Hammer Horror?

Depicting a nightmarish landscape of big city nights, with a mix of brightly flashing neon signs and foggy, shadowy landscapes, the classic 1944 film noir Murder, My Sweet, directed by Edward Dmytryk (The Caine Mutiny), is a feast for the eyes. Our reflective narrator is Philip Marlowe (played by Dick Powell in this one), his eyes bandaged in ominous fashion as he recounts the strange tale of his most recent mysterious cases to the circling sharks that are the police – especially lieutenant Randall (Don Douglas). The iconic private detective is, as he says, "just a small businessman in a very messy business". Dmytryk’s canvas oozes a certain visual panache, a perfect example being the way in which Marlowe meets a new client. Gazing out at the flashing neon signs from his office, in certain lights, he sees a face no one could forget (though at first it feels like some sort of vision or premonition). Soon, he realizes that there is a behemoth of a man standing behind him, named ‘Moose’ Malloy (Mike Mazurki) – he is a tough, thuggish giant who lacks brains, but makes up for it with brawn and a stick-to-it-iveness that is difficult to ignore. Marlowe soon realizes that the confused man won’t take no for an answer, so he accepts the money being offered to him and decides to hear him out.

Upon winning Best Director at the Academy Awards for his 1937 screwball comedy The Awful Truth (the highest grossing film of the year), Leo McCarey took his Oscar, turned to the applauding crowd and uttered the unusual acceptance of "I want to thank the Academy for this wonderful award . . . but you gave it to me for the wrong picture". The movie he was talking about was the powerfully emotional drama Make Way for Tomorrow. A bust at the box office, the film still brought recognition to one of the premier filmmakers of the era. Being a favourite of John Ford, Frank Capra, Jean Renoir, Ernst Lubitsch, George Bernard Shaw and Orson Welles (who called it one of the saddest films ever, claiming that "it would even make a stone cry"), as well as being the inspiration behind Yasujirô Ozu’s classic 1953 picture Tokyo Story, this is a pure piece of emotional film making. Funnily enough, though praised by iconic filmmakers and ardent film fanatics alike, it is probably one of the least known motion pictures out there. Nearly unseen, thankfully Criterion has released it, providing the movie with an avenue to finally reach a larger audience.

Though we have all become accustomed to November being coined Movember, there is another moniker that is perhaps lesser known. ‘Noirvember’ has, over the last few years, gone viral, making this eleventh month of the year the perfect one to celebrate the shadowy, gloom filled, doom-laden film noirs of the 1940s and 50s. So, I thought I would start us off with a bang by reviewing the classic 1947 crime noir Out of the Past. Written by Daniel Mainwaring (he wrote the screenplay and the novel the film is based off of under the pseudonym Geoffrey Homes – titled "Build My Gallows High") and directed by Jacques Tourneur (Cat People), past mistakes meet present danger when gas station owner Jeff Bailey (Robert Mitchum), who has been hiding in a small California town after a torrid life, is tracked down by Joe Stefanos (Paul Valentine), a trusted henchman for a smooth but sketchy gangster named Whit Sterling (Kirk Douglas).

Combining a touch of horror and film noir within a murder mystery, Abbott and Costello once again add their unique brand of humour to dark subject matter in the 1942 classic comedic caper Who Done It?. Directed by Erle C. Kenton (Island of Lost Souls), this flick finds straight man Bud Abbott playing Chick Larkin while funny man Lou Costello portrays Mervin Q. Milgrim; together, they are a pair of simple-minded soda jerks on the bottom floor of a popular radio station. Yet, their true dream is to become head writers for a mystery themed radio show – which is why they took the low paying jobs in the highfalutin building. Finding writer Jimmy Turner (Patric Knowles) and secretary to the boss, Juliet Collins (Mary Wickes), in their midst while working at the soda and ice cream bar, they see this as a prime opportunity to pitch their idea. Turner takes a liking to the funny friends and invites them to a live taping of his program, Murder at Midnight.

Adapting H.G. Wells’ novel "The Island of Doctor Moreau" for the screen, Paramount’s 1932 film Island of Lost Souls is not nearly as well known as the Universal horror pictures that were released around the same time (Dracula, Frankenstein, The Invisible Man), though it most definitely should be. Though H.G. Wells despised the picture and its overt horror elements (which he felt got in the way of the true message of his book), it has become known as the premier adaptation of the classic novel – though it was banned three times in Britain for its depiction of vivisection. Adapted by Waldemar Young and Philip Wylie, and directed by Erle C. Kenton (The Ghost of Frankenstein, House of Frankenstein, House of Dracula), the cautionary tale follows shipwrecked survivor Edward Parker (Richard Arlen) as he is picked up by a trading vessel. Treated by a dour doctor, Montgomery (Arthur Hohl), the newly resuscitated man discovers an odd array of animals on the ship.