes as policeman Frank Reeves, a local cop who wants to make sure Galt sticks to the straight and narrow path of legality after his prison stint.

If you like Lucille Ball in The Dark Corner, be sure to see her in Lured (1947), in which she plays a dancer who turns detective to help Scotland Yard catch a serial killer. Mark Stevens' other noir films include The Street with No Name (1948), Between Midnight and Dawn (1950), The Big Frame (1952), and Time Table (1956). William Bendix earned an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Wake Island (1942), but be sure to see him in Lifeboat (1944), The Blue Dahlia (1946), and, for contrast, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1949). Don't miss the scene-stealing Clifton Webb in Laura (1944), The Razor's Edge (1946), Sitting Pretty (1948), and Cheaper by the Dozen (1950). Henry Hathaway was primarily a director of Westerns, but his other notable noir films include Kiss of Death (1947), Call Northside 777 (1948), and the outstanding Marilyn Monroe noir, Niagara (1953).

Classic Films in Focus: KISS OF DEATH (1947)

Henry Hathaway’s 1947 Fox film noir has much to recommend it, but Kiss of Death is most notable as the shocking debut of Richard Widmark, whose performance as the picture’s chief villain is so gripping that it scored the Hollywood newcomer an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Widmark’s giggling psychopath, Tommy Udo, ranks among the genre’s greatest heavies, but beyond his scenes of sadistic humor Kiss of Death is a surprisingly domestic noir, with Victor Mature as a hard luck case who really just wants to enjoy a normal life with his wife and kids. With no femme fatale in sight and a plot that prefigures key elements of Cape Fear (1962), Kiss of Death is a worthwhile picture that avoids many, if not all, of noir’s cliches while still existing well within its boundaries.

Victor Mature plays Nick Bianco, an ex-con who returns to crime because his prison record keeps him from getting a regular job. When he’s convicted for a jewelry heist, Nick refuses to cooperate with assistant district attorney D’Angelo (Brian Donlevy) because he believes his organization will look after his family, but in prison he learns that his wife has committed suicide and his two little girls have been sent to an orphanage. Nick provides information about his former cronies and manages to rebuild his life with new wife Nettie (Coleen Gray), but his testimony against the murderous Tommy Udo (Widmark) places his entire family in terrible danger.

Like Robert Mitchum, Victor Mature has a face made for noir; his heavy brow and full lips are more striking than handsome, but the shadowy cinematography of the genre plays perfectly across his features. His Nick is a lifelong loser, a product of the underbelly whose own father was shot in the street by the cops, but he still longs for working class respectability. We don’t need D’Angelo’s frequently repeated assurances to know that Nick is really a good guy who deserves as many chances as it takes to turn his life around. One thing that sets Kiss of Death apart from other noir films is the depiction of the protagonist as a devoted and loving father; children are rare in noir’s dark world, but here the two young daughters drive Nick’s actions, both good and bad. He is attracted to Nettie not only because she is young and beautiful but because she loves his children and will be a good mother to them, better even than their real mother, an adulterous alcoholic who abandoned the girls by killing herself. Once Nick has Nettie, his children, and the honest life he always yearned for, he will do anything to protect them, even if that means taking on Tommy Udo all by himself.

Widmark’s gleefully insane killer functions as Nick’s polar opposite; here is a man who desires only power and status at any cost. Tommy initially likes Nick because he perceives him as a “big man,” but Nick has no taste for Tommy’s violent pleasures. Widmark invests his character with a hyper energy that frequently erupts into his trademark giggle, a sound more chilling than most villains’ deepest growls. As a grinning psychopath who relishes his victims’ fear, Tommy clearly gets a thrill out of murdering an old woman by pushing her down a flight of stairs, but he also delights in the notoriety his crimes bring him. When he threatens Nick’s wife and kids, he doesn’t have to spell out the perverse nature of his intentions; we understand the horrific implications of Tommy’s idea of “fun.” The influence of Widmark’s performance can be seen in later deranged killers from Robert Mitchum’s Max Cady in Cape Fear (1962) to Heath Ledger’s version of The Joker in The Dark Knight (2008), but it also informed Widmark’s own career, leading him to play similar types in The Street with No Name (1948) and Road House (1948). Even noir aficionados who find fault with Kiss of Death overall acknowledge the brilliance of Widmark’s turn as Tommy Udo and rank him not only as one of noir’s great villains, but one of film’s most chilling psychopathic characters.

