“A DARK YEAR AND A HARD NIGHT”

By Raymond Benson

From the directorial eye of Lewis Milestone (All Quiet on the Western Front) and a script by playwright Clifford Odets (plays Waiting for Lefty and Awake and Sing!) came the odd and mysterious adventure-spy picture, The General Died at Dawn. Released in 1936 by Paramount Pictures, the movie seems out of place for the time. Hollywood output in the thirties, for the most part, was all about entertainment and lifting an audience out of the doldrums of the Great Depression. There were some serious dramas from Tinsel Town, to be sure, but General is decidedly dark, moody, and rather cynical fare.

This was Odets’ first screenplay (from a story by Charles G. Booth). He would go on to write None but the Lonely Heart (1944) and Sweet Smell of Success (1957), which are also rather gloomy and acerbic pictures. Combined with Milestone’s own flare for peeling back the light and revealing what is, in protagonist O’Hara’s words, “a dark year and a hard night,” The General Died at Dawn is not feel-good material.

O’Hara (Gary Cooper) is an American mercenary in war-ravaged China. The evil warlord, General Yang (Akim Tamiroff) is overrunning the land and leaving behind starving (or dead) peasants. O’Hara works for the opposition, and his assignment is to deliver a beltful of money to Mr. Wu (Dudley Digges) so that the resistance can buy arms with which to fight Yang’s forces. Another American expat, Peter Perrie (Porter Hall), is ill and desires to get back to America at any cost. He’s in cahoots with Yang to stop the resistance from receiving those funds—for a price. Perrie thus orders his beautiful daughter, Judy (Madeleine Carroll) to seduce O’Hara and get him to take the train to Shanghai instead of a plane. It is there that Yang and his soldiers have set a trap for O’Hara. Other spies, both Chinese and Westerners played by the likes of Philip Ahn, J. M. Kerrigan, and William Frawley (!), enter the fray with motivations of their own.

What happens to the money and to the cast of motley characters provides a little over ninety minutes of action, adventure, and melodrama that doesn’t totally gel as one might wish. The plot is overly complex, and it isn’t often clear why some of the personnel do what they do. Granted, the movie was made in 1936 and the action takes place mostly within the interiors of train cars. There is certainly an awful lot of talking going on when at any point General Yang could have simply pulled out a gun and shot his nemesis or just torn open all the luggage to find the dough.

That said, this is Hollywood “exotica” in all its politically incorrect glory. Two actors—Armenian Tamiroff and Irishman Digges—wear Chinese makeup to play Yang and Wu (and Tamiroff received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor, the first year that category was offered). And yet, all the other Chinese characters are played by Asian actors. One supposes that because Yang and Wu were indeed supporting roles, then they had to be played by Westerners. (Sheesh.) But this was Hollywood in the 1930s, after all, and it was par for the course. For what it’s worth, Tamiroff is very good in the role.

Gary Cooper spends most of the movie carrying his pet monkey, Sam, who crawls all over Cooper as if the man was the primate’s long lost mother. It’s endearing, though, and Sam almost steals the movie. Nevertheless, Cooper exhibits the requisite hero qualities. He assuredly caused swooning among a certain selection of audience members. Carroll, who had recently made the move from the UK to Hollywood, holds her own, but the script unfortunately doesn’t fully develop her character.

Kino Lorber’s new Blu-ray restoration looks remarkably good, given the picture’s age and the Oscar-nominated soft focus black and white photography (by Victor Milner). There is an audio commentary by author/film historian Lee Gambin and actress/film historian Rutanya Alda that sheds some light on this dark picture. The only supplement is the theatrical trailer, nestled among other trailers from Kino.

The General Died at Dawn is for fans of 1930s Hollywood, adventure and spy thrillers, and the ever handsome Gary Cooper.

