skjam | Entries tagged with crime drama

The Damned Don't Cry (1950) dir. Vincent Sherman

Someone may be getting rich off this Oklahoma oilfield, but it's sure not Ethel Whitehead (Joan Crawford). She, her husband Jim (Morris Ankrum) and son Timmy live in her parents' house, and they're still barely getting by. Jim isn't getting promotions or raises, and the only "luxury" he thinks they can afford is his life insurance policy. So he flips his lid when he learns that Ethel has put a down payment on a bicycle for their child so that at least one family member can experience joy. His attempt to get Timmy to return the bike results in a fatal traffic accident. It's not surprising that this is the last straw for Ethel, who lights out for the big city.

Like many women who spent their adult lives as housewives, Ethel soon discovers that the only things she has to get a job with are her looks (she cleans up real good), poise and moxie. She quickly moves from retail clerk to stocking model. Unfortunately, being a corporate model comes with "entertaining" important clients, but on a side note, they tip well for her...services. Ethel crosses paths with her company's certified public accountant, Martin Blackford (Kent Smith) and takes a shine to him.

She soon learns that Martin is way better at his job than the value his current employer places on him (he's not much better off than Jim was.) But he's more pliable than Jim, and Ethel is able to hook him up with some higher paying customers.

Problem for Martin is, these customers are "legitimate businessmen", headed by George Castleman (David Brian) and they desperately need a real accountant to compensate for the fact that all their normal bookkeepers came up through the criminal ranks. While Ethel likes Martin as a friend, she feels he's "too good for her" so wangles a position as George's mistress.

So that she can be of more use to the organization, George arranges for Ethel to be trained as a socialite under the name Mrs. Lorna Hansen Forbes. Her ability to move among the upper crust is greatly enhanced. Finally, she's living the life she wanted. But then George learns that his underling Nick Prenta (Steve Cochran) may be attempting to go solo in his western district and sends Lorna to spy on him.

Tragedy ensues.

This film noir was very loosely based on the real-life affair of Virginia Hill and gangster Bugsy Siegel. It's very much a star vehicle for Joan Crawford, and after the first few minutes establishing the aftermath of her trip west, the camera is seldom off her for long.

It's made very understandable why Ethel leaves her home; Jim is an ass, and Ethel's father is unsupportive to the point of emotional abuse. Only the child kept her in the marriage, and the tragedy gives her reason to bail out. We do see some signs that she's actually mourning Timmy, still, and it's revealed that she sent her parents money once she started making it, only to have her father refuse it.

She wants to help Martin succeed in life, and get ahead herself, but she doesn't realize until too late the corrosive effects of working in organized crime. Martin is by the end not just helping the mob manage their money flow, but actively helping in murder, and so is Lorna, whatever she really meant to be doing.

It's a fast-paced story with plenty of excitement, and shot well in the Republic film noir style.

Content note: Death of a child, murder. Emotional, verbal and physical abuse. It's very heavily implied (Hays Code restrictions) that Ethel is engaging in prostitution and later just extramarital sex. George engages in overt sexism and is unfaithful to his wife. This is strong stuff for 1950, older teens on up.

Joan Crawford makes or breaks the film for viewers--if you like her acting, it's dynamite, if you don't then it's mud. Recommended to film noir fans.

Current Mood: awake

Beast from Haunted Cave (1959) dir. Monte Hellman

Deadwood, South Dakota may have had a wild reputation back in the day, but in modern times, it's a quiet tourist town. It's the sort of place you might go for a ski vacation if your budget doesn't run to Aspen. And that's why entrepreneur Alexander Ward (Frank Wolff) is here with his business associates Marty Jones (Richard Sinatra) and Byron Smith (Wally Campo) and secretary Gypsy Boulet (Sheila Noonan). They've hired local guide Gil Jackson (Michael Forest) to give them skiing lessons, and then lead a cross-country trip to a remote cabin.

This being a movie, that's not the real reason they're here. The plan is to set off an explosion in a disused mine on Sunday morning, thus drawing the local law enforcement and emergency personnel out of downtown. The three men will then rob the active mine office, stealing bars of gold. They'll then rendezvous with Gil and Gypsy at the top of the ski resort (far enough away from town to not notice the excitement), and go to the cabin. There's a pre-arranged plane set to land there in a few days; Mr. Ward plans to kill Gil and any members of his crew that have become liabilities, and escape into Canada.

