Whilst looking for details on Rex Harrison's 1978 Bollywood movie Shalimar (!) I found out about a weird sounding Film Noir that Harrison made with his wife,which was "inspired" by the suicide of Harrison's lover Carole Landis (with Harrison being the last person to see Landis,leading to question on the "suicide" verdict.)Gathering up titles to watch over the Easter holiday,I decided that it was time to walk down the hall.
The plot:
Continuing his affair with chorus girl lover Rose Mallory, Arthur Groome goes to a café to meet up with Mallory.Looking at the time,Arthur starts to suspect that Mallory may be cheating on him.Letting himself into her flat, (what a charmer!)Arthur discovers Mallory's blood-drenched dead body.Whilst checking to see if Mallory's is dead.Arthur moves her body and gets his suit covered in her blood.Despite burning the suit,Arthur gets caught up in the police investigation and becomes the lead suspect. Believing they have enough proof, the police decide to take Arthur to court on a murder charge,which will lead to Arthur and his wife Mary going down the long dark hall of Arthur's private life.
View on the film:
Going down a hall of murder for the opening, directors Reginald Beck and Anthony Bushell cake the Film Noir in a grubby atmosphere,as the directors and cinematographer Wilkie Cooper (who also worked on Hitchcock's Stage Fright) linger in the alleyways and dig into the dirt,and pull the rough-edge murder scenes out of the deep mud- drenched low-lights across the screen.Entering the courtroom,the directors impressively keep the Noir mood flowing across the room with stylish overlapping images which put the decayed Film Noir loner in the same position as the law.
Pulled down the hall of Edgar Lustgarten's novel,the screenplay by Nunnally Johnson & W.E. Fairchild criss-crosses faded British Film Noir memories with a surgery moral message (with capital punishment still taking place in the UK at the time.) Whilst "the message" does clean up the Film Noir grit,the writers wonderfully grind Groome's down in reaching the light,by keeping Mary as a rigid statue,whilst Arthur caves into his shattered Film Noir memory.
Appearing to "go method" in her performance,Rex Harrison's wife Lilli Palmer gives a very good performance as Mary Groome,by giving Mary a rock solid belief in her Arthur's innocence,which withstands everything thrown at it.Calling this his worst movie (!),Rex Harrison gives an excellent performance as Arthur Groome,thanks to Harrison tearing Arthur's upper class English gentlemen charms into brittle Film Noir shreds,as Arthur finds himself in the long dark hall.
The plot:
Continuing his affair with chorus girl lover Rose Mallory, Arthur Groome goes to a café to meet up with Mallory.Looking at the time,Arthur starts to suspect that Mallory may be cheating on him.Letting himself into her flat, (what a charmer!)Arthur discovers Mallory's blood-drenched dead body.Whilst checking to see if Mallory's is dead.Arthur moves her body and gets his suit covered in her blood.Despite burning the suit,Arthur gets caught up in the police investigation and becomes the lead suspect. Believing they have enough proof, the police decide to take Arthur to court on a murder charge,which will lead to Arthur and his wife Mary going down the long dark hall of Arthur's private life.
View on the film:
Going down a hall of murder for the opening, directors Reginald Beck and Anthony Bushell cake the Film Noir in a grubby atmosphere,as the directors and cinematographer Wilkie Cooper (who also worked on Hitchcock's Stage Fright) linger in the alleyways and dig into the dirt,and pull the rough-edge murder scenes out of the deep mud- drenched low-lights across the screen.Entering the courtroom,the directors impressively keep the Noir mood flowing across the room with stylish overlapping images which put the decayed Film Noir loner in the same position as the law.
Pulled down the hall of Edgar Lustgarten's novel,the screenplay by Nunnally Johnson & W.E. Fairchild criss-crosses faded British Film Noir memories with a surgery moral message (with capital punishment still taking place in the UK at the time.) Whilst "the message" does clean up the Film Noir grit,the writers wonderfully grind Groome's down in reaching the light,by keeping Mary as a rigid statue,whilst Arthur caves into his shattered Film Noir memory.
Appearing to "go method" in her performance,Rex Harrison's wife Lilli Palmer gives a very good performance as Mary Groome,by giving Mary a rock solid belief in her Arthur's innocence,which withstands everything thrown at it.Calling this his worst movie (!),Rex Harrison gives an excellent performance as Arthur Groome,thanks to Harrison tearing Arthur's upper class English gentlemen charms into brittle Film Noir shreds,as Arthur finds himself in the long dark hall.