Stubs - Side Street

Side Street (1949) Starring: Farley Granger, Cathy O'Donnell, James Craig, Jean Hagen. Directed by Anthony Mann. Screenplay by Sydney Boehm. Produced by Sam Zimbalist. Run Time: 83 minutes. USA Black and White. Film Noir, Drama.

Hollywood is always looking for great screen pairings. Many of them have become legendary, like Kathrine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall; Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers to name a few. Add to that the names Farley Granger and Cathy O’Donnell. At least that’s what MGM hoped for when they paired these two actors together after they’re first appearance on screen in RKO’s They Live By Night (1948). While that film lost money, the reviews were positive, so a repairing seemed in order. Each was under contract to a different independent film producer, Cathy O'Donnell to David O. Selznick and Farley Granger to Samuel Goldwyn, but borrowing actors for a particular film was part of the business.

With a budget of nearly $1 million, the film went into production on April 21, 1949 using locations in New York City including Central Park, Stuyvesant Town, Battery Park, the Bellvue Hospital morgue, the Polyclinic maternity ward, Wall Street, Bowling Green Park, the Fulton Fish Market, the Queensboro Bridge and a Greenwich Village nightclub. Production ended in mid-June. According to an article in the New York Times, filming of a scene in which a taxicab is being chased through the Wall Street area ran into some difficulties when the taxicab that was supposed to hit a curb and flip onto its side in front of the J. P. Morgan Building failed to do so after repeated attempts. Eventually, they would get it right.

New York City is a character in Side Street as well as the setting.

There is narration at the beginning of Side Street. While the voice is not identified, we will later learn who it is. He introduces the story a la The Naked City (1948). It will appear occasionally throughout, but here is trying to set the tone of the film. Through it we are introduced to the story of Joe (Farley Granger) and Ellen Norson (Cathy O’Donnell), a young married couple living with her parents, but expecting their own baby in a matter of days. Joe, who had previously had and lost a gas station business, is only able to get a job as a part-time postal carrier. But Joe still has big dreams, telling Charlie (Robert Malcolm), a patrolman he knows on his route, that he wishes he could buy her a fur coat and take her on a trip to Europe.

Joe (Farley Granger) confides in Charlie (Robert Malcolm), a patrolman he knows from his route.

Meanwhile, Emil Lorrison (Paul Harvey), a wealthy broker, goes to the bank to withdraw $30,000 in hundred-dollar bills. Chief teller Harold Simpsen (Whit Bissell) serves him.

Lucille Colner (Adele Jergens), Emil’s mistress, is on the phone with Victor Backett (Edmund Ryan) putting the final touches on their plans. In his office is George Garsell (James Craig), who is shaving with an electric razor and listening in. She needs to hear that Victor loves her and she tells him that she wants to get away afterwards. Victor throws out ideas like going to Cuba, which was still an option back then, to get her to complete the job. When they’re off the phone, George jokes that wherever she goes will be by way of the East River.

That is the day that Joe enters to deliver mail, temporarily interrupting the planning. He accidentally brushes two one-hundred-dollar bills to the floor. Out of politeness, he bends down to pick them up, but he’s stopped by George, who picks up the bills, puts them in an accordion file and puts them in a filing cabinet. He tells Joe to mind his own business, but Joe can’t stop thinking about it.

Later, with George in the other room as insurance, Emil shows up right on time. He tries to tell Lucille that he could only raise $15,000. But when she suggests she could go to his wife for the rest, Emil produces the money in exchange for the photos and negatives. George throws the envelope out of the room he’s in and holds a gun on Emil while he paws through the envelope for the evidence of his affair with Lucille.

Next time we see Lucille, her dead body is discovered floating in the East River. She has been strangled.

Joe steals what he thinks is an accordion file with $200 in it.