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“SMALL TOWN, BIG DRAMA”

By Raymond Benson

James Jones is mostly known for his debut novel, From Here to Eternity. His second novel, published in 1958, was Some Came Running, a 1,200-page potboiler that blows the lid off small town America. It was a more adult Peyton Place, if that was possible for the time. Colorful, sometimes sordid, characters populate the book, and it didn’t do as well as that classic first publication. Nevertheless, MGM immediately scooped it up and managed to turn it into a motion picture by the end of the same year.

Frank Sinatra found the material appealing, and he saw himself as the story’s lead, Dave Hirsh, a prodigal son of sorts from fictional Parkman, Indiana. Discharged from the army, Hirsh arrives in town with a hangover and a party girl he picked up in Chicago, Ginny Moorehead (Shirley MacLaine). His brother, Frank (Arthur Kennedy) is a big shot in Parkman. Frank owns a jewelry business and is on the board of one of the two rival banks. Dave and Frank have been estranged for years, especially since Frank put younger Dave in a boarding school when their parents died, instead of having Dave come live with him and his wife, Agnes (Leora Dana). Dave once fancied himself a writer and had published two books. While deep down he hopes to write again, his cynicism for just about everything keeps him from doing so. Dave meets Bama Dillert (Dean Martin) in the town bar, and they hit it off. Bama is an alcoholic, but he’s an amusing companion who, like Dave, likes to play poker games. Dave eventually meets and falls in love with the creative writing teacher at the school, Gwen French (Martha Hyer)—but Ginny, who has stayed in town to be near Dave, is a constant obstacle to that match. Other disreputable goings-on complicate the plot, such as Frank’s daughter (and Dave’s niece), Dawn (Betty Lou Keim), catching her father parked in the “lover’s lane” with the jewelry shop secretary, Edith (Nancy Gates). Will Dave find the love he wants and needs? Will the gangster from Chicago, who is in town to cause trouble for Ginny and Dave, resort to serious violence? Will Bama ever take off his hat, which he insists on wearing all the time, even in bed? You’ll have to see the film to find out.

That plot summary might sound like the outline of a soap opera, but never mind that—Some Came Running is a fascinating, searing, well-acted, and beautifully-directed drama. The director, Vincente Minnelli, was on a roll in 1958—he won the Academy Award for Director for Gigi (it won Best Picture, too), also directed The Reluctant Debutante, and ended the year with Some Came Running. For this reviewer’s money, Minnelli got the Oscar for the wrong film. Yes, Running is that good.

For one thing, Frank Sinatra has never been better, his Oscar-winning turn in From Here to Eternity notwithstanding. It’s shocking that, after receiving a nomination for his performance as a drug addict in The Man with the Golden Arm (1955), he was not up for Best Actor for Running. He commands every frame of film he’s in. Secondly, Dean Martin is terrific in one of his early “Dean Martin Persona” roles he fashioned for himself after the cinematic partnership with Jerry Lewis splintered. Finally, Shirley MacLaine is a delight as the not-so-bright, trampy, but good-natured Ginny—and she received her first Best Actress Oscar nomination for the performance. Kennedy and Hyer also both respectively received Supporting Actor and Actress Oscar nominations.

The movie is an insightful character study of lost souls reaching for a place called “happiness” by pretending that they’re already there. In many ways, the small town is a character, too, for it has the façade of Americana at its finest, and yet there are those pockets that exist in every town of skid row neighborhoods, seedy bars, loose women, and crime. It’s in the latter locations where Dave finds himself, no matter how much he aspires to be in the “respectable” parts of town life. Nevertheless, he knows, and the audience eventually learns, that there is one class of people in town who may be prosperous but are really phonies, and a lower class that is sleazy and yet sincere. What you see is what you get.

Some may find the dialogue and attitudes toward women—especially from Martin’s character, who calls all women “pigs”—to be sexist and even misogynistic. This, however, is part of the James Jones milieu, as well as a major aspect of the locale, the class structure, and the era in which the picture takes place. What the movie really has to say about women is far more significant and auspicious.

