Chicago Syndicate (1955)

Film noir is littered with titles referring to US cities: 'Inside Detroit', 'New York Confidential', 'Miami Exposé', 'New Orleans Uncensored', 'The Las Vegas Story' and so on. The windy city, Chicago, might top them all however in this list with 'Chicago Deadline', 'Chicago Confidential', the near-noir 'Chicago Calling', the proto-noir 'Gangs Of Chicago', and this one, 'Chicago Syndicate'. Released in 1955, it's also part of another long list of noirs, those dealing with exposing crime rackets. They became very popular after the Kefauver hearings in the early 50s, as I already mentioned in my review of 'New York Confidential'.

In this movie, Chicago's criminal top dog is Arnie Valent (Paul Stewart). By setting up countless small legitimate outfits as fronts for his less legal activities, and by using strawmen in his books, he's virtually untouchable for law enforcement. His top accountant however is ready to spill the beans to a newspaper editor, only get get gunned down by Valent's men outside the newspaper office. The newspaper editor and several city officials convene and decide they need an inside man to find something they can use on Valent. That man is Barry Amsterdam (Dennis O'Keefe), an accountant with an army background. After dropping hints he saw the hit and a talk with Valent he lands himself a job as an accountant for one of Valent's legitimate insurance firms. By first saving the company money on some big claims, and then showing Valent his top men are holding out on him, he works himself up to Valent's personal accountant. But before he can get to Valent's books, the ones with his name in them, he has to deal with Valent's girlfriend Connie (Abbe Lane) and socialite and high stakes gambler Sue Morton (Allison Hayes) who has her own reasons for wanting to get close to Valent.

'Winters said you were a bright boy.'
'I'm bright enough to be a coward where the syndicate is concerned.'

The movie's climax takes place in a tunnel system below Chicago, supposedly used for moving stock from a central warehouse to department stores around the city without having to deal with traffic. It's short but sweet, altho not coming close to similar and more memorable underground/tunnel scenes like those from 'He Walked By Night' and 'The Third Man'. But for a B-movie which this clearly is, it's really well-done.

Dennis O'Keefe is best known in noir circles for his lead roles in the Anthony Mann/John Alton noirs 'Raw Deal' & 'T-Men'. He appeared in a ton of noirs tho, mostly for B-studios. In some ways he always reminds me of a poor man's Alan Ladd, and like Ladd, he's perfect for film noir. He has the right look and stoic expressionless face. His Barry Amsterdam doesn't take the inside job out of a sense of duty or injustice, the only reason he's interested is the $60K reward that the group is offering him, so he can start up his own accounting firm. A nice touch, which helps set this movie apart from the usual breed of 'brave' men in these movies. His adversary here, Paul Stewart, was an accomplished actor, both on the screen and in radio, having paid his dues in Orson Welles's Mercury Group. Like O'Keefe he appeared in many noirs, such as 'Champion' and 'Kiss Me Deadly'. He is great here, giving a sophisticated edge to Valent, while also showing Valent to be from the streets when he visits his mother in one of Chicago's lower class districts with Amsterdam.

Allison Hayes plays a tricky role here, as Sue Morton is only an alias, she's really somebody else. That reveal comes at the halfway point of the movie, both for Barry Amsterdam and the viewer. It adds an extra plotline to the movie, and Hayes pulls it off well. I also liked that her character and Amsterdam have obvious chemistry, but don't really do anything about it, they're both 'all business' in a sense. Contrast that with Abbe Lane's Connie, who is only about one thing, her relationship with Valent and more importantly, everything that comes with it. She's jealous and suspicious, trusting nobody except Valent and her bandleader, played by Lane's husband Xavier Cugat. Cugat was a bandleader in real life, he and his orchestra appeared in several movies, primarily those with Lane in them. They also do a few musical numbers here, with Abbe Lane singing, she's not dubbed as was often the case in these noirs. Lane does an nice job of portraying a beautiful and jealous woman, including a scene where Connie and Sue exchange catty remarks back and forth before enaging in a catfight.

