To include heist films (a personal favorite) in the noir pantheon I’d gladly break the rules. But as it happens, for the three heist films I saw, ARMORED CAR ROBBERY, PLUNDER ROAD (Hubert Cornfield, 1957), and THE 3rd VOICE, I don’t need to. In each, the criminals are undone by the kind of mistiming and mischance endemic to noir. In ARMORED CAR ROBBERY (is there a blunter, more inviting B-movie title in the history of American filmmaking?), time is against the thieves. At the beginning, a police car arrives at the site of the robbery, a sports stadium in Los Angeles, sooner than expected. At the end, a private plane that the ruthless mastermind (William Talman) is set to take off in is held up by the arrival of a commercial airline. As he is run over by the arriving plane, the suitcase he is carrying flies open and money is scattered by the wind—an image of futility that Stanley Kubrick will reprise (steal) for the finale to his heist masterpiece THE KILLING.
I want to conclude with a tribute to an overlooked master of the failed-heist/scam subgenre, Hubert Cornfield. PLUNDER ROAD opens with a virtuoso noir set piece in which robbers execute an intricately planned holdup, stealing a gold shipment off a train during a torrential downpour. Once they have pulled off their heist, however, the thieves seem to have used up their resourcefulness as well as their survival skills. They divide up the gold onto three trucks and plan to meet up at a foundry where the treasure will be melted down. On the run, with roadblocks and news of their suspected whereabouts reported on the radio, they are quick to panic. Only one truck makes it to the foundry, where the surviving thieves melt the gold into cubes that they place on the hubcaps of a getaway car. Bad luck trails them to the end. Caught in heavy traffic on their way out of town, their car is bumped from behind. When the cops come over to help release the fender of the car that struck them, the thieves run. The stony ringleader Eddie (Gene Raymond), who throughout has expressed not a twinge of remorse or feeling when he has learned of the death or arrest of his partners, jumps off a bridge onto oncoming traffic. The camera pans past Eddie and his helpless, shrieking girlfriend, in effect erasing them from the film.
The greedy conspirators in THE 3rd VOICE, Marion Forbes, an embittered secretary (Laraine Day), and the nameless man (Edmond O’Brien) she hires to impersonate her wealthy boss, Harris Chapman, are also undone by ironic, dispassionate noir gods. The anonymous master of disguise who assumes the iden-tity of Harris Chapman after Marion has killed him is himself fooled by another masquerade: a seemingly hot-to-trot woman (Julie London) he picks up in a bar turns out to be Chapman’s suspicious new mistress. The elaborate scheme to claim Chapman’s money was therefore doomed from the start.
A world-weary thief (Dan Duryea, with Jayne Mansfield)near his end, in THE BURGLAR.
Taking aim: a scorned secretary (Laraine Day) about to shoot her wealthy boss, in THE 3rd VOICE.
In Cornfield’s grim existential noir, the crow, a bird of ill omen, makes several cameo appearances, as if to put its curse on the criminals. Wipes—from top to bottom and from left to right—nervous zooms, and an agitated jazz score provide apt punctuation for this ill-fated criminal set up. The twists and turns of the masqueraders’ plot are reflected in the many driving scenes in which a car follows the tortuous curves of steep hill-side roads in rural Mexico. This pitch-perfect dark film—noir without apologies or capitulation—ends with the shattering laughter of the secretary as she is arrested and taken off to jail.
THE 3rd VOICE and PLUNDER ROAD are exactly the kind of B-noir guilty pleasures I had hoped to discover in watching a raft of films that were for the most part new to me. These two films, along with other not-famous prime noir specimens cited here, including CAUSE FOR ALARM, THE BURGLAR, and the 1950s films of Andrew L. Stone—HIGHWAY 301, THE STEEL TRAP, A BLUEPRINT FOR MURDER, THE NIGHT HOLDS TERROR, JULIE, and CRY TERROR! —deserve to be regularly screened in pristine new prints at repertory theatres and film festivals as well as to be released in top-quality DVDs with special features celebrating the directors, writers, actors, cinematographers, and production designers who more than half a century ago created dark stories of enduring value.
Selected Bibliography
Agee, James. Agee on Film. Boston: Beacon Press, 1964.
Allen, Dick, and David Chacko. Detective Fiction: Crime and Compromise. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1974.
Alloway, Lawrence. Violent America: The Movies, 1946- 1964. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1971.
Appel, Alfred. Nabokov’s Dark Cinema. New York: Oxford University Press, 1974.
Ball, John, editor. The Mystery Story. New York: Penguin Books, 1978.