Warner Archive’s new Blu-ray release looks gorgeous in its vivid widescreen Technicolor. There’s not a blemish in sight. Supplements include an informative 20-minute documentary on the film’s history and making, and the theatrical trailer.

Some Came Running is an underrated, overlooked gem that should be re-evaluated. For fans of Sinatra, MacLaine, Martin, Minnelli, and James Jones. Highly recommended.

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“MURDER MYSTERY PARLOR GAME”

By Raymond Benson

The genius of Stephen Sondheim is usually reserved for the Broadway stage as the creator or co-creator of multiple award-winning and classic musicals (West Side Story, Gypsy, Company, Sweeney Todd, Sunday in the Park with George, etc.). The presence of Anthony Perkins is usually earmarked for screen and stage appearances as an actor (Psycho, Catch-22, Murder on the Orient Express, etc.). So, who would have thought that these two would team up to write a murder mystery screenplay—with no musical numbers within earshot—that would be filmed by director Herbert Ross, and then win an Edgar Allan Poe Award from Mystery Writers of America for the script?

The Last of Sheila, released in early summer 1973, seems to be a precursor to the series of Agatha Christie all-star-cast pictures that launched in the mid-70s (e.g., Murder on the Orient Express). It’s an original story, though, concocted by Sondheim and Perkins, allegedly inspired by real “scavenger hunt” party games that were thrown by their friends in those days. Starring (alphabetically) Richard Benjamin, Dyan Cannon, James Coburn, Joan Hackett, James Mason, Ian McShane, and Raquel Welch, the cast of seven is not as large as those Christie extravaganzas, but you get the idea. In a way, it is also an antecedent to the whodunnit, Knives Out (2019), which has a similar structure.

Movie producer Clinton (Coburn) is married to Sheila (Yvonne Romain in a cameo), who is killed by a hit-and-run driver after a late night party in Hollywood. A year later, Clinton invites six close friends to a week of sailing on his yacht in the Mediterranean. These include writer Tom (Benjamin), his wife Lee (Hackett), director Philip (Mason), casting agent Christine (Cannon), actress Alice (Welch), and her husband/manager Anthony (McShane). Clinton is a lover of parlor games, and he has concocted an elaborate murder-mystery-game in which the six contestants must compete as a condition for joining the cruise. Each player is given a card that reveals a “secret” that may or may not be a true one. For example, one card reads, “You are a shoplifter,” or “You are an ex-convict.” Each night at a port of call, the contestants must run around the village ashore and hunt for the answer to who holds that night’s particular card. Clinton provides the clues. On the first night, the object is to find out who holds the “shoplifter” card, and so on. It is revealed later in the picture that one of the cards reads, “You are a hit-and-run driver,” indicating that Clinton wants to reveal who killed Sheila.

Thus begins a game of musical chairs, as Christine puts it, with the tale twisting and turning and real secrets emerge. Director Ross—and the script—keeps us guessing, especially when one “solution” turns out not to be correct. The entire affair is told with a light touch, much like the future Agatha Christie all-star vehicles, but there is a seriousness underlying the proceedings that makes for a good caper.

The cast is excellent. Coburn is especially winning—there is one bit where is dressed in drag and it’s a shock! Benjamin, Hackett, Cannon, and Mason also display a command of the screen. A very young Ian McShane is almost unrecognizable from the man we know today. Welch is gorgeous, as always, and she competently stands her own with the others.

The new Warner Archive Blu-ray looks marvelous and comes with a DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack in 2.0 mono. An entertaining but somewhat meandering audio commentary by stars Benjamin, Cannon, and Welch accompanies the feature. The only supplement is the theatrical trailer.

The Last of Sheila was supposed to have been the first of several screenplay collaborations between Sondheim and Perkins, but this ended up being the only one. It’s a surprisingly good curio, though, and worth checking out, especially for fans of any of the cast members, mystery whodunnits, and the lush South of France locations.