'Everything gets better with age... except women.'

The names behind the camera are far more obscure. Director Fred F. Sears did direct several of the city noirs mentioned before, together with one half of this movie's duo of cinematographers, Henry Freulich. The other half, Fred Jackman Jr. lensed B-noirs like 'The Night Holds Terror' and 'They Made Me A Killer'. They managed to give the movie a decent, if unimaginative, look. The writers were also fairly undistinguished, Joseph Hoffman and William Sackheim. The crew does show what experience and workmanship can accomplish, as this is by no means a bad movie, it is well-paced and well-made.

As per usual, the movie ends with voice-over narration. But unlike most of these crime-busting noirs, the words spoken are not of the patronizing 'The brave government agents saved the day, order has been restored, you can sleep safely at night again.' sort, but more cynical, as it also implies that everybody, not just law enforcement agents, but also the general public needs to stay on their toes to keep the syndicate from rising up again. A nice touch to an above-average movie. 'Chicago Syndicate' is no classic by any standard, but it's well worth the effort.

7/10

New York Confidential (1955)

Between 1948 and 1952, a series of books with titles like 'New York: Confidential!' and 'Washington: Confidential!' were published; all written by journalist Jack Lait and newspaper columnist Lee Mortimer. These books described the seedy and criminal underbellies of various US cities in a pulpy and sensationalist manner, even if they were based on factual data and accounts. The series was quite popular, no doubt helped by the early 50s Kefauver Committee's investigation into organized crime and subsequent hearings of infamous mobsters. The hearings, and in turn the books, inspired numerous movies and TV and radio serials, including 1955's film noir 'New York Confidential'. The latter serving as inspiration for a TV series of the same name which aired 1 season in 1959.

Despite sharing a title with one of the Lait & Mortimer books, 'New York Confidential' the film was only 'suggested by' the books. The screenplay was written by Russell Rouse and Clarence Greene, who worked together on a number of movies, including several other noirs such as 'D.O.A.', 'The Thief' and 'Wicked Woman'. They often wrote the screenplay together with Rouse then directing and Greene producing the film, as is the case here. Eddie Fitzgerald did the cinematography, having already worked with Rouse & Greene on 'Wicked Woman'. Joseph Mullendore wrote his first score for this movie. He then quickly moved on to scoring TV series like 'The Dick Powell Show' and 'Burke's Law'.

'New York Confidential' starts out in the semi-documentary style that was popular in the late 40s to mid 50s, where government agents would typically infiltrate some sort of criminal outfit to bust it from the inside. In these movies a voice-over usually starts the movie, explaining the racket that would be all but obliterated by the end of the movie. But after such an intro, 'New York Confidential' quickly shifts, focusing solely on the criminals. There is no infiltrator, no government agency, secretly fighting this organization. The main concern of the film is captured in one quote which would have served far better as the tagline instead of the essay sprawled on the poster seen above:

The organization comes first

The organization is split up into territories, with a boss in every major city, each running their own territory. The New York boss is Charlie Lupo (Broderick Crawford), who is about to make a multi-million dollar deal. To carry it out he needs the support of corrupt politicians and lobbyists. What he does not need is publicity, which is exactly what he's getting when a local mobster shoots one of his men as well as some innocent bystanders. The law of the street demands he retaliate, so Lupo 'borrows' up and coming hitman Nick Magellan (Richard Conte) from the Chicago territory to try and keep his involvement out of the public and police eye. Magellan deals with the manner swiftly and deadly. Lupo is impressed, and arranges for Magellan to come work for him permanently.
In the end, the deal still goes sour due to a corrupt lobbyist talking a bit too freely in an interview. All the territory bosses gather and vote unanimously to bump off the guy. Lupo is chosen to take care of it. He orders his heavy, Wendler (Mike Mazurki), and his crew to make the hit. However, a cleaning lady messes things up and the men have to flee the scene, shooting a cop in the process. Lupo now has to do some major damage control before things really blow up in his face and he orders Magellan to get rid of Wendler and his men. Magellan kills two of them, but Wendler is on to Lupo and tries to cut a deal with the authorities to save his own skin. This could bring down the entire syndicate and Lupo is held responsible... The other bosses want blood and once again Magellan is asked to draw it for them.