Baxter, John. Hollywood in the Thirties. New York: A. S. Barnes; London: The Tantivy Press, 1968.
Bergman, Andrew. We’re in the Money: Depression America and Its Films. New York: New York University Press, 1971.
Borde, Raymond, and Etienne Chaumeton. Panorama du film noir americain. Paris: Les Editions de Minuit, 1955.
Braudy, Leo. The World in a Frame: What We See in Films. New York: Doubleday Anchor Press, 1976.
Bridgman, Richard. The Colloquial Style in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1966.
Burnett, W. R. Little Caesar. New York: The Dial Press, 1958.
Cain, James M. Double Indemnity. New York: Vintage Books, 1978.
———. Mildred Pierce. New York: Vintage Books, 1978.
———. The Postman Always Rings Twice. New York: Vintage Books, 1978.
———. Serenade. New York: Vintage Books, 1978.
Camus, Albert. The Rebel. New York: Vintage Books, 1956.
———. The Stranger. New York: Vintage Books, 1954.
Cawelti, John G. Adventure, Mystery, and Romance: Formula Stories as Art and Popular Culture. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1976.
Chandler, Raymond. The Big Sleep. New York: Vintage Books, 1976.
———. The Blue Dahlia. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1976.
———. Farewell, My Lovely. New York: Vintage Books, 1976.
———. The Long Goodbye. New York: Ballantine Books, 1971.
Cheney, Sheldon. Expressionism in Art. New York: Liveright, 1958.
Deming, Barbara. Running Away from Myself. New York: Grossman, 1969.
Durgnat, Raymond. “The Family Tree of Film Noir,” in Cinema (UK), 1970.
———. The Strange Case of Alfred Hitchcock or, the Plain Man’s Hitchcock. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1974.
Durham, Philip. Down These Mean Streets a Man Must Go: Raymond Chandler’s Knight. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1963.
Eisinger, Chester E. Fiction of the Forties. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1963.
Eisner, Lotte H. Fritz Lang. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.
———. The Haunted Screen. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1965.
Everson, William K. The Detective in Film. Secaucus, New Jersey: Citadel Press, 1972.
Farber, Manny. Negative Space. New York: Praeger, 1971.
Ferguson, Otis. The Film Criticism of Otis Ferguson. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1971.
Frohock, W. M. The Novel of Violence in America 1920- 1950. Dallas: Southern Methodist University, 1973.
Gabree, John. Gangsters from Little Caesar to The Godfather. New York: Pyramid, 1973.
Greene, Graham. The Ministry of Fear. New York: Penguin Books, 1978.
Gross, Miriam, editor. The World of Raymond Chandler. New York: A & W Publishers, 1977.
Gurko, Leo. The Angry Decade. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1947.
———. Heroes, Highbrows and The Popular Mind. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1953.
Hammett, Dashiell. The Big Knockover. New York: Vintage Books, 1972.
———. The Continental Op. New York: Vintage Books, 1975.
———. The Glass Key. New York: Vintage Books, 1972.
———. The Maltese Falcon. New York: Vintage Books, 1972.
Haycr
aft, Howard. Murder for Pleasure: The Life and Times of the Detective Story. New York: Biblo and Tannen, 1968.
Hemingway, Ernest. To Have and Have Not. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1970.
———. “The Killers,” in Men Without Women. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1932.
Higham, Charles, and Joel Greenberg. Hollywood in the Forties. New York: A. S. Barnes; London: The Tantivy Press, 1968.
Hirsch, Foster. Edward G. Robinson. New York: Pyramid, 1975.
———. Joseph Losey. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1980.
Hughes, Dorothy M. In a Lonely Place. New York: Bantam Books, 1979.
———. Ride the Pink Horse. New York: Bantam Books, 1979.
Jacobs, Diane. Hollywood Renaissance. Cranbury, New Jersey: A. S. Barnes; London: The Tantivy Press, 1977.
Kaminsky, Stuart. American Film Genres. Dayton, Ohio: Pflaum-Standard, 1974.
Kaplan, E. Ann, editor. Women in Film Noir. London: BFI, 1978.
Karimi, Amir Massourd. Toward a Definition of the American Film Noir (1941-1949). New York: Arno Press, 1976.
Karpf, Stephen Louis. The Gangster Film: Emergence, Variation and Decay of a Genre 1930-1940. New York: Arno Press, 1973.
Kracauer, Siegfried. From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German Film. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1947.
Landrum, Larry N., and Pat Browne, and Ray B. Browne, editors. Dimensions of Detective Fiction. Popular Press, 1976.