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By Raymond Benson

Anything that originated from the mind of celebrated mystery novelist, Cornell Woolrich, is worth one’s perusal, and the 1948 film adaptation of the author’s 1945 work, Night Has a Thousand Eyes, mostly measures up.

Directed with confidence and style by John Farrow, Night is a film noir that ticks a lot of boxes that define that Hollywood cinematic movement of the late 1940s and early 50s. There’s a cynical and disturbed protagonist who is haunted by the past, cinematography (by John F. Seitz) that highly contrasts light and shadows, voiceover narration, flashbacks, and, of course, crimes. It’s short (81 minutes) and it’s intriguing. The picture’s faults might be that it can be overly melodramatic at times, and there are a couple of weak casting choices that prevent Night from being a classic. It’s good enough, though.

John Triton (Edward G. Robinson) is “The Mental Wizard,” one of those mentalist performers in nightclubs who “predict” or “reveal” things about members of the audience. He’s successful, too, until his predictions become dangerous premonitions. For example, he “sees” that the woman he wants to marry, Jenny (Virginia Bruce), will die in childbirth. He thus ends his relationship with her, fearing that he would be the cause of her ultimate death. His business partner, Whitney Courtland, marries her instead. Courtland also buys oil-enriched land after Triton predicts it will make the man rich. Later, Courtland dies in an airplane crash that Triton has foreseen. Twenty years after that, Triton lives as a recluse, afraid of his shadow, fearing his own “gift.” He then meets Jenny and Whitney’s daughter, Jean (Gail Russell), who will inherit her father’s wealth—but Triton predicts that she, too, will die on a specific night at 11:00pm. Her fiancé, Elliott (John Lund), believes Triton is a phony, but Jean knows of the man’s history with her parents. The police, led by Lt. Shawn (William Demarest), get involved to protect Jean on the fateful night—and Triton himself is suspected of plotting to kill Jean. Triton must convince everyone that he has no ulterior motives and wants to prevent the tragedy from occurring.

Robinson is effective as Triton, although it’s one of his seriously sincere roles (like in Scarlet Street) in which he wrinkles his brow a lot and seems to be on the verge of crying. Unfortunately, the two supporting actors, Gail Russell and John Lund, are both duds. They move through the picture with low energy, and Lund is especially wooden. Luckily, William Demarest livens things up when he enters the movie.

The story is compelling, although it’s not quite clear why Jean wants to commit suicide at the beginning of the film, the catalyst for the rest of the tale to unfold.

Kino Lorber’s new 2K master looks quite good, considering the picture’s relative obscurity. It comes with an audio commentary by film historian Imogen Sara Smith. The theatrical trailer, along with other Kino trailers, complete the package.

Night Has a Thousand Eyes is for fans of film noir, Edward G. Robinson, Cornell Woolrich, and mysteries with a supernatural bent.

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“MURDER OR SELF DEFENSE?”

By Raymond Benson

This compelling 1949 melodrama—it can’t quite be called film noir due to a lack of many of the traits associated with that cinematic movement—would have a field day in the era of #MeToo. It was made during 1948 (released in January ’49) while the Production Code was still in effect. While it was taboo to say that the protagonist, Dr. Wilma Tuttle (Loretta Young), is “sexually assaulted” by one of her students at the college where she teaches psychology (it’s obvious that this is what occurs in front of our eyes on the screen), it’s perfectly fine for the investigating homicide detective, Lt. Dorgan (Wendell Corey), to make harassing sexual innuendos and sexist remarks about the woman he suspects of murder, not only to her face but to all the other men in the room while she’s present. But it was 1948, not that this is an excuse.

That said, The Accused, directed by William Dietele and produced by the inimitable Hal B. Wallis for Paramount Pictures, is fairly riveting, well-acted, and superbly written (by Ketti Frings, based on the novel Be Still, My Love by June Truesdell). Note that both the novel and the screenplay are written by women, making The Accused somewhat a rare feminist statement for the time.