In a way, 'New York Confidential' shows a more realistic version of the large crime syndicates than was common for the time. It would be impossible for a single man, or even a small team of people, to bring down this kind of organization, so this does not happen here, with the organization still firmly in its place at the end of the movie. What it shows, is how these outfits take care of their internal problems. Somebody wants to sell out, he dies, no matter how high up in the organisation he is. Loyalty to the organization outweighs everything. But that also means there's danger around every corner, and it comes in many disguises. The movie has elements of the 30s gangster movies as well as more modern movies like 'The Godfather' and 'Scarface' (both the 30s version and the more famous 80s version), by focusing only on the gritty, kill-or-be-killed lifestyle of the gangsters.

A meeting... From every territory in the country they answer the summons. Names you seldom hear, faces you rarely see. The high court of organized crime, sitting in judgement. A judgement which is final, from which there is no appeal.

Richard Conte and Broderick Crawford play the two main characters in this movie, and they're both excellent. Crawford's Lupo is struggling with his health, clearly brought on by his immense responsibilities towards the organization, and certainly not helped by his temper, calling people pigs left and right, even slapping his daughter Kathy (Anne Bancroft) violently in a burst of outrage. He takes a shine to Conte's Magellan however, who is the son of someone he used to work with. He also sees in Magellan someone unlike his usual henchmen, smart, cunning, calculated and above all, extremely loyal.

Crawford is great here, throwing around his weight, both literally and figuratively, with ease and command. At times he speaks so fast you're left wondering if the movie is playing at the right speed. Conte is his usual intense self, restrained and graceful but with a malevolent menace brooding in his pitch-black eyes. Magellan experiences some inner conflict when he starts to have feelings for Kathy, but his loyalty to the organization and to Charlie prevent him from doing anything about it, and Conte manages to make this inner conflict seem real. Conte also played a criminal in the classic 1955 film 'The Big Combo', but with a much more violent and volatile personality. And he pulls off both characters so well. Seeing Conte in a noir is always a treat.

Bancroft's part is small, too small. Her Kathy loathes what her father does and what he stands for, and she despises Magellan for it as well; despite the obvious attraction between them. I wish more time had been given to her character, because Anne Bancroft is pretty good here, the way she both despises and is attracted to Magellan simultaneously is done really well. She makes only a few appearances throughout the movie, but her character adds depth to it, including a rather shocking and surprising appearance near the end, which had been alluded to earlier on. The other two female characters that inhabit the film are Mama Lupo (Celia Lovsky) who Charlie Lupo clings on to far too much, and Iris (Marilyn Maxwell), his girlfriend. I didn't much care for Mama Lupo, but Iris's character has more depth to it, played well by Maxwell. Iris comes off as a femme fatale in the movie until the final part where she shows she genuinely cares about Lupo. She may be a gold digger, and she certainly acts like it, but she's also human.

The movie is riddled with familiar faces, character actors that appeared in dozens of 40s & 50s movies, credited and uncredited. From Mike Mazurki ('Murder, My Sweet', 'Night And The City') to Nestor Paiva ('Alias Nick Beal', 'Rope Of Sand') to J. Carroll Naish ('Humoresque', 'Clash By Night'). More often than not as each new face appears you're left thinking 'Where have I seen this guy before?'

Visually the movie does not stand out and is shot in the flat style that was common in 50s noirs ('The Big Combo' was a notable exception). Still, the characters and the story are noir. Try and find a nice guy in this one. You'll come up empty handed. People get killed, left, right and center. And the people ordering the hits and executing them are the main characters here. Sure, Magellan has a soft spot for Lupo's daughter, and every noir-head has a soft spot for Richard Conte, but he's not sympathetic. His boss tells him someone has to die, he makes it happen. He doesn't question it, he simply does it. No matter what choices the characters make, they cannot control what happens to them, once the wheels are set in motion with the drive-by shooting of Lupo's guy, it's all just another ride on the downward spiral of doom.