When Joe gets home, he’s reminded about how much he could use $200. Ellen is about to pop and he doesn’t want her to have to give birth in a Ward, but to do that, he needs money. Thinking the money will be the answer to his problems, Joe breaks into the now locked file cabinet when he finds the office is empty and Backett is away at court. Using an ax, he breaks the lock and steals the accordion file that he saw the money put in. He stuffs it into his mailbag and flees.

When Joe finally looks into the file he finds there is $30,000, not $200 in there.

On the roof of a building on his route, Joe stops to dig out the money from the file, but instead of $200, there is $30,000. He takes the money and stuffs the accordion file into a crevice he finds in a brick wall. He takes the money home and sneaks it into his bedroom. Fashioning a crude box, he puts all but $200 of the money into the box. When Ellen gets home, Joe pretends that the money he gives her is because he’s found a new job from an Army buddy of his. But he needs to leave that night for Schenectady so he can learn the business. He promises to be back before she has the baby.

Joe lies to his pregnant wife Ellen (Cathy O’Donnell) that he has a new job.

He takes the money to Nick Drumman (Ed Max), a bartender he knows, but he tells him the box is a nightgown he’s bought for his wife and asks Nick to hold it for him so she doesn’t find it in the apartment. Nick puts it in a cabinet. Joe then checks into a seedy hotel where he spends a couple of days that he’s supposed to be out of town.

Joe trusts bartender Nick (Ed Max) to watch after his new found fortune.

In the meantime, Capt. Walter Anderson (Paul Kelly) of the New York Police Department investigates Lucille Colner’s murder. A search of her possessions finds a “love diary” and they start to interview men whose names appear, including both Lorrison and Backett.

After a few days, he returns home, where a neighbor asks him what his wife had, a boy or a girl? He rushes down to the hospital and finds that his wife is in a Ward, not a private room. He gets to see his child for the first time but is rushed out of the Ward by the head Nurse, Williams (Sarah Selby).

When Joe goes back to Nick to retrieve his money, he finds out that he's sold the bar and moved away.

Feeling remorse about the theft, Joe goes back to Backett’s office under the guise that he’s running an errand for a friend. Not only does Backett tell him he has no idea what $30,000 Joe’s talking about, but Joe also notices the file cabinet is gone from the office. Joe, of course, tells Backett where he lives and that he doesn’t have the money on him, but knows where it is. He’s still in the office when George returns. Backett leaves sort of bewildered.

When Joe tries to return the money, Victor Backett (Edmund Ryan)
 acts like he has no idea what he's talking about.

When Backett tells George about Joe’s errand, he warns him that the money will lead police to Lucille’s murderer. Fearing a trap, Backett sends George to follow him to retrieve the money. Joe goes to Nick’s bar to retrieve his package, but in the intervening days, Nick has sold the bar. The new owners are friendly, though at first, they claim not to have seen a package. But they look a little harder and find a package the same size and shape as the one Joe had left in Nick’s care. But when he examines the package, he finds instead of the money, there is a nightgown inside.

When Joe asks about Nick’s address, the new owner gives him the one they have for him. Unbeknownst to Joe, another man, whom we learn was George, has already been there for the same information. The address is a small funeral home, where Joe is waited on by Nick’s young nephew Tommy Drummon, Jr. (Peter De Bear). For two bits he gives Joe Nick’s address. Again, Joe doesn’t know that he’s the second man to have paid the fee.

By the time Joe gets to Nick’s apartment, he finds that he’s been killed, strangled, just like Lucille had been. He finds one of the currency wrappers on the floor and figures out that the money was there and has been taken. The phone rings out in the hall, and when neighbors knock on the door, they believe he’s home since they saw a man go into his apartment. Joe manages to escape out the window, but now Anderson is looking for him, too.

The police know they have two murders, both strangled, but they believe they might have been done by two different men.

Joe goes back to the hospital and breaks in after hours. There he confesses to Ellen what he’d done. She advises him to go to the police. But Joe doesn’t think he can and flees.

