In March, the American Cinematheque brings film noir back to the big screen in Los Angeles! Co-presented with the Film Noir Foundation, our 16th annual Noir City festival will present three weeks of jaded gumshoes, femmes fatale and menacing heavies in gloriously gritty black-and-white. These evenings round up the form’s usual suspects as well as rarely screened gems, including the Foundation’s new 35mm restoration of TOO LATE FOR TEARS and new 35mm print of SOUTHSIDE 1-1000! Whether you’re a noir novice or well acquainted with this postwar demimonde of crime and (occasionally) punishment, Noir City is well worth a visit.
This year’s astounding lineup of films shows the genre’s popularity around the world with evenings devoted to French (TWO MEN IN MANHATTAN, RIFIFI, JENNY LAMOUR), British (IT ALWAYS RAINS ON SUNDAY, BRIGHTON ROCK) and Italian (OSSESSIONE) noir. We remember a trio of talented actresses who died in 2013 with noir nights devoted to Joan Fontaine (BORN TO BE BAD, IVY), Eleanor Parker (CAGED, DETECTIVE STORY) and Audrey Totter (TENSION, ALIAS NICK BEAL). We’ve also got tributes to actor Dan Duryea, writer David Goodis and director Hugo Fregonese, and more.
Join Eddie Muller and FNF co-director Alan K. Rode as they host another edifying and entertaining excursion into the dark recesses of Hollywood’s most lasting artistic movement – film noir.
Series programmed by Eddie Muller, Alan K. Rode and Gwen Deglise. Program notes by John Hagelston.
Closing Night Party! This year’s closing-weekend party is on Saturday, April 5 and will feature film, live music from Dean Mora’s Swingtet, martinis, gambling, and other noirish activities – come dressed as a femme fatale, gumshoe or gangster! Restored Prints!
Dan Duryea Double Feature! Opening Night! Egyptian Theatre • Fri, Mar 21, 2014 • 7:30pm
TOO LATE FOR TEARS / LARCENY
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
Introduction by Eddie Muller and Alan K. Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.
Restored 35mm Print!
TOO LATE FOR TEARS
1949, 99 min, USA, Dir: Byron Haskin
A ruthless housewife is determined to keep an ill-gotten satchel of cash, even if it means murder. One of the great noirs of the classic era, long thought lost but now returned to the big screen! Starring Lizabeth Scott, Dan Duryea, Arthur Kennedy. Directed by Byron Haskin (*I Walk Alone”, *The War of the Worlds”, “Treasure Island”) this Noir features L.A. locations, including the Hollywood Hills and Westlake Park (now known as MacArthur Park.)
The film was restored by UCLA Film & Television Archive and the Film Noir Foundation. The restoration combined 35mm dupe negative elements from France with some material from surviving prints. No Blu ray release has been announced.
LARCENY
1948, Universal, 89 min, USA, Dir: George Sherman
Here’s one of Dan Duryea’s most obscure titles, also notable for being the first foray into film noir for crooner John Payne (of 99 RIVER STREET and KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL fame). The two slicks play hustlers trying to bilk a war widow (Joan Caulfield) out of her money. Things really heat up when pistol-packing Shelley Winters, who has a thing for both men, hits town. Wisecracking scriptwriter Bill Bowers has a field day with all the slang-spewing sass. Screening format: 35mm
Joan Fontaine Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Sat, Mar 22, 2014 • 7:30pm
BORN TO BE BAD / IVY
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.
BORN TO BE BAD
1950, Warner Bros., 94 min, USA, Dir: Nicholas Ray
Joan Fontaine looks sweet and innocent on the surface, but after she steals millionaire Zachary Scott away from another woman, she continues an illicit affair with novelist Robert Ryan. Things just get more complicated from there in this energetic, daring and slightly nasty little melodrama. One of Nicholas Ray’s best early films, and certainly his most audacious until JOHNNY GUITAR. With Mel Ferrer – and the original deleted ending!
CRITIC’S NOTES: Joan Fontaine has never been better as the baby-faced evil Christabel, one of the screen’s most memorable demonic femmes. Nicholas Ray’s efficient film never lets up. Truly the girl you love to hate. (Joan Crawford in “Queen Bee” comes a close second.) A MUST SEE
Ultra-Rare Screening!
IVY
1947, Universal, 99 min, USA, Dir: Sam Wood
Joan Fontaine memorably portrays an amoral Edwardian vixen whose hobby of seducing wayward men becomes the road to perdition. Fontaine’s tour de force performance occurred in a role originally intended for her sister Olivia de Havilland! A distinguished British cast includes Patric Knowles, Herbert Marshall and Sir Cedric Hardwicke. NOT ON DVD!
