Black Angel (1946) Woolrich Inspired Film Noir and the novel it's based on

For all New York based Noir Aficio-Noir-dos, it's too bad it didn't follow the novel

Here is a Cornell Woolrich based film that unfortunately completely changes the entire setup of the novel. 

The 1943 novel takes place in New York City, The 1946 film adaptation unfortunately moves everything to Los Angeles. That wipes out the entire searching The Bowery flophouses for "Heartbreak" sequence. Though, interestingly enough Heartbreak shows up in the film as a song on a record. 

In the novel the main protagonist is a woman Alberta Murray. The first inkling that something is wrong is when her husband stops calling her by his pet name for her, "Angel Face." Then she finds a solid gold powder compact engraved "To Mia from Marty," in Kirk's overcoat pocket. Kirk tells Alberta that he found it on the street. When the next day it is gone, and she asks about it, Kirk tells her that he took it to a jewelers and left it there when the jeweler told him it was just a gilt metal fake. Suspicious because she noticed a "14 k,"  Alberta visits the jeweler who tells her Kirk was never there. Alberta now suspects her husband Kirk's infidelity with Mia Mercer, a woman of somewhat loose morals whose real profession is left to the imagination. Woolrich describes a publicity photo of her as a scantily clad "attraction," at a place called Dave Hennessey's The Hermitage. Probably a topless showgirl or a stripper. (In the film the name Mia Mercer is changed to Mavis Marlowe and she is now a nightclub singer). 

Alberta, after finding a valise and two of Kirk's suits missing, thinks her husband is going off on a weekend trip with Mia. 

Alberta decides to go and do something about it. She sleuths out Mia's address from The Hermitage and goes to confront her in person.  Mia lives in a posh apartment that has various pieces of bric-a-brac festooned with her initials MM. When she gets to Mia's apartment building she finds the door to Mia's unlocked and Mia in her bedroom laying on the floor, suffocated to death with a pillow. While the threat to her marriage is now defunct, Mia, worried about any scandal connecting Mia to her husband Kirk, grabs Mia's address / telephone book. Leaving the apartment Alberta notices on the way out, that the front door didn't lock because someone, the murderer, jammed a matchbook with a single letter M on it's cover, into the doors lock mechanism. It prevented the bolt from engaging. 

Alberta rushes back to her home and frantically tries to get ahold of her husband at his office, to warn him about going to Mia's. It's already too late. When Kirk gets to Mia's the murder has already been discovered, and he is arrested by the police. Various witness statements place Kirk at Mia's apartment many times. 

The trial is quick, Kirk is found guilty, and ever loyal Alberta armed with Mia's address book decides to try and find the real murderer before Kirks execution date. In the address book there are four "M's". 

Marty ----- Crestview 6-4824

Mordant ---- Atwater  8-7457

Mason -- Butterfield  9-8019

McKee ---- Columbus 4-0011

So the rest of the novel is about Albert's quest to find the killer and exonerate her husband. 

The first listing Marty has a diagonal line through it. Its crossed off Mavis' list. Alberta finds out that it is the number of a fairly swank residence hotel. At that hotel Alberta asks them for any Marty's they had or have listed in the register, within the last year. Of the Marty's listed one left town, the other full named Marty Blair left a forwarding address to a more downscale abode. Way downtown. At this hotel, the desk clerk tells Alberta that Marty is a tall, thin guy, and, an alcoholic, who is now a skid row bum, and living in a flop house down somewhere on The Bowery (L.A readers think Bunker Hill). It's one of a city of New York's size many shithole neighborhoods that come and go throughout its almost 400 year history. 

The Bowery sits North of Chinatown, East of Little Italy and West of The East village and The Lower East Side.  "... in the 1920s and 1930s, it was an impoverished area. From the 1940s through the 1970s, the Bowery was New York City's "Skid Row," notable for "Bowery Bums" (disaffected alcoholics and homeless persons)" (Giamo, Benedict, On the Bowery: confronting homelessness in American Society (University of Iowa Press) 1989.)

The Third Avenue El ran above the Bowery until 1955. It shaded the pavement and sidewalks below in various shades of gloom. "It is filled with employment agencies, cheap clothing and knickknack stores, cheap moving-picture shows, cheap lodging-houses, cheap eating-houses, cheap saloons", writers in The Century Magazine found it in 1919. "Here, too, by the thousands come sailors on shore leave, – notice the 'studios' of the tattoo artists, – and here most in evidence are the 'down and outs'" ( Frank, Mary and Carr, John Foster, "Exploring a neighborhood", The Century Magazine 98 (July 1919:378).)