The first wild card shows up when Marty gets a little drunk and picks up barmaid Natalie (Linné Ahlstrand), getting her to show him the disused mine in the middle of the night. He plants the explosive while her back is turned, but they're then attacked by a mysterious beast (Chris Robinson). Marty flees, leaving Natalie for dead, but is shaken by this and suffering random attacks of guilt and belief that he's being followed by the beast.

Natalie's disappearance is investigated by the authorities, but they don't make the connection to Marty, and it's noted that some recent animal deaths have been attributed to a loose cougar.

The explosive goes off (killing an unlucky watchman) and the robbery itself goes off just fine. Next wild card is that Gypsy starts being attracted to Gil, and vice versa. (Alexander is not a good boyfriend.)

On the trip to the cabin, the audience sees that the beast is indeed following Marty. At the cabin, Gil learns about the robbery and becomes increasingly suspicious of his clients. Byron finds himself developing a flirtation with native housekeeper Small Dove (Kay Jennings). A heavy snow delays the plane.

Isolated as they are, the small group is menaced by the beast, which has taken up a lair in a nearby cave. Who, if anyone, will survive?

This crime movie interrupted by a monster was shot on location in Deadwood and the surrounding area as producer Gene Corman and his brother Roger had been lured to South Dakota by that state's Chamber of Commerce offering financial incentives to film there and their own desire to get out of California for a while. Roger Corman was preparing his own movie Ski Troop Attack which used some of the same locations, actors and screenwriter Charles B. Griffith. The beast costume was made by Mr. Robinson himself out of his own pocket, as he was working for exposure (it worked, he got a lot of TV roles, and was still doing movies as of 2022!)

As you might expect, the lack of budget really shows. The sets are minimal, the acting is mostly adequate at best, and there's a reason we see very little of the monster until the climax. But it's nice to see the South Dakota locations, and the skiing sequences don't feel overly long or like filler. The scene where some of the beast's victims wake up in Haunted Cave is actually pretty disturbing.

Content note: Alcohol abuse, smoking, extramarital sex is implied. Outdated term for a Native American woman. Younger children should have adult guidance.

Several of the people involved would go on to make much better movies, but with its short run time, this would make a good double feature with another B-Movie--say, The Wasp Woman, its first feature partner.

Current Mood: warm
Current Music: "Waiting Just for You"--Blackmore's Night

Ma Barker's Killer Brood (1960) dir. Bill Karn

Kate "Ma" Barker (Lurene Tuttle) was born into a hardscrabble family as the tenth child and suffered many privations growing up. She stepped up a bit by marrying the first young man to take notice of her, George Barker (Nelson Leigh) but by the time their fourth son was born, it was obvious that George was going nowhere fast and could barely keep the family fed. Ma soon encouraged her boys to steal, as the only way to get what you want is to take it, and even planned their crimes for them. One, Herman (Don Grady), was a sensitive lad more interested in music, but Ma soon beat obedience into him. George disapproved of the direction Ma was taking the family, but had a weak character and chose fleeing the marriage--afterwards, Ma made out she was widowed.

Within a year, even though the law couldn't prove anything, the Barker boys were notorious for their thievery, and the sheriff ran the family out of the county. This unleashed what would become the Barker/Karpis gang on the rest of America.

This black and white crime film is loosely based on the true story of a notorious gang of robbers and kidnappers, most of whom were related by blood. It leans heavily into the myth of Ma Barker as a criminal mastermind, and rearranges events to make her look both smarter and more diabolical than she probably was in real life.

We rejoin the family several years after going on the road. Herman (Don Spruance), Doc (Ron Foster), Lloyd (Rex Holman) and Fred (Eric Morris) have grown into hardened criminals. They're soon joined by kill-crazed Alvin Karpis (Paul Dubov) who was a cellmate of one of the brothers in prison. The gang is on good terms with John Dillinger (Eric Sinclair) and Baby Face Nelson (Robert Kendall). Another associate is Machine Gun Kelly (Victor Lundin), who wants to have crime plans created by Ma, but she's deemed too expensive by Kelly's lover Lou (Myrna Dell). Lou and Ma cordially despise each other, especially after Lou's plan for a kidnapping goes south.

After Herman commits suicide to avoid capture, the gang relocates to Saint Paul, Minnesota. There Ma masterminds the kidnapping of a wealthy banker. This nets the family a hefty ransom, but puts the FBI on their trail, and things go sour from there, culminating in a lethal Florida shootout.

