Some time ago, I watched Hangover Square, my first Laird Cregar movie (which was sadly his last). In it, his obsession with a girl ends up bringing absolute chaos to not only his life, but the lives of those around him. This movie is strangely similar to that in terms of the story, but this plot point doesn't get fully revealed until the closing minutes. I Wake Up Screaming is about two sisters, Jill and Vicky Lynn (Betty Grable and Carole Landis respectively), how one of them falls for the trap that is the promise of fame in the movie industry, and how what ended up happening to her causes a mess of an investigation. Firstly, a sports promoter named Frankie (Victor Mature) is being interrogated by a roomful of detectives about what he knows regarding the death of Vicky. A flashback ensues in which we see Frankie and two of his friends meeting her for the first time at a restaurant where she works. Frankie's buddies insist on making Vicky into a star using his influence, since she seems to dislike her job. Frankie's plan works at first, but Vicky doublecrosses him by saying she wants to go to Hollywood instead of staying with his plans. Frankie doesn't like the sound of this, and soon, Jill arrives home only to find Frankie kneeling beside the corpse of her sibling. Shortly before her death, Jill spotted a strange man looking into the large window at the front of her restaurant. Jill think's he had something to do with her demise, but is shocked to learn he's now the head detective at the precinct she is being questioned at. This man, Ed Cornell (Laird Cregar), becomes a total pain for both Jill and Frankie for the rest of this film. The phrase "keep your friends close and your enemies closer" epitomizes Ed's doctrine on how to deal with criminals, as he shows up in Frankie's very bedroom one night completely without a warrant. Ed hates Frankie, but doesn't have much on him proving that he's the one who murdered Vicky. Although Jill doesn't particularly care for Frankie, she seems to know he's not guilty, and they're drawn closer together because they're both being tormented by Ed. After they both begin going out together, Frankie and Jill come back to the apartment and are ambushed by Ed and a cop. Ed arrests Frankie after he discovers an incriminating note Jill hid in one of her paintings, stating that "Vicky will be out of the way, and the sooner the better." Jill knocks out Ed, misleads the cop as to where Frankie is, and they both escape. They decide to split up so that they'll be harder to track, and Jill goes to a library. She is eventually apprehended by investigators, and Ed suggests letting her go free to force Frankie into the open. Frankie meets up with Ed, the latter telling him he doesn't need to hurry in his attempts to prove he's a killer, since time passes so agonizingly slow for someone in Frankie's position. After retracing the actions and things Vicky did in her last moments, Frankie is able to discover the true murderer: the feeble looking desk clerk at her hotel, Harry (Elisha Cook Jr). Harry admits to killing Vicky, but also shocks Frankie by saying Cornell has known Harry was the killer the entire time. Still, for some reason, he fought tooth and nail to see Frankie's neck in a noose. Frankie shows up at Ed's apartment and surprises him, inquiring why he wanted to see him dead so badly even though he was innocent. Cornell says it's because he thought Vicky was the ideal woman for him, but Frankie's act of trying to make her a star put an end to that and moved her out of his reach. Ed commits suicide by overdosing on medicine, and Jill marries Frankie after a ball. Like so many other movies I've seen, the villain really steals the show here. As Cornell, Cregar relentlessly pursues the main character for the entire runtime and won't stop until he's sentenced to the chair. The audience will understandably hate him, but in the final moments, he's made out to be a kind of tragic figure since he only wanted to punish someone who took away everything that was important to him. To Ed, Frankie was guilty of stealing Vicky, which is just as wrong as any crime. I don't think I've ever seen a movie with Betty Grable in it before (let alone a serious one) but she's convincing here. She lies to Ed about not liking Frankie, but much of the movie's second half focuses on her relationship with him. In all, I felt that this film was kind of generic by noir standards, but is saved mostly by Cregar's remorseless performance. Actors like him took this genre with such incredible depth and actually made it deeper.
Review of I Wake Up Screaming