What follows in the novel are great descriptions by Woolrich (for anyone interested in Noir New York) of the typical Bowery flop. For instance, none of the flop hotels had street floor lobbies. I didn't know that. The ground floors were all high ceilinged shop fronts. The hotel lobbies were up on the 2nd floor. Alberta must make her way up a, longer than usual flight of stairs, of each flop ask the desk clerk for Marty Blair and if there, ask for him to give a him description. No dice. Then climb back down the stairway walk past the next store front and climb back up to the next 2nd floor lobby and repeat. After a couple of dozen flops she finally gets a lead on a bum they call "Heartbreak."

Some of the real Bowery Flop Houses under the 3rd Avenue el all their lobbies were on the 2nd Floor. Compare to the Hollywood backlot Bowery Flop below.

Note no el so no shadowy gloom, a ground floor entrance and a bit too California sunny, (from The Killer That Stalked New York (1950)).

The rest of the leads are Mordant who turns out to be a a heroin pushing "Dr. Feelgood". To get into this strange lowlifes good graces she pretends to be a friend of Mia's and agrees to be a drug mule making deliveries to, The Spotless Cafeteria Diner a greasy spoon on Canal Street, West of Chinatown, The Oregon Bar under the el on 3rd Ave above 49th St., The Mimi Club with a girlie floor show up on 8th near Columbus Circle, and, the Gem Theater an all night grindhouse on 42nd Street. 

Ladd Mason a high society type who Alberta meets, in a mini cocktail bar called the Blues Chaser, around the corner from The Ritz Hotel. And finally Jerome J. McKee a  mobbed up owner of the Ninety Club, where Alberta must audition for the chorus line in order to get into his presence. It is here BTW at this nightclub where Alberta receives her black dress with wings, the  "Black Angel" costume. The Black Angel of the title refers to Alberta and her quest for justice which ends in the doom of each of the men in Mia's phone book.

The 1946 film version of Black Angel directed by Roy William Neill and written by Roy Chanslor changes a lot of story points, switches the action from New York to Los Angeles then of course drops the whole Bowery search, all of Dr. Mordant and the drug dealing angle altogether, and combines alcoholic Marty "Heartbreak" Blair and socialite Ladd Mason into pianist/composer Martin Blair. Alberta and Kirk Murray in the novel, are changed to Catherine and Kirk Bennett. Mavis Marlowe (Mia Mercer in the novel) changes from being a slutty playgirl to a slutty blackmailer aka the Black Angel of the film title) The film also expands a police captains role. 

Cinematography was by Paul Ivano and Music was by Frank Skinner.

Constance Dowling as Mavis Marlowe

The film stars Film Noir vets Dan Duryea as Martin Blair, Peter Lorre as Marko, Broderick Crawford as Captain Flood, Constance Dowling (The Flame) as Mavis Marlowe, along with June Vincent as Catherine Bennett, Wallace Ford as Joe Hobart, Cavanaugh as Hotel Caretaker, Freddie Steele as Lucky, John Phillips as Kirk Bennett and Mary Field as Flo the Maid.

Dan Duryea as Martin Blair

 lt.

Peter Lorre

Broderick Crawford as Captain Flood rt., Robert Williams as Second Detective 

John Phillips as Kirk Bennett

June Vincent as Catherine Bennett

Mary Field as Flo the Maid

Story 

Los Angeles. Martin Blair. Marty. Leaning. Against cut stone façade. Looking. Up at a window. In the multi story Wilshire House.  Yearning, like a puppy for a lost bone. He wants Mavis. Mavis Marlowe, nightclub chanteuse, (remember in the novel she is politely called an attraction). She still has the hook in his heart. Marty. Ex husband. Composer. Wondering, who's boning her now.

A nice camera zoom past a Wilshire Blvd. street sign up to a lit window. Then through the blinds to a chandelier. What should have been just a fancy one floor apartment judging from The Wilshire House façade turns into an opulent and cavernous two story palace. A Universal Studios Noir. 

The maid Flo, is on her way out, she drops off a package that came for Mavis.  Mavis was putting the finishing touches on her makeup. The package contains a brooch. Its a red broken heart in cut stone. 

As the maid turns to leave Mavis tells her to put on some music. She puts on Heartbreak by Martin Blair, sung by Mavis Marlowe. Mavis hears that, blows her top, and goes out to bawl out Flo. She tells her that she told never to play that again. 

