Noirsville Clip of the Week

The Blue Grotto - from Transitional Beatnik Noir - Night Tide (1961) Dennis Hopper and Paul Horn on flute

Noirsville Update - Night Tide (1961)

 An updated review of a restored release with new screencaps for Night Tide (1961) 

Noirsville Pulp Art

 

One Way Street (1950) Cali-Mex Noir

Directed by Hugo Fregonese (Apenas un delincuente, Man in the Attic (1953), My Six Convicts, Black Tuesday, Old Shatterhand). 

Written by Lawrence Kimble. Cinematography by Maury Gertsman, Music by Frank Skinner. 

The film stars James Mason (a Classic Noir Vet)  as Dr. Frank Matson, Märta Torén (Illegal Entry, Deported, Sirocco) as Laura Thorsen, Dan Duryea (another Classic Noir Vet) as John Wheeler, Basil Ruysdael (The File on Thelma Jordan, The Scarf) as Father Moreno, William Conrad (another Classic Noir Vet) as Ollie, Rodolfo Acosta (Salon Mexico, Victims of Sin) as Francisco Morales, King Donovan (another Classic Noir Vet) as Grieder, Robert Espinoza as Santiago, Tito Renaldo (Tension, Ride The Pink Horse ) as Hank Morales, Margarito Luna as Antania Morales, Emma Roldán as Catalina, George J. Lewis as Capt. Rodriguez. 

Story

Night. Somewhere in Los Angeles. 

Märta Torén as Laura Thorsen

A mid century modern looking apartment house. Laura Thorsen a classy looking twist, looks out of an open third story window. We hear sirens out in the city.  In the room behind her and seated around a table. are mob boss John Wheeler and two of his goons Grieder, and Ollie. 

They just pulled a job and the loot is sitting in a small leather bag on a sideboard. During the heist Ollie got winged in the left arm. Two others of their crew haven't returned. 

 William Conrad as Ollie

Grieder who gives off a junkie / rodent aura, is getting anxious, getting twitchy. Grieder keeps looking at the bag, he wants his split (maybe needs a hit), while Ollie is whining about his wound. He wants Wheeler to send for the gangs croaker, Doc Matson. 

Matsen conveniently lives just down the hall in the same apartment building. Somehow, it's never explained how exactly, gambling debt's?, possibly, Matsen gets involved in the underworld and becomes a mob croaker. Maybe it's partially because his judgement is fogged. He's still bitter and emotionally fucked up because, even with all his skills as a gifted physician, he could not save his own young wife. 

Wheeler, tired of listening to Ollie, asks Laura to go fetch the Doc. 

Big mistake Johnny. Laura has the hots for Frank, and she lets him know it. 

Johnny BTW has been "taking care" of Laura ever since her old man, Johnny's best friend, got it on another job they was pulling. Johnny's been molding her into his idea of a kind of  high class dream woman ever since. Some speculative pedo vibes here.

So when Laura gets to Frank's she just walks right in, so she's obviously been here before, no? 

Laura subtexting Frank played by James Mason

Matson, meanwhile, has been biding his time, formulating an ingenious plan and waiting for just the right set of circumstances to spring it. And it just walked in his door.

Frank grabs his doctors satchel and follows Laura back to the Johnny's apartment. 

In the apartment it's down to business Frank puts his little black doctor's bag down along side the satchel with the $200,000, from the robbery. He grabs a hypo and gives Ollie a shot and then grabs some scissors and starts cutting off Ollie's shirt. 

Dan Duryea as Johnny Wheeler 

Johnny is sounding irritable. He always gets a migraine headache whenever a big job goes down, and Grieder wheedling him about splitting the cash isn't helping.

King Donovan as Grieder

Take these pills....

When Frank is done patching up Ollie he reaches into his satchel and pulls out a pill bottle and gives a couple to Johnny, telling him that they will ease his migraine. Johnny is surprised, but Frank reminds him that he always gets them. 

Johnny takes the pills and chases them down with his drink 

Frank replaces the pill bottle and shuts the bag and then picks up both his black bag and the gangs satchel of C-notes. WTF? Johnny makes a crack, thinking he's joking but Frank tells Johnny that he's taking the money and Johnny is going to let him if he wants to live. 