Left out of the story is why the gang had gone to St. Paul in the first place. At the time, that city's police department under chief Thomas "Big Tom" Brown was notoriously corrupt and sheltered gangsters in exchange for a share of their loot. It's even been suggested that Chief Brown was the real planner behind the infamous kidnapping. But not only would have including this have undercut the story of Ma Barker being the mastermind, but run afoul of the Hays Code, which was very touchy about the depiction of police corruption.

If I didn't know the production date, I would have thought this movie was made in the 1930s. It's very much a throwback to the gangster films of that time, with elements of the early 1950s Pre-Code comic books like Crime Does Not Pay. Lots of exciting violence and the crooks generally having a good time and sneering at law enforcement, with a last act where it all crashes down and a closing monologue emphasizing the bitter fruit of crime.

Ms. Tuttle is a hoot as Ma, berating those that screw up, trading barbs with Lou, and pulling out her "frail little old lady who has no idea her sons are criminals" act whenever necessary. Paul Dubov is chilling as Karpis, and the rest of the cast is adequate. This is a low-budget thriller more interested in telling an exciting story than realism or historical accuracy. (See if you can spot the out of period car!)

Content note: Lots of gun violence, some lethal. (No gore.) Suicide, murder, a man is burned alive. Child abuse, emotional abuse. Surgery is done without anesthesia. Ma may have committed bigamy. It's implied that characters are having extramarital sex. Karpis kills a hamster (we don't see the corpse) for cruel fun. Older teens should be able to handle it.

This is a trashy fun movie, the sort of thing to watch with friends who also enjoy the gangster genre. Do not watch this one with a "true crime" fan unless you are ready for non-stop nitpicking.

Death Wish (1974) dir. Michael Winner

Paul Kersey (Charles Bronson) has a pretty good life. He's a respected architect at a large firm, he's married to a beautiful woman (Hope Lange), has a pretty daughter (Kathleen Tolan) and a respectful son-in-law (Steven Keats). Kersey is well-off enough to afford a winter vacation in Hawaii. But this is the early 1970s, and he must return to crime-ridden cesspool New York City. When hoodlums invade Kersey's apartment, kill his wife and rape his daughter, the police can do very little. If only there was some way to fight back! It's as though society has developed a death wish.

This 1974 crime thriller, based on a novel of the same name by Brian Garfield, is one of Charles Bronson's best known roles. As he goes from conscientious objector to killer vigilante, we follow the journey step by step. We learn that he grew up with guns, but abandoned them at his mother's behest after his father died in a hunting "accident." His co-worker calls him a "bleeding heart liberal" for acknowledging that street crime is often motivated by poverty, but since that co-worker's solutions to the crime problem involve concentration camps and a police state, the co-worker may be a biased source. (Their more traditionally conservative boss objects to a police state on the ground that it would mean higher taxes.)

With his wife dead and daughter near catatonic from her trauma, Kersey has much manpain. In a time before ubiquitous security cameras and DNA testing, the police inform Kersey there's little chance that they will be able to find the culprits--for this particular crime, anyhow. Kersey's boss gives him an assignment out in Tucson, Arizona to give him a break. There Kersey meets affable land developer Aimes Jainchill (Stuart Margolin), who reintroduces Kersey to the joys of shooting, and the concept of bringing justice from the smoking barrel of a gun. Jainchill even packs a revolver for Kersey as a gift to get around New York City's strict handgun laws.

Despite an initial poor reaction to his first mugger kill, Kersey soon learns to enjoy it, and rises to fame as the anonymous "vigilante" fighting back against crime. It's at this point that NYC police detective Frank Ochoa (Vincent Gardenia) comes in, as the lead investigator of the vigilante killings.

Good: Paul Kersey is not superhuman; he makes mistakes and gets wounded by muggers who manage to outflank him. His method involves wandering about looking vulnerable until he attracts or finds muggers to ambush, and it's suggested that sometimes he has to do this for hours before getting lucky.

The movie doesn't go with racial stereotypes--there's both white and black criminals ("Freak #1" is likely ethnically Jewish, as he's played by Jeff Goldblum rocking a crown hat that was considered stylish by lower-income teens in the 1940s), white and black cops, and white and black ordinary citizens. The movie notes that Kersey statistically kills more black than white muggers, but this is implied to be luck of the draw.

There's no cheap catharsis where Kersey tracks down and kills his family's attackers. The "freaks" might be pulled in for something else later, but for this, they get away.

Less Good: Kersey's wife and daughter are in the story to be attacked so that he has reason to seek revenge. The daughter has no coherent dialogue after the attack, and barely exists as a character before that.