Instead of going to the police Joe goes on the run, but while still trying to find out where the money came from. And his attempts to track down the source of the money only makes him look worse to the cops, as he looks guilty by association to the cops like Anderson who are looking for him. After he tracks down Harold Simpsen, he is only steps ahead of the police.

Joe tracks down Chief cashier Harold Simpsen (Whit Bissell).

He goes back to the accordion file and looks for anything that will help him. He finds a photo of Harriette Sinton (Jean Hagen) and manages to track her down. She’s a singer in a Greenwich Village bar. Joe pretends to be someone else and tells her he’s trying to get in touch with his old friend George, her ex-boyfriend. He buys her drinks and she flirts. When she goes to get ready, she catches him going through her purse.

Joe tracks down Harriette Sinton (Jean Hagen) at a Greenwich Village nightclub.

They take a taxi. Joe thinks they’re going back to her place, but instead, it turns out to be George’s. Along with cab driver Larry Giff (Harry Bellaver), George knocks Joe out and plans to kill him. Giff’s enthusiasm for the activity starts to wane.

George Garsell (James Craig) knocks Joe out. Larry
 Giff (Harry Bellaver), a taxi driver, helps him.

Harriette thinks her bringing Joe to George will restart their relationship and George appears to go along. But in the end, she knows too much, so George does what he always does and strangles her to death, dumping her body in the cab. Joe is taken down to the cab as well, with the plan to kill him and dump both bodies in the river.

Larry and George take Joe for a ride.

Meanwhile, Anderson has started to put things together. After interviewing and detaining Backett, he gets a tip and heads out to George’s apartment. A chase ensues through the very deserted streets of Manhattan. But Giff wants out. George lets him park the cab and get out, but while Giff is fleeing, George shoots and kills him. Then holding a gun on Joe, makes him drive the cab.

Capt. Walter Anderson (Paul Kelly) finally gets around to Backett and brings him in for questioning.

Joe’s heart isn’t really in trying to outrun the police to assist his would-be killer, so while he drives fast, he also manages to overturn the cab (see above). As the police surround the cab, George gets out and tries to run away, only to be shot and killed himself.

Joe manages to turn the cab over, ending the pursuit.

Ellen, who has been down at police headquarters, arrives on the scene as Joe is being helped from the cab. He’s injured and put on a gurney and into the back of an ambulance.

Ellen is there to see Joe taken away in an ambulance.

Anderson, who we realize has been narrating, leads us to believe that in the end, Joe will be all right, though that still seems to be up in the air at that moment.

The film was released on December 14, 1949, to less than glowing reviews. Bosley Crowther of the New York Times called Side Street “a fair enough crime picture” in his review the next day. The film would go on to earn $777,000, resulting in a loss to the studio of $467,000. It may be no wonder that after their two films together lost money that Farley Granger and Cathy O’Donnell were not reunited on screen again.

That said, Granger and O'Donnell make a pleasant and likable enough onscreen couple. Granger is perhaps best known for his roles in two Alfred Hitchcock films, Rope (1948) and Strangers on a Train (1951), so his acting here is not a surprise.

Farley Granger and Cathy O’Donnell make a likable screen couple.

Cathy O’Donnell first made a name for herself in the film The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), playing the girlfriend of returning WWII vet and double amputee, Petty Officer 2nd Class Homer Parrish (Harold Russell). Like that film, she doesn’t get all that much screen time here, especially in comparison to Granger. She would have a relatively short career, her last film being Ben-Hur (1959).

Of the other co-stars, Edmund Ryan is well cast as the conniving attorney Victor Backett. He is always interesting when he’s on screen. The other actors are good, whether they’re playing cops, Paul Kelly as Capt. Walter Anderson, or villains, like James Craig as George Garsell, they're good, but not outstanding.

One surprise is Jean Hagen, who plays the singer Harriette Sinton. The only other film I’d seen her in was Singin’ In the Rain (1952), in which she has a fairly significant though one-dimensional role. Here her acting is more on display.