MacShane, Frank. The Life of Raymond Chandler. New York: Penguin Books, 1978.
McArthur, Colin. Underworld USA. New York: The Viking Press, 1972.
McCarthy, Todd, and Charles Flynn. Kings of the Bs: Working Within the Hollywood System. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1975.
Madden, David. James M. Cain. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1970.
———., ed. Tough Guy Writers of the Thirties. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1968.
Nevins, Jr., Francis M. The Mystery Writer’s Art. Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1970.
O’Hara, John. Appointment in Samarra. New York: Random House, 1934.
Phillips, Cabell. The 1940s: Decade of Triumph and Trouble. New York: Macmillan, 1975.
Rosow, Eugene. Born to Lose: The Gangster Film in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1978.
Ruehlmann, William. Saint with a Gun: The Unlawful American Private Eye. New York: New York University Press, 1974.
Ruhm, Herbert, editor. The Hard-Boiled Detective: Stories from Black Mask Magazine 1920-1951. New York: Vintage Books, 1977.
Sarris, Andrew. The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929-1968. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1968.
Schrader, Paul. “Notes on Film Noir,” in Film Comment (Spring 1972).
Shadoian, Jack. Dreams and Dead Ends: The American Gangster/Crime Film. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1977.
Silver, Alain, and Elizabeth Ward, eds. Film Noir, An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style. Wood-stock: The Overlook Press, 1979.
Solomon, Stanley. Beyond Formula: American Film Genre. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1976.
Tyler, Parker. Magic and Myth of the Movies. New York:
Simon & Schuster, 1970. Warshow, Robert. “The Gangster as Tragic Hero,” in The Immediate Experience. New York: Atheneum, 1970.
Wolfe, Peter. Graham Greene: The Entertainer. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1972.
Wood, Robin. Hitchcock’s Films. New York: A. S. Barnes; London: The Tantivy Press, 1977.
Woolrich, Cornell (as William Irish). “Angel Face,” in Crime on Her Mind, ed. by Michele E. Slung. New York: Pantheon, 1975.
———. Angels of Darkness. New York: The Mysterious Press, 1978.
———. The Black Angel. New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1943.
———. Nightwebs. New York: Avon, 1974.
———. “Rear Window,” in Stories into Film, edited by William Kittridge and Steven M. Krauzer. New York: Harper & Row, 1979.
Willett, John. Expressionism. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1970.
Wilson, Edmund. “The Boys in the Back Room,” “Why Do People Read Detective Stories?” in Classics and Commercials: A Literary Chronicle of the Forties. New York: Vintage Books, 1962.
Selected Filmography
THE ACCUSED. Paramount. 1949.Screenplay: Ketti Frings, from the novel BE STILL, MY LOVE by June Truesdell. Director: William Dieterle. Director of Photography: Milton Krasner. Music: Victor Young. Art Directors: Hans Dreier, Earl Hedrick. Editor: Warren Low. Cast: Loretta Young, Robert Cummings, Wendell Corey, Sam Jaffe, Douglas Dick.
ACT OF VIOLENCE. MGM. 1949. Screenplay: Robert L. Richards, from an unpublished story by Collier Young. Director: Fred Zinnemann. Director of Photography: Robert Surtees. Music: Bronislau Kaper. Art Directors: Cedric Gibbons, Hans Peters. Editor: Conrad A. Nervig. Cast: Van Heflin, Robert Ryan, Janet Leigh, Phyllis Thaxter, Mary Astor.
ANGEL FACE. RKO. 1952. Screenplay: Frank Nugent and Oscar Millard; from an unpublished story by Chester Erskine. Director: Otto Preminger. Director of Photography: Harry Stradling. Music Score and Conductor: Dimitri Tiomkin. Art Directors: Albert S. D’Agostino, Carroll Clark. Editor: Frederic Knudtson. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jean Simmons, Mona Freeman, Herbert Marshall.
APPOINTMENT WITH A SHADOW. 1959. Universal-International. Screenplay: Alec Coppel, Norman Jolley. Director: Richard Carlson. Director of Photography: William E. Snyder. Music: Joseph Gershenson. Art Directors: Alexander Golitzen, Bill Newberry. Editor: George A. Gittens. Cast: George Nader, Joanna Moore, Brian Keith, Virginia Field, Frank DeKova.
ARMORED CAR ROBBERY. RKO. 1950. Screenplay: Earl Felton, Gerald Drayson. Director: Richard Fleischer. Director of Photography: Guy Roe. Music: Roy Webb. Art Directors: Albert S. D’Agostino, Ralph Berger. Editor: Desmond Marquette. Cast: Charles McGraw, Adele Jergens, William Talman, Steve Brodie, Gene Evans, Douglas Fowley.
