After pledging our allegiance to the good time girls of “Vixenville”, the fun comes to a screeching halt at the entrance of “Blind Alley.” In his Dark City account Eddie Mueller describes it as the grimmest part of town. As he puts it: “If Dark City’s random pitfalls don’t get you, a guilty conscience will. It doesn’t matter if you’re innocent. Around here Justice truly is blind, but not because she’s impartial: Either God’s poked her eyes out, or she’s earning good dough looking the other way. This is Blind Alley, the bleakest part of this merciless town. No maps sold here. You’re on your own.” (Pg.111) That statement leads us right to Stranger On The Third Floor (1940) which is now acknowledged as the seminal production launching what would later become known as film noir.
Although there is still much debate as to whether or not noir is a genre or a style, it seems clear that Stranger On The Third Floor marks the start of the movement not just for style, but also where theme is concerned. This main theme is when an innocent unjustly accused of a crime flails desperately to clear their name. False accusation is central to the beleaguered protagonist of a “Blind Alley” narrative, and this is exactly the case with Stranger On The Third Floor. The story concerns reporter Michael Ward (John McGuire) who is the key witness in a murder trial which falsely convicts Joe Briggs (played by stalwart noir character actor Elisha Cook Jr.) also of The Maltese Falcon fame.
When the reporter himself comes under suspicion for murder the viewer fully understands how terrifying it can be when the tables are turned. Stranger On The Third Floor heightens the tension when he has a surreal nightmare about becoming trapped as a victim of circumstance in a crime with no way out – and facing execution! The use of bizarre angles, deep shadows, and overall harshness of the black & white cinematography, especially in the courtroom nightmare sequence leave a memorable imprint on the viewer, setting the tone of other “Blind Alley” noirs to come. The aptly titled Quicksand (1950) also hits the bullseye as a taut, gripping noir thriller about a hapless mechanic Dan Brady (Mickey Rooney) who gets sucked into a life of escalating crime as the result of a petty embezzlement from his employer. Through some other naive and poor choices such as getting involved with a cold, self-serving femme fatale, a minor embezzlement quickly escalates into more serious crimes like auto theft, blackmail, a mugging, robbery, and a failed attempt at fleeing to Mexico to evade the police.
The role of Brady was quite a departure for Rooney who previously was much better known for starring in family comedies and musicals as a major star for MGM studios. Although Rooney’s performance and Quicksand as a whole received lukewarm reviews at the time, the film is appreciated considerably more now. It’s viewed as one of the more intriguing cultural artifacts of the early 1950s that resonates more today as the little guy always gets the short end of the stick. As a viewer should expect from noir, stories like Stranger On The Third Floor and Quicksand are gripping accounts of how an average Joe can be quickly banished to oblivion through poor choices, bad associates, and/or being unjustly accused of a crime.
It’s also notable that some of the best noir entries as the aforementioned still excelled even with small budgets and the lack of high wattage stars. Interestingly, Peter Lorre of The Maltese Falcon fame once again was the common denominator, the effective villain of Stranger and Quicksand. Another stunning entry in the “Blind Alley” collection is D.O.A (1950). In this fast-paced, outrageous thriller a small town accountant, Frank Bigelow (Edmond O’Brien) goes to San Francisco for one final fling before his impending marriage. After living it up with some boozy conventioneers at the hotel, Bigelow continues the party at a nightclub where a stranger switches a poison-laced cocktail to him. Later the next day, feeling ill, Bigelow is told by a doctor that there is no antidote for this type of poison and that he only has a few days to live! D.O.A. is a quintessential “Blind Alley” thriller where the story zips right along as Bigelow goes on the warpath to hunt down who killed him and why.
Once again, we have an innocent who gets completely caught up in a web of circumstances beyond his control and Bigelow ends up merely as collateral damage to cover up a bigger crime that he unwittingly had a minor role in. Also, once again D.O.A. is exemplary for the lighting, menacing locations, and the literal/figurative darkness that is so central to the noir universe. D.O.A is also a stand out as Bigelow bursts into a San Francisco police station declaring that he is already murdered. This would have been a totally unexpected and disconcerting opening for any film of that era, but is particularly memorable for a noir. If anything, D.O.A has been quite an influential film over time by inspiring four remakes and even a noir musical in 2011.
