Ultimate gangster also starred in some good crime movies

by Terry Lawson

Detroit Free Press (MCT)

10 July 2007

Until 1981, when Lawrence Kasdan revived the style with “Body Heat,” film noir was something sought out and discussed primarily by pale-faced film students who might have preferred to have it remain their own private reserve.

Too bad for them. Today, noir—with its shadowy rooms and shadowier characters—is a brand, so popular that studios sift through their catalogs for any film that has even a frisson of the formula. Sometimes a slouched hat and a sass-talking dame will qualify a movie for a DVD release with a noir banner.

In the 1940s and `50s, MGM was better known for musicals than mysteries and crime thrillers, but it did have Edward G. Robinson, costar of what is one the greatest of all noirs, “Double Indemnity,” and they made excellent use of his talents. He’s the lead in three of the four new titles, $19.99 each, issued under the “MGM Film Noir” banner, including the excellent “The Woman in the Window” (4 stars), made in 1944, the same year as “Indemnity.”

Robinson is cast as a New York professor of criminology who repairs to his club for a quiet drink with his colleagues. On leaving he stops to admire a portrait in the window of a nearby art gallery. In one of the great noir shots, the real face (a never sultrier Joan Bennett) of the subject of the painting appears in reflection, and after some conversation, the two end up at her place, where things take the ever-expected, unexpected turn. Impeccably directed by Fritz Lang, and looking better than ever on this restored DVD, “Woman” has an ending that noir lovers love to debate; it’s a perfect twist or a complete contrivance. Even if it’s the latter, it can’t spoil a near-perfect movie.

Robinson also is the catalyst of “The Stranger” (3 stars), though legend has it he was the second choice of his director and costar Orson Welles. Welles wanted Agnes Moorehead in the role of the federal agent who has tracked Nazi Welles to a small town in Connecticut, where he has reinvented himself as a respected prep school teacher. If “The Stranger” feels surprisingly conventional, it’s because it was one of Welles’ periodic attempts to prove he could make films on time, on budget, that common filmgoers would enjoy—and they did.

“A Bullet for Joey” (2 stars) is not a noir, just a routine gangster film with a Cold War backdrop; Robinson gives a rare by-the-numbers performance, perhaps because he is miscast as an inspector for the l Canadian police whose investigation of a murder leads him to a Russian plot employing a mobster (played by George Raft) to kidnap a nuclear scientist.

The sole title not featuring Robinson, 1952’s “Kansas City Confidential” (3 stars) is closer in style to noir, being a crisp little B-movie directed by the underrated Phil Karlson. It starred John Payne as an ex-con turned flower delivery driver who plays the patsy in a bank heist orchestrated by mobster Preston Foster.

Also new this week:

Film festival favorite “The Page Turner” did not see a theatrical release in many cities, so the DVD release (3 stars, Tartan, $22.95) is especially welcome. French director Denis Dercourt co wrote this tense and tight thriller about the long-nurtured revenge taken on a haughty concert pianist (Catherine Frot) by the character of the title. (Deborah Francois), is as deceptively sinister as the music in the film is ravishing.

Susanne Bier’s “After the Wedding” (3 stars, IFC, $24.95) did have a brief theatrical run, but the DVD release should bring new admirers to this beautifully acted melodrama about a man (Mads Mikkellsen, who was terrific as the villain in “Casino Royale") who reluctantly returns to his native Copenhagen to seek money for the orphanage he runs in India, only to realize his would-be benefactors have an ulterior motive.

Even better is “Sweet Land” (4 stars, Fox, $27.98), a tender, moving drama and beautiful-to-behold movie that might have been an Oscar contender had it been better promoted. Elizabeth Reaser, in her first starring role in a feature film, plays Inge, a mail-order bride whose husband-to-be (Tim Guinee), a farmer in rural Minnesota, failed to understand she was German, instead of Swedish like himself. In the days following WWII, Inge is not accepted in the community, and the minister refuses to bestow his blessing. It’s a small, understated gem of a movie that will melt the heart of even the hardest-boiled cynic.

TV on DVD:

“The Complete Second Season” of Ricky Gervais’ comedy “Extras” (3 stars, HBO, $29.98), starring himself as Hollywood hanger-on Andy Millman, has him escaping the ignominy of earning a living as an extra when he finally sells his sitcom script, “When the Whistle Blows.” But he discovers that the big time is just as excruciating as the small time. The second season, by the way, is the final season; as he did with the original British version of “The Office,” Gervais wrapped up the show after two seasons, before the joke went stale.

Those who bemoan the loss of new episodes of “Mystery Science Theater 3000” will be happy to know that wiseacres Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy have reunited for “Film Crew: Hollywood After Dark. “ They put their kibitz-commentary to a 1968 exploitation movie released under the ludicrous title “Walk the Angry Beach. “ It stars none other than “Golden Girl” Rue McLanahan as an innocent girl from the Midwest who arrives in Tinseltown to become an actress. Instead, she falls into the hands of sleazy producers and ends up as a stripper, not to mention becoming the butt—heh, heh—of the Film Crew’s jokes.

Family film of the week:

If you tend to feel guilty about flopping the little ones down in front of the DVD player without being around to provide context or translate hard-to-understand dialogue, Fox has come up with something that might make you less anxious. Kid-friendly “Follow Along” editions of animated favorites like “Ice Age,” “Robots,” “Ferngully—The Last Rain Forrest” and “Garfield—The Movie,” and the live-action family films “The Sandlot” and “Good Boy!” all come with English and Spanish “Kids Captioning”—large-type subtitles so that kids can read along as they watch. Yes, of course it’s a marketing ploy, but that doesn’t mean it won’t help build their reading skills.