While Side Street looks good, it is still a flawed film. It is the kind of film noir that I don’t really like. It relies on the protagonist seeing two options and choosing the one that only makes his problem worse. I won’t get into the issue of stealing, we all know it’s wrong, but that’s not where the story loses me. The temptation was too great for him to resist, but it’s after his unexpected bounty that his decision making goes out the window. The film’s plot is based on one bad decision leading to another and to another.

First, Joe should never have gone back in person to see Backett. Having been a postal deliveryman, you’d think the first thought would be to mail the money back. And he only makes things worse when he gives Backett all of his vitals. So much for anonymity. Then when his wife offers him the option to go to the police, Joe decides to run. And then Joe decides to go after the bad guy by himself and nearly gets killed. Only in Hollywood would this situation have a happy ending.

Side Street is not a great film noir, but it is far from the worst one made. Perhaps with a better script, it might have fared better both when it was released and now, nearly 67 years later. If you’re new to Film noir, then there are many others worth watching before you get to this one. And if you’ve been a fan of the genre, then you will be disappointed at what could have been.

Be sure to check out our Film Noir Review Hub for reviews of other films in this genre.

Stubs - He Walked by Night

HE WALKED BY NIGHT (1948) Starring: Richard Basehart, Scott Brady, Roy Roberts, Jack Webb, and Whit Bissell. Directed by Alfred L. Werker and Anthony Mann. Produced by Bryan Foy and Robert Kane. Screenplay: John C. Higgins, Crane Wilbur. Story by Crane Wilbur.  Music by Leonid Raab. Run Time: 79. Black and White. USA. Film Noir, Drama, Crime

Last stop on this year’s Summer of Darkness tour is He Walked By Night, a small film noir film starring Richard Basehart. Unlike many film noir, there really is no femme fatale or even a woman featured in the cast. This is a male dominated film from start to finish.

Based on the true and violent story of Erwin Walker, a disturbed World War II veteran and former employee of the Glendale Police department, the film may seem like a movie long version of the old radio and TV series, Dragnet. There is even narration that is reminiscent to that of the series. The semi-documentary approach to the filmmaking lends to its sense of realism.

The movie is a character study of Roy Martin/Roy Morgan, though it never tells us what motivates him to become a criminal, even when he is offered a legitimate job with the possibility of profit-sharing in the future. But Roy is still interesting to watch as he methodically figures out what to do next, even as the police close in on him.

Like many films in this genre, this one involves murder and in fact starts with one. Early one morning, Officer Robert Rawlins (John McGuire), a Los Angeles beat cop, on his way home from work, stops a man he suspects of breaking into a radio store. For his trouble, Rawlins is shot and mortally wounded. But before he lapses into a coma, Rawlins manages to crash his police car in the burglar’s getaway car. When police arrive on the scene of the shooting, they find the trunk of the car filled with an arsenal of navy surplus equipment and Lee Whitey (Jack Webb) finds nitroglycerin in the glove box. And despite the officer’s description of his killer, the police have few other clues to go on.

After their investigation at the scene, two detectives, Sergeants Marty Brennan (Scott Brady) and Chuck Jones (James Cardwell) are assigned by Captain Breen (Roy Roberts) to catch the shooter.

The police throw out a dragnet and pull in any man who might fit the description. But even though they find some parole violators, including Pete Hammond (Frank Cady) they are no closer to finding who shot Rawlins, who finally succumbs to his wounds and dies.

The suspect, whom we later learn is named Roy (Richard Basehart), flees and hides in his Hollywood bungalow and listens to the police calls on a specially built radio. He shaves off his moustache which had been one of the features the police were looking for. His only companion is his little dog.