Keep an eye out for Karl Malden in a small supporting role as one of the cops working with the district attorney, and be sure to appreciate the lovely Coleen Gray as Nettie. For more of Richard Widmark’s best films, see classic noir like Night and the City (1950) and Pickup on South Street (1953) as well as the Westerns Yellow Sky (1948), Broken Lance (1954), and Warlock (1959). Victor Mature stars in I Wake Up Screaming (1941), My Darling Clementine (1946), and Samson and Delilah (1949). You’ll find Coleen Gray in Nightmare Alley (1947), Red River (1948), and Kansas City Confidential (1952). Henry Hathaway’s other noir films include The Dark Corner (1946), Call Northside 777 (1948), and Niagara (1953), but he is probably best remembered today for True Grit (1969).

Classic Films in Focus: NIAGARA (1953)

Although she is better remembered for comedy roles like Sugar Kane in Some Like It Hot (1959), Marilyn Monroe got her first big break in a noir picture, The Asphalt Jungle (1950). Niagara, a color noir thriller from director Henry Hathaway, was released in 1953, the same year as both Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and How to Marry a Millionaire, but the Marilyn we meet in Niagara is quite a different gal from Lorelei Lee. Though not an essential example of the noir style, Niagara is an exciting film that pulses with sexual energy, and it puts Marilyn to good use in the role of a murderously unfaithful femme fatale.

Our story takes place in and around Niagara Falls, where a young married couple, Ray (Max Showalter) and Polly (Jean Peters), are finally enjoying a long postponed honeymoon, thanks to Ray's winning idea for the shredded wheat company where he works. At the cabins they meet another couple, Rose (Monroe) and George (Joseph Cotten), whose marriage appears far less happy. In fact, Polly soon discovers that Rose has another man in her life, while George appears to be coming unglued at the seams. When George turns up missing, everyone assumes it was suicide, but Polly, always in the wrong place at the wrong time, finds herself drawn into the deeper and far deadlier truth.

All of the major parts are well played, with Joseph Cotten edgy and worn as the understandably troubled George, and Max Showalter (credited as Casey Adams) blissfully and benignly stupid as Ray. The real action of the film belongs to Polly and Rose, however, with Peters and Monroe making perfect foils to one another. As Rose, Monroe comes across as cheap and scheming but certainly not dumb, even though she uses other people's assumptions about her to her own advantage. Both Rose and Polly are far more intelligent than any of the men around them, and the film's focus on its women makes Niagara an interesting noir choice for female viewers. Rose is very much a classic femme fatale, but Polly is more complex; Monroe might be the flashier figure, but Polly is the film's real protagonist, and Peters plays her beautifully. We only wonder why she is married to a dolt like Ray, who never listens to his wife and patronizes her with excruciating self-assurance as Polly tries to explain her suspicions about George and Rose.

The falls themselves function as another major character in Niagara. Hathaway and cinematographer Joseph MacDonald present the rushing water as the ultimate metaphor for unbridled passion, with almost all of the key scenes involving the falls or the river.  The characters spend a lot of the movie in bright rain slickers, climbing slippery catwalks, cruising on The Maid of the Mist, and wandering through the sights. It would be a great tourism advertisement if it weren't for all the homicide.

Technicolor noir is condemned as antithetical to the style by some purists, but Niagara successfully puts its palette to work in the service of its themes, and Marilyn certainly looks more interesting in color. If you enjoy Niagara, you can see more of Marilyn in film noir in The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and Clash By Night (1952). For more from Jean Peters, try Pickup on South Street (1953) and A Blueprint for Murder (1953). Look for Joseph Cotten in Citizen Kane (1941), Shadow of a Doubt (1943), and The Third Man (1949).

An earlier version of this review originally appeared on Examiner.com. The author retains all rights to this content.