Mavis, now seething once she figured it all out, calls down to the doorman and gives him instructions that she doesn't want to see Martin Blair now or ever.

Marty thinking that by now Flo should have given her the brooch, thinks he's made in the shade. He crosses Wilshire. Walks into the lobby and gets the news that Mavis has shot him down before he even got near the saddle. 

She doesn't want to see you not now or ever

The doorman has to get rough. Marty stalks out. Passes Marko. Slovakian. Owner. Rio's Nightclub.  Goulash Greaseball. 

Marty overhears, Marko asking for Mavis. The Doorman tells him to go right up.  

Dick Wessel as Doorman

So Marty, now knows, who is playing hide the Carniolan kielbasa with Mavis. That thought, makes him want to drink. He heads off looking for his favorite bar Al's. Too bad this film was set bound. If they would at least have used Bunker Hill the L.A. equivalent of The Bowery it would have been a bit more impressive.

Marko!

All the events outside the Wilshire House are witnessed by LAPD Captain Flood and another officer on stakeout but we don't know who they are watching.

Later that evening Kirk Bennett husband of Catherine Bennett. Shows up at the door to Mavis' apartment.  

(Remember, these two characters from the novel are Alberta and Kirk Murray, with Alberta being the main protagonist of the novel) 

Kirk hears Heartbreak playing and the door open. He goes right in. So there is your subtext, Mavis' door is open. She's doing not only Marko but Kirk too and who knows who else. In the living room he stops to light a match. His lighter doesn't work so he picks up a matchbook, its got a letter "M" on the cover and a phone number inside. He calls out again Mavis' name.

He finds Mavis strangled in her bedroom. The broken heart brooch is pinned between her breasts. He leaves his finger prints everywhere. 

He goes back out to the living room to shut off the repeating record. When he does so, he hears a thump from the bedroom. Running back in there, he checks the closet, pauses when he notices that the broken heart brooch is now gone. 

That distraction was enough. Who ever was in the room was hiding behind the door. He runs out through the living room and out the hall door. Kirk runs out after him. Too late. He is gone. The apartment door swings shut and Kirk is now locked out. Kirk panics. He runs to the elevator but the door is opening. He U-turns for the stairs, but the maid Flo stepping out of the car spots him. 

Mary Field as Flo the Maid

Night. Suburban house. Flood and his partner climb the porch and ring the door bell. Catherine Bennett opens the door and finds out that her husband is wanted for murder. (this is the first appearance at the twelve minute mark, of the character the Woolrich novel is all about).

Kirk soon shows up and is immediately arrested. Here is where Catherine Bennett begins to try and clear her husband of the murder charges and subsequent death sentence.

Noirsville

Marion Martin as Millie

Wallace Ford as Joe

          Freddie Steele as Lucky rt

Black Angel is very watchable with some good visual style touches and Duryea puts in a very good performance showing lot of range. Lorre walks around with a cig stuck to his lower lip so much he looks like a mono tusked walrus. June Vincent, for me anyway, was a bit wooden in this, she has no spark. 

Constance Dowling has that natural look that some women have in their eyes that signals "warning," just below this carefully made up surface I am one crazy bitch. Some of you will know that look. 

Broderick Crawford plays his part against his usual blustery type, he is a calm, under control captain of detectives.  

Black Angel is a disappointment after reading the novel. The film just doesn't do it justice. As a lot of Aficio-Noir-dos and Noir-istas are well aware the MPPC and the Legion of Decency and occasionally the studios themselves have fucked up a lot of Noir. 

Black Angel also could have been another great "sleazy underbelly" of New York Noir had it actually been shot on the locations it describes. This could also be said of Deadline At Dawn. As is a 7/10.

Here is another example of a Noir that could be remade into a completely New Noir just by following Woolrich's novel. It would even work better as a Mini Series (with the right cast) a la HBO's Perry Mason TV Series 2020–.)

Cornell Woolrich disliked the film version of his novel. Woolrich saw the film at the urging of Mark Van Doren, a Columbia University professor, and hated it. He wrote to Van Doren in 1947: "I was so ashamed when I came out of there ... it took me two or three days to get over it. All I could keep thinking of in the dark was: Is that what I wasted my whole life at?" ( http://www.sphozy.com/writings/nightmare-world-cornell-woolrich-first-you-dream-then-you-die)