There are some flaws in this one. It was shot on a tight budget, so most scenes take place on sets, making it feel static and even slow at times. It also has the unimaginative flat 50s look I mentioned before, I am not a fan. And to top it off there are a few plotholes that make little sense other than putting the right person, in the right place, at the right time. But oh well, nothing new. I'd still say not to pass up on this one. It not only has a great cast with equally great performances, but is also one of the bleaker noirs with some great assassination scenes to boot. Not a classic, but nowhere near a dud either...

7/10

Kiss Me Deadly (1955)

The private investigator is an often used character in film noir. Well-known examples are Sam Spade ('The Maltese Falcon') created by Dashiel Hammett and the iconic Philip Marlowe ('Murder, My Sweet', 'The Big Sleep') created by Raymond Chandler. Number three on the list, and the main character of 1955's 'Kiss Me Deadly', is Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer. First appearing in 1953 in 'I, The Jury', Mike Hammer became a popular character, even becoming the main character of 3 TV series (Marlowe got only 1 TV series, Sam Spade 0).

For 1955's 'Kiss Me Deadly', screenwriter A.I. Bezzerides ('Thieves' Highway') based the story loosely on Spillane's novel 'Kiss Me, Deadly', removing much of the original story in favor of adding a lot of 50s paranoia to it, especially the nuclear and cold war fears of those years but also (in a much more subdued manner) McCarthyism. He also turned Mike Hammer into a selfish, mean person who seems to enjoy inflicting pain on others. Whereas the original Mike Hammer was tough and hard-boiled, like Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe before him, Bezzerides' Mike Hammer took it to a new, and pretty unsympathetic, level. Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe might not always play by the book, Bezzerides' Hammer doesn't read so the rules in the book simply don't apply to him. A moral code only gets in the way of things. Mickey Spillane was heavily disappointed with the overall result and especially the way Mike Hammer was portrayed in this movie. The movie however was a success.

The movie was produced and directed by Robert Aldrich ('The Dirty Dozen'), with cinematography by Ernest Laszlo ('D.O.A.', 'Impact') and music by Frank Devol ('The Dirty Dozen'). All three would work together on another noir, 'The Big Knife', that same year.

In the movie Mike Hammer (Ralph Meeker) is a private detective who specializes in divorce cases. He typically accepts a case from the wife, and then finds out dirt on the husband to get some more money from him as well... And if that doesn't work, he gets his assistant Velda (Maxine Cooper, in her first motion picture) to put them in an embarassing situation so he get extort some money out of them anyway.

This is the Mike Hammer that almost runs over a woman on a dark road at the start of the movie, while driving a fast Jaguar. The woman, barefoot and wearing nothing but a trenchcoat, is Christina Bailey (Cloris Leachman, also in her first motion picture). Hammer begrudgingly gives her a ride to the nearest busstop. Christina gets a pretty clear picture of Mike based on his car and sneering tone of voice:

'You have only one real, lasting love. [..] You. You're one of those self-indulgent males who thinks about nothing but his clothes, his car, himself. But you do push-ups every morning just to keep your belly hard... [..] You're the kind of person who never gives in a relationship, who only takes.'