Screening format: 35mm | BORN TO BE BAD print from the collection of George Eastman House.
French-American Noir Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Sun, Mar 23, 2014 • 7:30pm
TWO MEN IN MANHATTAN / RIFIFI
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
Screening formats: DCP (TWO MEN IN MANHATTAN) and 35mm (RIFIFI)
The screening of TWO MEN IN MANHATTAN is part of our monthly series of treasures from the Cohen Film Collection. Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.
TWO MEN IN MANHATTAN (DEUX HOMMES DANS MANHATTAN)
1959, Cohen Film, 84 min, France, Dir: Jean-Pierre Melville
When a French delegate to the United Nations vanishes into thin air, two French journalists comb nocturnal Manhattan in search of answers. Melville’s obsession with the look and sound of American culture is given free rein in this jazzily directed homage to film noir and New York. In French and English with English subtitles.
CRITICS NOTE: Like Melville’s “Max and The Junkmen” (“Max et les Ferrailleurs’) , “Two Men In Manhattan” features detectives as protangonists. Although Melville tricked people into believing he shot sections of films like “L’Ainé des Ferchaux” in the U.S. he did shoot on location in New York City for “Two Men In Manhattan” (“Deux Hommes Dans Manhattan”). Melville plays French journalist Moreau, a stringer for the French press agency in New York, who investigates the mysterious disappearance of a UN delegate, Fèvre-Berthier, with the help of shady, hard-drinking tabloid photographer Delmas (Pierre Grasset). Discovering the diplomat in his American mistress’ apartment. dead from a heart attack, Delmas rearranges the death scene and takes several lurid shots to sell to the newspapers. To protect the reputation of the dead former Resistance fighter, Moreau’s boss, convinces Delmas to surrender the roll of scandalous shots.
Any chance to see Melville’s stylish existential work is a not to be missed. This seamy
Aristotelian rediscovery, takes part in one jazz-scored neon-lit night and features brothels, strippers and hookers and Times Square.
RIFIFI
1955, Rialto Pictures, 122 min, France, Dir: Jules Dassin
Back from the pen, tough guy Jean Servais rejoins his cronies and freshly imported safecracker César the Milanese (Dassin himself, billed as Perlo Vita) for a little jewelry store smash-and-grab job – but Servais wants the whole works! The central heist is an edge-of-your-seat, 30-minute sequence without dialogue or music, so detailed that it provided a feasible blueprint for real-life pros. “A vivid exercise that more or less invented the idea of French film noir. … For the French, RIFIFI had Hollywood pizzazz; for Americans, it had Continental sophistication. For both, it seemed to possess an authoritative naturalism.” – J. Hoberman. “The best film noir I have ever seen. A marvel of skill and inventiveness.” – François Truffaut. In French with English subtitles.
British Noir Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Wed, Mar 26, 2014 • 7:30pm
IT ALWAYS RAINS ON SUNDAY / BRIGHTON ROCK
IT ALWAYS RAINS ON SUNDAY
1947, Rialto, 92 min, UK, Dir: Robert Hamer
A former barmaid, now the harried matriarch of a family in impoverished Bethnal Green, jeopardizes everything when she shelters the escaped fugitive who was once her lover. A slice-of-life noir and prototype of British “kitchen sink” drama. Googie Withers stars.
BRIGHTON ROCK
1947, Rialto, 92 min, UK, Dir: John Boulting
This archetypal British noir tells the taut and tragic tale of young gangster Pinkie (Richard Attenborough) and the turmoil he brings to a beleaguered resort town trying to emerge from the ruins of war. Voted #15 in BFI’s poll of Britain’s greatest films.
CRITICS NOTE: A MUST SEE DOUBLE BILL- MOODY AND SEARING. Screening format: 35mm
Eleanor Parker Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Thu, Mar 27, 2014 • 7:30pm
CAGED / DETECTIVE STORY
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
CAGED
1950, Warner Bros., 96 min, USA, Dir: John Cromwell
Flat-out the best “women behind bars” movie ever made. Sentenced to prison for her role in a failed robbery that killed her husband, vulnerable innocent Marie Allen (Oscar-nominated Eleanor Parker) undergoes a degrading transformation in “the joint.” Parker gives the performance of her career, supported by a cell block of sensational actresses: Agnes Moorehead, Hope Emerson, Betty Garde, Jan Sterling, Lee Patrick, Jane Darwell and many more. A classic!