Wilma (Young) is harassed by student Bill Perry (Douglas Dick), a handsome but arrogant womanizer who has perhaps already gotten a fellow student (Suzanne Dalbert) “in trouble.” In the interest of counseling Perry, Wilma agrees to be given a ride home. Instead, Perry takes her to a secluded cliff in Malibu overlooking the ocean, where he proceeds to enact an attempted rape. Wilma clobbers him on the head, killing the young man. Obviously, she was defending herself. She panics, though, and decides to stage the death by making it appear that Perry jumped and committed suicide. Later, Perry’s “guardian” and attorney, Warren Ford (Robert Cummings), appears to settle Perry’s affairs and becomes embroiled in the police investigation. Ford meets Wilma and falls in love—and she with him, too. However, Wilma is besieged by guilt and flashbacks of the “crime,” sometimes inexplicably speaking hints of what she’d done as if she were talking in her sleep. Lt. Dorgan (Corey) suspects her, but he also wants to date her, and there is a bit of rivalry with Ford for her hand. As the story progresses, evidence is uncovered that points to Wilma as Perry’s killer… will she be arrested? And if so, can she convince a jury that she had acted in self-defense?

Loretta Young had just enjoyed great success as the lead in The Farmer’s Daughter (1947). She was cast in The Accused, replacing Hal Wallis’ intended casting choice, Barbara Stanwyck (she refused the part). Then, Young won the Oscar for The Farmer’s Daughter, elevating her stock even higher. Would she have taken such a potboiler role in The Accused had she known she would soon be an Oscar-winning actress? Who knows… That said, Young is quite good in The Accused, although her character seems to wilt in fear and uncertainty way too often.

Robert Cummings is fine, but Wendell Corey is a bit too slimy and predatory for believability. Maybe in 1949 it was realistic for a cop to come on to his suspect, but now it just feels creepy. Douglas Dick is frightening as the sociopathic student, and Sam Jaffe is always fun to watch (here he is the police forensics guy).

The ending is surprisingly ambiguous as to whether Wilma walks away free from her trial. No spoilers here, but Lt. Dorgan has a final line that points to how this is going to go. A message to women everywhere regarding assault and self-defense? Perhaps. Very bold for 1949.

Kino Lorber’s new Blu-ray looks satisfactory in its restoration. It comes with an audio commentary by film historian Eddy Von Mueller. The only supplement is the theatrical trailer, along with other Kino trailers.

The Accused is for fans of Loretta Young, melodramatic crime pictures, and Hollywood in the late 1940s.

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“DOUBLE TROUBLE”

By Raymond Benson

Crime stories about twins are usually compelling, despite the sameness (no pun intended) about them. Among the Living, a 1941 potboiler from Paramount, is a short (only 69 minutes!) thriller that, with a few cuts, might have been an episode of an Alfred Hitchcock Presents or similar anthology television program. It moves quickly, holds interest, and contains a reasonably dynamic performance from Albert Dekker as twins—one of them “normal,” and the other insane.

Dekker had an admirable career in Hollywood for three decades, usually working in supporting roles. He is perhaps best known as the titular character in Dr. Cyclops (1940). Landing a dual starring part in Among the Living was likely a result of his appearance in Cyclops.

The old Raden home is supposedly haunted, barely looked after by the elderly Black caretaker, Pompey (Ernest Whitman). Old man Raden, who owned the town textile factory, a hotel, and other businesses, has died. He was not a popular man. His son, John (Dekker), arrives for the funeral with his wife Elaine (Frances Farmer). Family friend Dr. Saunders (Harry Carey) delivers a bombshell to John. John’s twin brother, Paul, who allegedly died and was buried at the age of ten, is still alive. Paul (also Dekker), has been kept a prisoner in a room in the old house, looked after by Saunders and Pompey. Paul is stark, raving mad—but he is also naïve about the world outside. Paul murders Pompey, escapes, and runs loose in town, where he rents a room at a boarding house. There, he meets Millie (Susan Hayward). At first there might be the beginning of a romance, but Paul’s ignorance about the ways of society are eventual red flags to Millie. When Paul murders a bar girl because she screamed “like his mother did,” the manhunt is on. And since innocent John looks exactly like Paul, you know who gets accused of being the murderer…