That's Mike Hammer in a nutshell, and maybe the nutshell as well: hard, bitter and tough to crack. Before they reach the busstop however, a gang corners the car and ambushes them. They interrogate and torture Christina until she dies, and they push Hammer, Christina in his Jag down a hill. Hammer ends up in a hospital and is out for three days. Obviously Hammer thinks there's something big in Christina's death, and hoping there's something big in it for him, he starts to investigate. The story then becomes this long and twisty road where paying attention is necessary, as persons get introduced quickly and disappear again quickly, but in some cases are still crucial to the plot. Essentially, Christina had knowledge on the whereabouts of  a mysterious small suitcase, 'the great whatsit', and an even more mysterious Dr. Soberin (Albert Dekker) is after it. Soberin has enlisted the help of suave upper-class gangster Carl Evello (Paul Stewart) to get his hands on the suitcase. And then there's Lily Carver (Gabrielle Rodgers), Christina's roommate who seems slightly crazy and naive but is anything but. Hammer has to make sense of it all, and via a complex sequence of events and interviews, and a poem by English poet Christina Rossetti, slowly finds out what is going on and what this 'great whatsit' is that everybody is after.

Mike Hammer has no real friends in this movie, except a Greek mechanic, Nick (Nick Dennis), who provides the only genuinely sympathetic character in this movie with his upbeat, bright personality and 'Va-va-voom!' exclamations. And it isn't until Nick is killed that Hammer really starts to get personally involved in the case, before it was just a possible opportunity to make some money. The only other person that he 'cares about' in this movie is Velda ('cares about' is used in the most liberal sense here, because he has no problems pimping her out for his divorce cases), his loyal assistant. She knows she will never be Hammer's love, but she's content with it. She knows that whenever he is in trouble, he'll come to her, and that is good enough for her. She is also the one who dubs the secret everybody's after 'the great whatsit', before Hammer or Velda even know they're looking for a suitcase. And then there's police lieutenant Pat Murphy (Wesley Addy), who despises Hammer despite having a weird sort of professional working relationship with him.

Dr. Soberin makes appearances throughout the movie but his face isn't shown until the last part of the movie. But just by showing his shoes and trousers and by using Dekker's natural dominant voice he brings a lot of menacing and foreboding weight to the mythical Soberin character. When he's torturing Christina with pliers and later on when he gives Hammer a shot of sodium pentathol (the truth serum) in the leg in a casual manner and then pats him on the leg in an almost friendly manner, with the camera only showing Soberin from the waist down in both cases, not seeing his face only adds to the threatening and menacing nature of Dr. Soberin.

There are a couple of scenes that are done as single shots, but are done in a naturalistic way and are heavy on dialogue, you almost don't notice it. And despite them being dialogue-heavy scenes and done in a single shot, there's also a lot going visually, which makes these scenes so great. There's also a lot of attention in the way shots are framed and styled, it's really a gorgeous movie if you just look at the cinematography, directing and staging. And while it is essentially a B-movie, the actors are almost without exception giving great performances and the (many) important characters are fairly complex and 3-dimensional, even if they're not exactly sympathetic.

The opening credits are shown moving top-to-bottom, going backwards. So for instance, it first reads 'Robert Aldrich' and then 'directed by'. It's quite original, here's a shot of the title of the movie, courtesy of the wonderful Movie Title Stills Collection:

It seems pretty ridiculous now the way 'the great whatsit' is portrayed, and I still am a bit puzzled by how 'sensationalist' this movie becomes right at the end. It does take away quite a bit of the film's appeal to me, even though the movie as a whole is pure noir greatness. I'm sure it felt quite different when this was released, but it is just plain comicbook silly now. But, I would say that despite that flaw, it is still a highly enjoyable film noir that I can wholeheartedly recommend.

Killer's Kiss (1955)

'Killer's Kiss' from 1955 was Stanley Kubrick's 2nd feature length movie as well as his first film noir. His second one being the well-known and critically acclaimed 'The Killing' from a year later of course. Stanley Kubrick co-wrote, directed, co-produced, edited, did the cinematography and probably made coffee first thing in the morning for everybody working on this movie. Due to inexperience with using a soundcrew, he ended up taping the movie without sound, and adding in all sound and dialogue afterwards. By that time however, main actress Irene Kane (who would later on become a journalist under the name Chris Chase), was no longer available, so someone else had to do her voice, an actress named Peggy Lobbin. It might explain why Kane's character in the movie comes across as wooden and awkward. But I digress...