DETECTIVE STORY
1951, Paramount, 103 min, USA, Dir: William Wyler
Eleanor Parker’s second Best Actress nomination in as many years is a memorable turn as the unfortunate wife of tormented NYPD detective Kirk Douglas in a splendid screen adaptation of Sidney Kingsley’s hit play. Powerfully helmed by William Wyler and nominated for four Academy Awards. Co-starring William Bendix, Lee Grant, George Macready, Cathy O’Donnell, Horace McMahon, Gladys George, Joseph Wiseman, Gerald Mohr and Frank Faylen.
Screening formats: 35mm (CAGED) and DCP (DETECTIVE STORY)
French & American Noir Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Fri, Mar 28, 2014 • 7:30pm
JENNY LAMOUR / ANGELS OVER BROADWAY
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
Introduction by Alan K. Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.
JENNY LAMOUR (QUAI DES ORFÈVRES)
1947, Rialto Pictures, 102 min, France, Dir: Henri-Georges Clouzot
Maurice (Bertrand Blier), the jealous husband of ambitious cabaret chanteuse Jenny (Suzy Delair), is blamed for murder when a lecherous movie producer turns up dead. Director Henri-Georges Clouzot spins a classic police procedural, following dauntless Inspector Antoine (French actor Louis Jouvet, in his greatest role) as he doggedly goes about untying the knots in this delightfully perplexing, character-driven mystery. In French with English subtitles. CRITICS NOTE: ANOTHER MUST SEE
ANGELS OVER BROADWAY
1940, Sony Repertory, 79 min, USA, Dir: Ben Hecht, Lee Garmes
An off-beat, mordant melodrama that was written, directed and produced by the great Ben Hecht. A con-man (Douglas Fairbanks Jr.) lures a suicidal embezzler into a rigged poker game with an unemployed chanteuse (Rita Hayworth) only to have the tables turned by a boozing playwright (Thomas Mitchell in a superb performance). Hecht received an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay with co-director Lee Garmes providing the shadowed cinematography.
Los Angeles Noir Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Sat, Mar 29, 2014 • 7:30pm
SOUTHSIDE 1-1000 / ROADBLOCK
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
6:30 PM: Before our L.A. noir double feature, join the Southern California chapter of the Mystery Writers of America for an informative discussion on Los Angeles’ noir heritage in film and literature. Panelists include novelists Eric Beetner (Dig Two Graves), P.G. Sturges (the Shortcut Man series), and Steph Cha (Follow Her Home). Book signing in the Egyptian lobby beginning at 6:30 PM, followed by panel discussion.
Double feature begins at 7:30 PM. Introduction by Alan K. Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.
SOUTHSIDE 1-1000 New 35mm Print!
1950, Warner Bros., 73 min, USA, Dir: Boris Ingster
Slam-bang crime drama courtesy of the King Brothers is highlighted by downtown L.A., Hollywood and San Quentin prison locations as Don DeFore goes undercover to smash up a counterfeiting ring. Sultry Andrea King, George Tobias, Barry Kelley and Morris Ankrum co-star.
ROADBLOCK
1951, Warner Bros., 73 min, USA, Dir: Harold Daniels
After several years of playing tenacious cops or cruel gunmen, character actor Charles McGraw was elevated to leading-man status by RKO boss Howard Hughes, becoming the studio’s “B” version of Bob Mitchum. Nobody could clip off dialogue like McGraw. In this prototypical noir, he finally reveals a soft center, as an insurance investigator who goes crooked trying to satisfy an avaricious dame (Joan Dixon). Screening format: 35mm
Audrey Totter Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Sun, Mar 30, 2014 • 7:30pm
TENSION / ALIAS NICK BEAL
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
Introduction by Alan K. Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.
TENSION
1949, Warner Bros., 95 min, USA, Dir: John Berry
Vampy sexpot Audrey Totter is married to mild-mannered druggist Richard Basehart – but she sleeps with every “real man” she sees. So Basehart takes the noir way out – kill his wife’s lover and disappear into a new identity. But cops Barry Sullivan and William Conrad smell a rat. Then Audrey and Barry eye each other … and the tension is stretched to the breaking point. John Berry’s expert direction steamrolls plot holes flat – and Audrey is a 100-proof hoot.
ALIAS NICK BEAL
1949, Universal, 93 min, USA, Dir: John Farrow
A true noir rarity! The Faust legend is played out as a supernatural noir thriller, with Ray Milland as the suave devil tempting ambitious DA Thomas Mitchell and fallen woman Audrey Totter in this dark and devious doppelgänger of Capra’s “It’s A Wonderful Life”.