Among the Living isn’t going to win any awards, but it’s a quick and entertaining flick with some twists, albeit predictable ones. Dekker is fine in both roles, and his Paul is effectively played as a child inside a killer’s mind. Hayward, still in her early rise to stardom in those days, is gorgeous and bubbly as the daughter of the boarding house landlady. The movie sparkles when she’s on the screen.

It’s not quite a film noir, but the photography by Theodor Sparkuhl, and the look of the picture, infuses enough German Expressionism in it to hint toward what was to come in Hollywood crime pictures. In a way, it owes much more to its studio’s horror series.

Kino Lorber’s new Blu-ray release looks remarkably good, given the picture’s age and obscurity. It comes with an audio commentary by professor and film historian Jason A. Ney. The only supplements are the theatrical trailer and others from Kino releases.

Among the Living is for fans of early Hollywood crime flicks… and Susan Hayward.

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REVIEW BY ADRIAN SMITH

Lexington Books

202 Pages

6 x 9 inches

Hardback

ISBN: 978-1-7936-0121-6

October 2021

RRP: $95/£73.00

A blind masseur, Zatoichi would wander from village to village in Feudal Japan hoping for employment to maintain his meagre existence. Hidden within his cane was a sword which he would frequently be required to use against an assortment of yakuza, villains, assassins and ronin. Zatoichi was a legendary blind swordsman whose adventures were charted across an initial run of twenty-six feature films and a hundred television episodes all starring Shintaro Katsu between 1962 and 1979, with a return to the character one last time for the film Zatoichi in 1989. Katsu was something of a legend in Japan, and he came from a showbusiness family: his elder brother was Tomisaburō Wakayama, star of the Lone Wolf and Cub series. This in-depth new book from academic Jonathan Wroot takes in not only Katsu’s incredible run, but also looks at other Zatoichi films such as the 2003 reboot directed by and starring Takeshi Kitano. Known primarily as a comedian and TV presenter in his native Japan (remember Takeshi’s Castle?), Kitano’s Zatōichi won dozens of awards including the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival. Another Zatoichi film was made as recently as 2010, suggesting that this is a character, so ingrained in Japanese culture, that we have not seen the last of just yet.

Wroot charts the influence of Zatoichi across other countries as well, with Taiwanese and Indonesian cinema both producing variations of the blind swordsman back in the 1970s, whilst Zatoichi himself occasionally crossed over into other cultures (Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman in 1971 saw him cross paths with one of Hong Kong cinema’s most popular disabled fighters, played by Jimmy Wang-Yu). In American cinema, Rutger Hauer played a variation of the character as a blinded Vietnam vet in 1989’s Blind Fury, a remake of 1967’s Zatoichi Challenged, and in the Star Wars film Rogue One (2016), Hong Kong actor Donnie Yen played a blind warrior skilled with a staff, which, as Wroot points out, is a further connection between the Star Wars universe and Japanese cinema (Akira Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress (1958) is often cited as a key influence). In terms of pop culture, perhaps most significantly, there is Marvel’s Daredevil, given the Netflix treatment across three series (2015-2018, plus The Defenders series in 2017), in which a blind lawyer with second sight fights the criminal underworld using his training in martial arts from the Samurai-style warrior known as Stick, who was also blind.

Jonathan Wroot’s has packed The Paths of Zatoichi with information and analysis of this significant long-running character who goes across such a huge area of Japanese film history, and the book also has much to say about franchises, remakes and adaptations within global popular culture. Highly recommended.

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