For me, the highlight of this film noir was simply ogling the two female leads, played by Audrey Totter ("Claire Quimby") - who wasn't beautiful but had an incredible body - and Cyd Charisse ("Mary Chandler"), who had a much smaller role but was pleasing. They were opposites: a nasty film-noir femme fatale (Totter) and a wholesome girl-next-door (Charisse).
Totter played a number of classic blonde film noir floozies, women who sure look good on the outside but are nasty on the inside. She, Marie Windsor and Lizabeth Scott were all excellent noir "molls." Totter, as of this writing, is still alive at the age of 89. I think this was one of her better performances.
It's a good thing the characters in this film were interesting because the story was a little too slow, to be honest. It's hard to picture, especially in the last 50 years, a crime movie with no action. We don't even see the only crime committed. It is something we hear about after the fact. We can pretty much guess who did it - it is made more than obvious - so the only question remaining is how are the police going to catch "Claire."
Actually, all the actors are good in this movie and I really enjoyed some of the film noir photography. The DVD transfer of this movie, which is part of the "Film Noir Classics Collection Vol.4," is very good. Richard Basehart has the lead role as meek pharmacist "Warren Quimby." In order to hatch a plan involving murder, he dons contact lenses and darkens his hair and becomes Charisse's boyfriend, "Paul Sothern." The idea is to kill the man who took away his slimy wife, played almost to perfection by Totter.
The fairly-young-looking Basehart, like the two ladies, is very good in this film, his first noir since the excellent "He Walked By Night" released the year before. Basehart didn't begin his film career until he was in his middle '30s.
Of the two policeman, William Conrad is fairly intense but Barry Sullivan's character is bland, despite having some juicy parts.
I think this story would have been much better with a few twists to it, and I can think at least one good one: Warren's pal "Freddie" (Tom D'Andrea) in on the crime. With Freddie nosing around all the time, looking after Warren's welfare, I thought he might wind up with a bigger part in this mystery - maybe the surprise killer to help his buddy - but it wasn't to be. That's really a summation of the story: something that could have been really clever, but wasn't to be despite some good acting performances.
Totter played a number of classic blonde film noir floozies, women who sure look good on the outside but are nasty on the inside. She, Marie Windsor and Lizabeth Scott were all excellent noir "molls." Totter, as of this writing, is still alive at the age of 89. I think this was one of her better performances.
It's a good thing the characters in this film were interesting because the story was a little too slow, to be honest. It's hard to picture, especially in the last 50 years, a crime movie with no action. We don't even see the only crime committed. It is something we hear about after the fact. We can pretty much guess who did it - it is made more than obvious - so the only question remaining is how are the police going to catch "Claire."
Actually, all the actors are good in this movie and I really enjoyed some of the film noir photography. The DVD transfer of this movie, which is part of the "Film Noir Classics Collection Vol.4," is very good. Richard Basehart has the lead role as meek pharmacist "Warren Quimby." In order to hatch a plan involving murder, he dons contact lenses and darkens his hair and becomes Charisse's boyfriend, "Paul Sothern." The idea is to kill the man who took away his slimy wife, played almost to perfection by Totter.
The fairly-young-looking Basehart, like the two ladies, is very good in this film, his first noir since the excellent "He Walked By Night" released the year before. Basehart didn't begin his film career until he was in his middle '30s.
Of the two policeman, William Conrad is fairly intense but Barry Sullivan's character is bland, despite having some juicy parts.
I think this story would have been much better with a few twists to it, and I can think at least one good one: Warren's pal "Freddie" (Tom D'Andrea) in on the crime. With Freddie nosing around all the time, looking after Warren's welfare, I thought he might wind up with a bigger part in this mystery - maybe the surprise killer to help his buddy - but it wasn't to be. That's really a summation of the story: something that could have been really clever, but wasn't to be despite some good acting performances.