Brennan and Jones go to the Crime Investigation Lab, where Whitey demonstrates the nitroglycerin or “safecracker soup.” Other than that the evidence is quite limited. There are no fingerprints on the car, except for the man it was stolen from, or the tools. Lee tells Breen, who joins the detectives that he thinks the suspect is scientific and knows electricity. That gets Breen to call the Captain in charge of burglaries about cases where a pick lock was used. In what might be a comical shot by today’s standards, they show Sgt. Brennan looking into the Modus Operandi files, which is an old punch card computer system. But that only narrows it down to a couple of hundred possible suspects.

Speaking of suspects, next we see him ours is changing license plates on a stolen car. Using the alias Roy Martin, he has been consigning revamped and improved stolen electronic equipment through Paul Reeves (Whit Bissell) at Reeves Electronic Laboratories. Reeves wants Roy to work for him, but Roy declines. He has other plans. Reeves does talk to him about a particular piece of equipment Roy is working on, a TV projector that can show a 12 foot image (not bad for the time). Reeves already has a customer lined up for it.

But after Roy delivers it, the customer, Mr. Dunning (Thomas Browne Henry) recognizes the projector as one he himself had built, but which had been stolen and calls the police. Breen assigns Brennan and Jones to follow up. They think there might be a connection between Roy Martin and the Rawlins' case. Brennan and Jones have Reeves tell Roy that he sold the projector and for him to come pick up his money at 8:30 that night.

But Roy comes for his money before seven and even though there are police already set up, he manages to get past them. Reeves is acting nervous, which Roy picks up on. When Brennan closes in, Roy hides and gets the jump on Brennan, knocking him out. He then gets into a shootout with Jones when he comes to his partner’s aide.

Jones manages to shoot Martin, who flees and back in his bungalow, removes the bullet from his side.

With Jones in the hospital paralyzed from his wounds, Reeves is brought in by the police, but he cannot identify Roy from the photos they have. He doesn’t know much about Martin, only that he picked up some of his knowledge about electronics while he was in the service. They let him go, but put a tail on Reeves and someone to watch his house.

Meanwhile, Roy changes from burglaries to robbery and wearing a variety of disguises (eye patches, glasses and bandaids) strikes the liquor stores known as “bottle stores” in what is described as an one man blitz. Martin, has also found a quick and easy mode of getting away, using the vast network of storm drains that run under L.A. We’re told there are 700 miles of them and that some are wide enough to drive two cars down at the same time. The narration also tells us that the storm drains are a place to hide and to stash weapons.

Back in the Crime Lab, Whitey shows Breen that the bullets that killed Rawlins, paralyzed Jones and were fired at a recent liquor store robbery are all from the same gun. This leads Breen to round up all the robbery victims to put together a composite of the robber. Using an overlay of various slides showing hairstyles, eyes, chins, noses, etc. the police are able to put together a likeness of Martin, which Reeves is brought in to identify. The likeness is then printed and sent out to prisons and government agencies around the country, but no one recognizes the face.

One night, even though there is a heavy police presence, Roy is waiting for Reeves to come home. After beating him up, Roy takes whatever money Reeves has, but tells him to get more for the equipment of his. Reeves tells the police he wants to run, but Breen tells him that they’re using him as bait. He even chastises Brennan for letting Roy get in and out of the house he was supposed to be watching.

Breen wants to take Brennan off the case, and tells him to take two weeks off. The next day, Brennan goes to see Jones in the hospital. But Jones already knows Brennan is off the case. The two partners discuss the case, but Jones makes Brennan see that the suspect knows how the police work and might have worked for a nearby police department, which sends Brennan back on the hunt. After looking through pages and pages of photo IDs, Brennan finally finds someone who recognizes him as a former police radio dispatcher who worked there before the war. Based on a letter turning down a job offer after the war, Brennan finds the signature of Roy Morgan matches the signature of Roy Martin on the back of one of the checks from Reeves.