The story revolves around 3 characters: over-the-hill prize-fighter Davey Gordon (Jamie Smith), taxi dancer Gloria Price (Irene Kane) who works in a dance hall owned by Vincent Rappalo (Frank Silvera) who's obsessed with her. Gordon and Price live in the same apartment block and their windows are opposite each other, so they occasionally catch a glimpse of each other. One night, after Gordon loses a televised fight watched by Rappalo and Price, Rappalo goes over to Gloria's apartment and he gets a bit too frisky with her. She starts to scream, and Gordon hears her and runs over to help her. Rappalo is long gone by then, but it is the first real contact Davey and Gloria have. The next morning they have breakfast and Gloria tells Davey the story of how she became a taxi dancer, a paid dance partner. Before they know it they're in a relationship, born more out of a need for real human contact than anything else. Davey's uncle George who owns a horse farm in Seattle has asked him to come over for a vacation, and Davey's thinking of moving there to work. He wants Gloria to come with him, and she accepts. They both try to get their last payment, Davey from his manager and Gloria from Rappalo and that's when things go haywire. Rappalo doesn't want to let Gloria go that easily, so he has his men kidnap her, but not after they kill Davey's manager due to a mix-up, and the movie rapidly moves to a violent climax in a mannequin factory where Rappalo and Davey face off.

The story is fairly straight-forward, and doesn't need all that much time to play out. In fact, it takes less than an hour. Maybe that's why Kubrick added a fairly unrelated scene where Gloria recounts the story of her father and her sister and how she ended up as a taxi dancer. The scene shows her sister Iris, a ballerina, in a solo dance with Gloria narrating. It's quite unnecessary for the story and serves little purpose. Iris however was played by Ruth Sobotka, who was Kubrick's wife at the time, so maybe that explains things.

Jamie Smith and Irene Kane are not exactly great actors, and Frank Silvera is the saving grace of this movie acting-wise. But the cinematography really helps this movie. Even though Kubrick was still fairly inexperienced at this point, his eye for beautiful and clever shots was already present. He utilizes a (now mostly torn down) industrial area of Manhattan in effective ways to create claustrophobia and tension and show rundown building and empty, grey streets. Also the strange angles he uses during Davey's fight help tremendously with that scene.

There are 2 musical themes that are repeated several times. One is a softer, more romantic theme which gets played (in varying ways) during the more mellow parts of the movie. Then there's a more upbeat samba-like theme, which gets played during the more tension-filled scenes. Pretty nice touches. Then during the final scene in the mannequin factory, when the two men finally square off, the music stops and the echo-ing sounds of their footsteps and weapons hitting materials are the only sounds left. The soundtrack is actually quite clever this way, it compliments/mimics the mood of the film, right until the final fight, when the echoing sounds becomes a soundtrack in itself. Very clever.

The final squaring off itself between Davy and Rappalo is quite insane and brutal. Rappalo is wielding an axe and Davy a sharp-pointed pole, and the way Rappalo is swinging the axe wildly and hitting the mannequins, it really seems like somebody could've gotten seriously hurt during the shooting. It's a great sequence which is more realistic also becuz both men are stumbling around, tripping over broken mannequin parts, throwing whatever they can at each other. It looks anything but choreographed. It's an awesome scene.

Because all sound had to be added afterwards, it comes off rather weird at times. The sounds of Davey and Kid Rodriguez hitting each other during the fight sound rather fake for instance. Which is a shame, the fight itself is filmed in a pretty nice manner with strange angles, such as from between Davey's legs and from the floor looking up between the 2 fighters. It is also apparent often that the dialogue was added afterwards, and the sounds of footsteps are almost invariably out of sync with the visual footsteps. It distracts a bit at times but truth be told, it works to the movie's advantage in the aforementioned fight, the echoing sounds really add tension there.

'Killer's Kiss' is not a classic film noir nor classic Kubrick movie, but it's pretty good nevertheless and especially the last 20 minutes or so are well worth watching.