MAKSQUIBS CINEMATHEQUE: MYSTERIOUS INTRUDER (1946)

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Thursday, February 7, 2019

MYSTERIOUS INTRUDER (1946)

Richard Dix returns for the fifth in Columbia Picture’s low-budget THE WHISTLER series, derived from the anthology radio show. In this one, he’s a shady Private Investigator and seems to be having a fine old time of it, playing an unexpectedly subversive creep in his usual gentlemanly manner. Neat. Hired by an elderly record shop owner to find a missing young woman, heir to a possible fortune, he’s soon unraveling a couple of murders and on the hunt for the mysterious inheritance. William Castle offers straightforward direction, long before his schlockmeister heyday of horror gimmicks in the ‘50s & ‘60 (THE TINGLER; MR. SARDONICUS), though can’t quite keep the plot revelations from feeling arbitrary. Still, with help from a decent cast for this sort of thing (Regis Toomey; Mike Mazurki; Barton MacLane), Philip Tannura’s through-a-glass-darkly lensing and a no-nonsense one-hour running time, it gets the job done.

DOUBLE-BILL: A great silent star (THE TEN COMMANDMENTS/’23; REDSKIN/’29), Dix rarely found his old form in sound films. Probably best in THE LOST SQUADRON/’32. (see all three below)

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A last thought before we go.

Well, enough from me. But before we sign off, here's a great quote from Emile Zola's L'OEUVRE (THE MASTERPIECE), which is about painting rather than the yet to be invented medium of film, but which points a fine critical eye toward the whole idea of art criticism. It's a good, if chilly, thought to keep in mind, especially when you surf the net.

"Has it ever struck you that posterity may not be the fair, impartial judge we like to think it is?

"Suppose the artist's paradise turned out to be as nonexistent as the Catholics, and future generations prove just as misguided as the present one and persisted in liking pretty pretty dabbling better than honest to goodness painting. There are some accepted masterpieces for which I myself wouldn't give a twopenny damn.

"Classical training has given us a wrong view of everything and forces us to acclaim as geniuses a lot of fellows who are no more than well-balanced, facile painters, while what we might really prefer is the work of more emancipated but less even artists known only to an initiated few. Immortality at present depends entirely on the average, middle-class mind and is reserved only for the names that have been most forcibly impressed upon us while we were still unable to defend ourselves...

"Perhaps that's the sort of thing that's best left unsaid. It's certainly the sort of thing that gives me the shudders!"- Emile Zola

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Thursday, February 7, 2019

MYSTERIOUS INTRUDER (1946)

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A last thought before we go.

DROP ME A LINE