The movie implies that vigilantism works, with New York City's crime rate falling as criminals become afraid of newly empowered citizens. (This is a change from the book, where one of the points is that vigilante tactics do not improve things.)

Topical: The police are depicted as well-meaning but overwhelmed. It's not that they can't catch criminals (most of Kersey's victims have arrest and/or conviction records), but there's so much crime that they can't keep up, and the chance of catching the perpetrator of any given random crime is low. They're better at tracking down Kersey, as he has a distinctive M.O., uses the same gun for each killing, and leaves clues that can be investigated. Ochoa does an illegal search of Kersey's apartment, but by that time he's been instructed to not so much arrest the vigilante as make him "disappear." Ochoa draws the line at killing Kersey, but is willing to convince the vigilante to leave town.

There's also discussion of what medical insurance will and won't pay for. There's an upper limit on what they'll pay for hospitalization.

Content note: Violence, a bit of gore. Rape, partial nudity. A fair amount of R-rated rough language. Kersey vomits just off camera.

Overall: A suspenseful crime drama that's fairly realistic in its violence, and has a strong performance by Charles Bronson. Well worth watching, but skip the sequels.

I had a few days off that I would normally have used to go to Convergence (it does have a few online events this weekend) and decided to do a little binge watching. I stumbled across the 2010 Singapore crime drama "Unriddle", available on Crunchyroll and U.S. Netflix. Not done with the first season yet, but here's a few thoughts.

Hu Xiaoman is a police officer, head of a squad that initially specializes in kidnapping investigations. Their investigation of the abduction of an Indonesian woman leads them to the hideout of a human trafficking gang. But someone tips off the gang just before the police arrive. The victims are rescued, but the gang escapes. The leak turns out to have come from Hu's colleague and potential love interest Zhang Yuze, who turns out to have done it to protect his inside informant in the gang, Da Bao ("Bun") who he is using to capture the gang's foreign connections as well.

Bun's true nature is kind of spoiled by her being in the opening credits, but in the show, the big clue is that she deliberately passes the key to the victims' cage to the victims when the hideout is raided so they won't die in the fire gang leader Savage has ordered to destroy the evidence.

When Zhang mysteriously disappears, Bun is forced to go to Hu to become her informant and wrap up the investigation. The two women initially hate each other, but as Bun helps Hu with other cases, they become bickering buddies.

There are heavy soap opera undertones between the cases--all the main characters have sad backstories. Bun's family in particular turns out to be "found family" as none of the members are blood relations but were kind of adopted by Bun due to their circumstances.

Hu of course is a "good" cop, though she's cold-blooded towards suspects and remember, the cops can and will lie to you to get you to incriminate yourself. Zhang seems like a good cop initially, but there's a certain case from fifteen years ago that's the myth arc of the season that suggests otherwise. Their superior Andrew* is super shady from the get-go; it's possible he's on the side of the angels, but he too was involved in the case from fifteen years ago and is clearly hiding things and routinely warns Hu off investigations that come too close. Hu's subordinates are earnest and don't seem to be abusing their power, but are not quite as smart/competent as she is.

*Due to Singapore's history, most of the characters have Chinese names and "English" names, and in addition many have nicknames. Which name they actually use depends on the character's preference.

Bun of course is more your streetwise, low level criminal type, though the "criminal" part fades out over the course of the story. She's got a warm heart behind her coarse exterior, and is respected in her seedy neighborhood. She's got a habit for giving people unpleasant nicknames though; she calls the conventionally attractive and slender Hu "Bony Shrew" and a suspect in one case "The Sissy."

The police don't get off entirely uncriticized; the basis of an early case is the catastrophic failure of the cops to properly follow up a missing persons report. (Insert "Cool motive. Still murder." gif here.) This inspires Hu to do better which comes in handy when Andrew dumps a bunch of missing person cases on her to distract from the Zhang investigation. On the other hand, there's several instances where following rules works to the disadvantage of the police and victims. And anyone who asks for a lawyer or a warrant is in fact guilty of something, not always the thing the police care about.

As you might expect from a crime drama, there's a fair amount of potentially triggering content: domestic abuse, harm to children, homophobia/transphobia, offscreen rape, drug abuse, suicide, and probably other things.

I'm finding it fascinating, but clearly not to everyone's taste.

eta: Full review now up. http://www.skjam.com/2020/08/24/tv-review-unriddle-season-one/