However, we are far from finished with our investigation of Eddie Mueller’s Dark City and are now taking a plunge into the “Psych Ward”. Mueller describes this part of town as: “Far from the typical tourist spots of Dark City is the Veteran’s Hospital, packed with men who fought their best, but left pieces of themselves in places they never considered visiting.” (Pg.129) The bland, institutional VA hospitals have nonetheless served as frequent settings for harrowing accounts of shell-shocked vets back from the horrors of World War Two having to start life over in the American urban jungles. John Payne was one of the actors best exemplifying the disillusionment of the vet having to resurrect his life while suffering diminished mental capacity.
The Crooked Way (1949) is outstanding in this case. Eddie Rice (Payne) is a decorated infantryman just released from a VA hospital although he’s not entirely ready to face the outside world. His brave, exceptional service does nothing, however to protect him from falling into the clutches of goons who think he’s a gangster of the pre-war period and want to rub him out. Of course, this proves to be untrue – but there’s a lot of plot to get through before this resolution occurs. Again, The Crooked Way like all of the above mentioned films doesn’t necessarily suffer from having a small budget and didn’t need special effects to make it compelling and the creepy, sinister photography worked well for it.
The Crooked Way was also similar to Somewhere In The Night (1946) which also featured a veteran, George Taylor (John Hodiak) plagued by amnesia who’s not entirely sure of his identity, grasping at meager clues. Naturally, this causes him to get caught up with an assortment of rough characters – but has a surprise ending which shouldn’t be spoiled here. It’s also intriguing that Los Angeles is a typical setting for noir stories and proves to be a constant hazard for detectives, former veterans, and amnesiacs of all sorts. With that in mind, the L.A. region with its make-believe, perpetual carnival atmosphere also makes it an ideal cover for all manner of fakes, phonies, pathological liars, thieves, thugs, and other disreputable characters to menace our protagonists.
Another popular “Blind Alley” narrative was The Blue Dahlia (1946) based on the Raymond Chandler (of Murder, My Sweet fame) original screenplay and starring Alan Ladd, one the biggest stars of the decade. As with many noirs there’s a lot of story packed into The Blue Dahlia where vet Johnny Morrison (Ladd) and two of his friends are back from the service to Los Angeles. However, a peaceful homecoming is not in the cards for Johnny as his wife Helen (Doris Dowling) has proved to be an unfaithful, all-around tramp – having an affair with a shady nightclub owner for starters. Even worse than that, Johnny finds out that Helen had killed their young son in a car crash because of her irresponsible, drunken driving. However, things really heat up when Helen is murdered and Johnny is the first person suspected (the husband always is)!
In true noir style, Johnny experiences one harrowing ordeal after another with the creeps and oddballs of the Los Angeles underbelly in the attempt to clear himself of this crime and find the real killer. The Blue Dahlia proved to be another bang-up noir: heavy on action, hardboiled attitude, an assortment of villains for the protagonist to square off against, and the somber atmosphere all combined to make it a box office sensation of the time and a classic today. Another less known but worthy noir of the disillusioned veteran subcategory is Act Of Violence (1949).
Act Of Violence is concerned about former vet Frank Enley (Van Heflin) who initially appears to have adjusted well to life in postwar America. However, he soon ends up being stalked by another veteran who had been part of his unit (played by major noir figure Robert Ryan). It turns out that Parkson (Ryan) knows secrets about Enley’s less than exemplary behavior during the war, by selling out his captured unit to the Nazi’s for personal gain. Enley and Parkson become locked in mortal combat in Parkson’s quest for revenge.
Enley’s cozy, proper suburban family life is ripped apart as he trudges through the Los Angeles underworld of pimps, whores, hired assassins, etc. – unable to get rid of Parkson or find redemption for himself. Act Of Violence made good use of several rough L.A. locations with murky night sequences to enhance the noir style. They also served as a stark metaphor of the division in his persona: the image of the All-American guy who was actually a snitch and a sell-out in another life. Well, for now we’ve completed our rough-and-tumble tours of “Blind Alley” and “The Psych Ward” and soon we will gather at “Knockover Square” in our remaining journeys through Dark City.