Johnny puts two and two together and says "the pills." Frank explains that he'll be dead in an hour, but he 'll phone him and tell him the antidote, after he splits. At this point Laura exclaims "take me with you," to Frank. 

"take me with you"

Nothing like kicking a guy in the balls when he's down. Not only is Frank taking their money, but he's taking Johnny's fantasy dream girl, shack job, with him. Ollie is bemused and Grieder starts getting apoplectic at the though of losing his cut. You can almost picture a cartoon bag of money flying out a window in his head.

Meanwhile, we cut to see Arnie, the last remaining member of the gang arriving in the hall outside Johnny's apartment door and see him eavesdropping on what's been going on.

Jack Elam as Arnie

Back in the apartment Johnny tells Frank to go but threatens that he may change his mind as they make that long walk to the sidewalk and the car. Grieder is not happy.

When Frank and Laura go out in the hall Arnie has disappeared. They walk to the elevator and ride down to the lobby, and then head out along the breezeway towards the sidewalk and Frank's car.

Up in the apartment Grieder looking helplessly out the window pulls his gun and is about to shoot at Frank but Johnny shoots him down before he can do it. 

King Donovan buying the farm 

Laura and Frank hop in the car and drive away. As they are driving Laura asks Frank about calling Johnny with the antidote. Frank tells her that he doesn't need to because the pills he gave Johnny were harmless. At about this point Arnie pops up from the back seat with a revolver pointed at the back of Frank's head. 

When Frank asks him if he wants him to turn around Arnie says no way, now that they got all the money. Arnie orders Laura to slide over and take the wheel from Frank. Bad idea Arnie, because Frank spins around gabs his gun hand and slips over the seat. While wrestling with Arnie the gun goes off but Frank manages to break Arnie's neck. 

Now with a dead body in the car Franks instructs Laura to drive extra carefully. But this is a Noir so of coursed they side swiped by a truck and get into an accident. Arnie is the only "casualty," and Frank explains to the police that are investigating the incident, that Arnie was a hitch-hiker that they just picked up a few blocks before the accident. 

Frank give the police his card and tells them to call him tomorrow if they have any more questions. 

Frank and Laura head to the nearest used car lot and buy another sled and flee to the border at Tijuana Mexico. That's only a hundred and forty miles but in 1950 if you were following the speed limits it would probably be a 3-4 hour drive.

Ones in Tijuana they find the local airport and hire "Hank" Torres to fly them in his Piper J-3 Cub to Mexico City.

Back in Los Angeles, Johnny is very much alive and pissed. He first has Ollie put the word out to the mob to be on the lookout for the Doc, but later gets a brainstorm and has Ollie call the cops claiming that it's a matter of life and death that they contact Doctor Matson and he gives them a description of Matson's car. 

Later Johnny gets a call back from the police, and is told that the Doc and Laura were in an accident and that a guy named Arnie, a hitch hiker that the Doc picked up was the only casualty. Johnny sends Ollie out the the scene of the accident to check all the used car lots within walking distance.

Once we get to this point the film goes Noirsville when on the flight to Mexico City the Piper Cub's fuel pump quits, forcing the plane to land in a remote costal village. At this point we switch gears from Crime into an Adventure / Western complete with a friendly padre, a gang of kids, federales, bandidos and a medicine woman, before returning to Crime Noir. 

Noirsville

Basil Ruysdael as Father Moreno

 

Rodolfo Acosta as Francisco Morales

This film is very similar to The Treasure of The Sierra Madre. The Huston film starts off Noir in Tampico, switches to a Western Adventure and then plunges back into Noir as gold fever consumes Dobbs. 

This is a well made film.  Most of the cast Mason, Torén, Duryea, Conrad, Acosta, Donovan, and Renaldo, are fully believable, only Basil Ruysdael as Father Moreno is pushing credibility for me. 

The film is entertaining enough to keep you interested in the fate of the characters even with the heavy handed MPPC predictably making sure the law prevailed. 7/10.

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