THE ASPHALT JUNGLE. MGM. 1950. Screenplay: Ben Maddow and John Huston; from the novel by W. R. Burnett. Director: John Huston. Director of Photography: Harold Rosson. Music: Miklos Rozsa. Art Directors: Cedric Gibbons, Randall Duell. Editor: George Boemler. Cast: Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, Jean Hagen, Sam Jaffe, Marilyn Monroe.
BEWARE, MY LOVELY. Filmmakers-RKO. 1952. Screenplay: Mel Dinelli; from his play and short story The Man. Director: Harry Horner. Director of Photography: George E. Diskant. Music: Leith Stevens. Art Directors: Albert S. D’Agostino, Alfred Herman. Editor: Paul Weatherwax. Cast: Ida Lupino, Robert Ryan.
BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT. RKO. 1956. Screenplay: Douglas Morrow. Director: Fritz Lang. Director of Photography: William Snyder. Music: Herschel Burke Gilbert. Art Director: Carroll Clark. Editor: Gene Fowler Jr. Cast: Dana Andrews, Joan Fontaine, Sidney Blackmer, Philip Bourneuf, Shepperd Strudwick, Barbara Nichols.
BEYOND THE FOREST. Warner Brothers. 1949. Screenplay: Lenore Coffee; from the novel by Stuart Engstrand. Director: King Vidor. Director of Photography: Robert Burks. Music: Max Steiner. Art Director: Robert Haas. Editor: Rudi Fehr. Cast: Bette Davis, Joseph Cotten, David Brian, Ruth Roman, Dona Drake.
THE BIG CARNIVAL (ACE IN THE HOLE). Paramount. 1951. Screenplay: Billy Wilder. Director of Photography: Charles B. Lang. Music: Hugo Friedhofer. Art Directors: Hal Periera, Earl Hedrick. Editor: Arthur Schmidt. Cast: Kirk Douglas, Jan Sterling, Porter Hall, Frank Cady, Ray Teal.
THE BIG CLOCK. Paramount. 1948. Screenplay: Jonathan Latimer, adapted by Harold Goldman; from the novel by Kenneth Fearing. Director: John Farrow. Director of Photography: John F. Seitz. Music: Victor Young. Art Directors: Hans Dreier, Roland Anderson, Albert Nozaki. Editor: Gene Ruggiero. Cast: Ray Milland, Charles Laughton, Maureen O’Sullivan, Elsa Lanchester.
THE BIG COMBO. Security-Theodora-Allied Artists. 1955. Screenplay: Philip Yordan. Director: Joseph H. Lewis. Director of Photography: John Alton. Music: David Raskin. Production Designer: Rudi Feld. Editor: Robert Eisen. Cast: Cornell Wilde, Jean Wallace, Richard Conte, Brian Donlevy.
THE BIG HEAT. Columbia. 1953. Screenplay: Sydney Boehm; from the novel by William P. McGivern. Director: Fritz Lang. Director of Photography: Charles Lang. Music: Daniele Amfitheatrof. Art Director: Robert Peterson. Editor: Charles Nelson. Cast: Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame, Jocelyn Brando, Alexander Scourby, Lee Marvin, Jeanette Nolan.
THE BIG SLEEP. Warner Brothers. 1946. Screenplay: William Faulkner, Leigh Brackett, and Jules Furthman; from the novel by Raymond Chandler. Director: Howard Hawks. Director of Photography: Sid Hickox. Music: Max Steiner. Art Director: Carl Jules Weyl. Editor: Christian Nyby. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Martha Vickers, Dorothy Malone.
BLACK ANGEL. Universal. 1946. Screenplay: Roy Chanslor; from the novel by Cornell Woolrich. Director: Roy William Neill. Director of Photography: Paul Ivano. Music: Frank Skinner. Art Directors: Jack Otterson, Martin Obzina. Editor: Saul A. Goodkind. Cast: Dan Duryea, June Vincent, Peter Lorre, Broderick Crawford, Constance Dowling, Wallace Ford.
BLAST OF SILENCE. Universal-International. 1961. Screenplay: Allen Baron. Director: Allen Baron. Director of Photography: Merrill Brody. Music: Meyer Kupferman. Art Director: Charles Rosen. Editor: Merrill Brody. Cast: Allen Baron, Molly McCarthy, Ralph Tucker.
The Dark Side of the Screen: Film Noir Page 27