There is a Hollywood address on the letter, which prompts Brennan to talk to the postal carriers for that area. One of the postmen (Wally Vernon) recognizes Roy and Brennan sets a trap. Disguised as a delivery man for Arden Milk, Brennan rendezvous with the postman, who tells him Roy’s in unit number seven. Outside the apartment, Brennan purposefully drops a milk bottle breaking it. The commotion brings Roy to the door so that Brennan can get a good look at him.

Having made the identification, Brennan and Breen set up a plan to capture Roy. Once Roy returns home, the plan goes into operation. However, Roy is expecting them. His dog seems to sense when police are nearby giving him warning. We watch as the police slowly tighten the circle around Roy’s apartment. Inside, Roy grabs a gun, a flashlight and a jacket and waits. His dog’s bark alerts him that there are police outside and when he looks out through the blinds in his door, he sees one of them changing his location. He escapes through a trapdoor in his closet out onto the roof. He eludes police, once again ducking down inside the storm drain.

But the police dragnet finally catches up to Roy, keeping him from making a quick escape as they move to block the drains. Breen then leads men down into the drain. The police are slowly cutting off Roy’s escape routes as they come after him from both directions. But Roy isn’t through. He has one stash of weapons that he gets to ahead of his pursuers. He can see the policemen advancing by the beams from their flashlights.

Roy tries one final manhole, but the cover has a patrol car parked on top of it. Using tear gas, the police flush Roy out into the open where he is finally shot dead. And the movie ends there.

This is the movie that made Richard Basehart a star. Variety, at the time, noted with his performance that “Basehart establishes himself as one of Hollywood's most talented finds in recent years.” Never a major star, Basehart was nevertheless a good actor. Perhaps best known as the Admiral in television’s Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Basehart usually gave a solid performance in any role he took. A good example of this is Tension(1950), previously reviewed on this blog. He also appeared in Fellini’s La Strada (1954).

When I was watching this film again, I kept thinking I had seen the actor who played Det. Brennan before. He reminded me of the actor in Born to Kill (1947). Only after watching it did I find out that Scott Brady was the younger brother of Lawrence Tierney, who starred in Born to Kill and many other films. Brady is like a lightweight version of his older brother, but his quiet determination is perfect for the role he’s playing in this movie.

As noted before, Jack Webb would go on from this movie and create Dragnet, first on radio and then on television. It would run on radio from 1949 through 1957, but also on TV from 1951 to 1959 and again from 1967 to 1970. He Walked By Night is a blueprint for the series, which follows a police procedural from crime to arrest. The trial and its outcome was already a foregone conclusion and tacked on at the end of the show.

But the real star of He Walked By Night, is the cinematographer John Alton. The use of shadow and light is breathtaking (see examples below). My personal favorite scenes are those in the LA Sewers, where you see the flashlights in the long dark tunnels. This is what black and white cinematography is all about: crisp whites, deep focus and sharp blacks. Film noir is a genre that is all about living in the shadows and this film handles them as well as any film I’ve seen. Alton is famous for his work on film noirs, such as T-Men (1947), The Amazing Dr. X (1948), Raw Deal (1948), Border Incident (1949), Mystery Street (1950) and The Big Combo (1955). He also shot Father of the Bride (1950), its sequel Father’s Little Dividend (1951) and Elmer Gantry (1960).

An example of the light and dark in the Sewer Drains

The cookaloris certainly got a workout

Roy (Richard Basehart)  looking out from the shadows

It is a compelling story that is well told. While Alfred L. Werker, who was active from 1917 to 1957, is credited as the director, Anthony Mann, who does not receive screen credit, apparently took over the production. Unlike Werker, Mann is well known as the director of such films as T-Men (1947). Raw Deal (1948), Border Incident (1949), Side Street (1950), Winchester ’73 (1950), The Naked Spur (1953) and El Cid (1961).

He Walked By Night is a film that has a lot to recommend it: a seminal storyline, good acting, good directing and a look that will stay with you long after you’ve watched it. The film is worth viewing and should be included on any serious survey of the film noir genre.