Warner Bros. was still testing out short/solid Dane Clark & long/lean Zachary Scott for post-WWII stardom in this neat, formulaic programmer. Debuting Janis Paige, also getting the star-in-the-making treatment, is the nightclub singer the boys tangle over: Scott a mob-connected gaming house owner, Clark a nightlife news columnist.* Paige loves ‘em both, but leans toward Scott even after he gets involved in a murder. The film runs pretty well for the first two acts, but takes a bad turn forcing its last act climax into place with a poorly staged raid at Scott’s newly opened boíte & backroom betting hot spot. Frederick De Cordova (long time Johnny Carson TONIGHT SHOW producer & infamous director of Ronald Reagan’s BEDTIME FOR BONZO/’51) really stinking up the joint in this laughable moment before straightening up for a pretty good race-to-the-hideout finale. All told, a ‘close-but-no-cigar’ time waster if not for Zachary Scott, one of the more interesting actors Hollywood ever wasted. (And for the decidedly weird homoerotic/masochistic overtones going between Scott & Harry Lewis his lapdog of a bodyguard. Who thought up this relationship, and how'd it get past the censors at the Breen Office?)
DOUBLE-BILL: *None of these three quite made the leap from ‘leading player’ to star, but you can best see the possibilities from Scott in Jean Renoir’s THE SOUTHERNER/’45; Clark in Frank Borzage’s MOONRISE/’48; and Paige showing her comic chops in Rouben Mamoulian/Cole Porter’s SILK STOCKINGS/57 against Fred Astaire.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Unless my ears lie, Paige only does her own vocals on the intro to her opening number. Everything else taken over by some unnamed in-house studio soprano.
No comments:
Post a Comment