CRITICS NOTE: THIS RARITY IS A STONE GROOVE Screening format: 35mm
OSSESSIONE Egyptian Theatre • Wed, Apr 2, 2014 • 7:30pm
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
OSSESSIONE
1943, 131 min, Italy, Dir: Luchino Visconti
Based on James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice, the first acclaimed work of Italian neorealism is a gritty, earthy (and unlicensed) adaptation of the famous noir novella, much closer in tone and spirit to Cain’s tale than the 1946 Hollywood version. Clara Calamai and Massimo Girotti burn up the screen as the doomed lovers, but Visconti makes the story as much about poverty as about lust and greed. The film was reviled and banned by Italy’s Fascist government, and MGM (legal holder of the movie rights) confiscated and destroyed all the prints it could find. Yet OSSESSIONE survives, a stunning hybrid of noir and neorealism – the director’s first masterpiece. In Italian with English subtitles.
CRITICS NOTE: ANOTHER MUST SEE
Visconti’s version of James Cain’s “The Postman Always Rings Twice” is closer in tone to the bleak book. MGM tried for years to develop a successful scrip of Cain’s novel that would pass the censors. In 1948 they filmed their watered down, more glamorous version starring Lana Turner and John Garfield. Although Visconti’s actors have shed all makeup (to the dismay of leading lady Clara Calamai) gorgeous close-ups alert you to a great stylist.
Considered by some Italian critics as the first Neo Realist film, Visconte’s film, a blend of French Poetic Realism and hard-boiled American pulp captures the climate as the Fascist regime was collapsing. Already in trouble with government censors in pre-production, the finished film was denounced by the Italian government as “too realistic.” The government forced the film to be withdrawn from circulation and destroyed the original negative. Due to the war, Visconti couldn’t obtain film rights to Cain’s novel, preventing the film from being shown in the U.S.
“Ossessione” finally had a commercial release in the United States in June 1977, premiering in New York at the D.W. Griffith Theater. That print and all succeeding prints are based on a duplicate negative Viscounti hid in his closet.
Hugo Fregonese Double Feature! Egyptian Theatre • Thu, Apr 3, 2014 • 7:30pm
HARDLY A CRIMINAL / ONE WAY STREET
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
CRITICS NOTE: I applaud the festival’s decision to show European Noir. Of all the notable double bills, this is the most alluring.
HARDLY A CRIMINAL (APENAS UN DELINCUENTE)
1949, Film Noir Foundation, 88 min, Argentina, Dir: Hugo Fregonese
A bank employee (Jorge Salcedo) uses a loophole in Argentine law to concoct the perfect crime, planning to reap the rewards of his embezzlement after serving six years in prison. A vivid cross between NAKED CITY and BRUTE FORCE, and an evocative look at mid-20th century Buenos Aires. In Spanish with English subtitles.
CRITICS NOTE: The only Argentine director with a successful career in Hollywood, Fragonese directed numerous B-films including “One Way Street” ( with James Mason), “The Raid” (Van Heflin, Anne Bancroft and Lee Marvin) and “Man in the Attic”, the Jack the Ripper thriller starring Jack Palance, and the late noir “Black Tuesday” (Edward G. Robinson.)
“Just an Offender” played in the official section of the Venice Film Festival 1949 and won the Film Critics Association of Argentina award for Male Newcomer (Jorge Salcedo). It is considered a classic of Argentine cinema, as is his first feature “Where Words Fail” (with the dream ballet) which lead to his first Hollywood contact with Louis B. Mayer. “Where Words Fail” was released in 1951 in America by M-G-M. Look for Fragonese’s wife Faith Domergue in a cameo role in the casino scene,
ONE WAY STREET
1950, Universal, 79 min, USA, Dir: Hugo Fregonese
Even though he had just begun his American film career, James Mason already had his doomed-fugitive persona down pat in ODD MAN OUT and THE RECKLESS MOMENT. Here he’s a disillusioned doctor who feels responsible for his wife’s death and believes he’s only worthy of patching up wounded criminals. Deciding to take a gamble, he tricks Los Angeles gang boss Dan Duryea out of his latest haul, as well as absconding with Duryea’s more than willing moll, Marta Toren. The pair head for Mexico with the swag – but can they outrun Duryea’s seemingly limitless reach?
CRITICS NOTE: One Way Street’s script has a fascinating triptych structure, contrasting two urban night chases. A sunny Mexican village (the central section) gives the lovers a sort of DMZ.
David Goodis Double Feature! Fri, Apr 4, 2014 – 7:30pm
NIGHTFALL / AND HOPE TO DIE
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
Philippe Garnier will sign copies of his book Goodis: A Life in Black and White at 6:30PM in the lobby.
Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.
NIGHTFALL
1957, Sony Repertory, 79 min, USA, Dir: Jacques Tourneur
One of the last true noirs of the classic era, this often-overlooked gem, based on a novel by noir legend David Goodis, features terrific direction from Tourneur and stunning cinematography by Burnett Guffey. Aldo Ray plays an artist whose life goes permanently haywire when fate interrupts a winter hunting trip. From then on it’s life on the run, dozens of double-crosses, psychotic killers on his trail, lots of de rigeur flashbacks, and a young Anne Bancroft decked out in sequins and lace.
CRITICS NOTE: “You’re the most wanted man I know,” says toothsome model Marie (Anne Bancroft) to James Vanning (Aldo Ray) an innocent man on the run from criminals. Everyone in Stirling Silliphant’s 78 minute script is in the wrong place at the wrong time
Like “Out Of The Past” Tourneur opens with a compelling twenty minutes, this time featuring Burnett Guffey signature camera moves and dolly work. (Guffey shot “In a Lonely Place”, “All the King’s Men” “The Reckless Moment”, ” Knock on Any Door”, From Here to Eternity”, “Bonnie and Clyde” and countless others.
AND HOPE TO DIE (LA COURSE DU LIÈVRE À TRAVERS LES CHAMPS)
1972, CCFC, 99 min, France, Dir: René Clement
This adaptation of David Goodis’ novel Black Friday concerns a crook on the lam (Jean Louis Trintignant) who crosses paths with a Montreal gang plotting a big score – led by noir stalwarts Robert Ryan and Aldo Ray. “Froggy” (as Ryan dubs our hero) decides to join in the heist and, of course, ends up neck-deep in danger. An odd and invigorating French-Canadian-American production, this is a rarely screened homage to noir on both the page and screen, sparked by a devilish script from author Sébastien Japrisot (The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun). English dubbed version.
CRITIC’S NOTE: Francis Lai (“A Man And A Woman) contributes an elegiac score. A flash opening chase sequence and cinematography by Edmond Richard (“The Discreet Charm Of the Bourgeoisie” and ‘That Obscure Object of Desire” add to Sébastien Japrisot’s inventive script.
René Clement and editor Roger Dwyre use single frame flashbacks to get to Tony’s subconscious.
Lea Massari (“L’Avventura”) plays one of the gang members.Jean-Jacques Beineix was second A.D.
Please note that Noir City Hollywood actually ends on Sunday, April 6, but our party is on Saturday, April 5!
16th Annual Film Noir Festival Closing Weekend Party: DETOUR
Presented in collaboration with the Film Noir Foundation and The Kitchen for Exploring Foods.
Sat, Apr 5, 2014 7:00pm, Egyptian Theatre
DETOUR
1946, Wade Williams, 70 min, USA, Dir: Edgar G. Ulmer
“Whichever way you turn, fate sticks out a foot to trip you” in this low-budget noir classic. Hitchhiking to Hollywood, loser Tom Neal takes several wrong turns and ends up on the expressway to hell – Ann Savage
Pull the brim of your fedora down low over your face and jump on the Red Car to join a bevy of other shady characters for a celebration – Noir City style. Get in a noir mood with a screening of DETOUR, followed by a party in the Egyptian Theatre Courtyard!
7:00 PM: Introductions and screening of DETOUR (info below).
9:00 PM: Dinner is served, bar open & entertainment begins. Party till midnight!
Our Box Office will be open until 9 PM for latecomers.
Wet your beak and tip a few martinis, gin fizzes or brews. All ticket holders will have a choice of two free alcoholic & non-alcoholic beverages from our bar, plus other options from a cash bar. Shuffle with a dame or sailor to the rhythms of the Dean Mora Swingtet and the sweetest canary you’ll ever hear tweet. Don’t let the coppers catch you gambling in the casino when they raid the burlesque show! The Victory Variety Hour performs.
Vintage make up styling tips and lipstick touch-ups from Besame Cosmetics, plus a vintage make-over for one lucky winner. Plenty of vintage photo opportunities!
Step into Noir City in vintage 1930s, 40s or 50s attire! Come as a femme fatale, gumshoe, gun moll or mobster (or come as you are – no special attire required)! When shopping for your glad rags, get 15% off merchandise at Iguana Vintage Clothing and Paper Moon Vintage and 10% off at Vintage Vortex when you mention Film Noir!
TICKETS are only available on Brown Paper Tickets and will not be sold on Fandango for this event. You can also purchase a ticket in person at the Egyptian Theater box office.
Go to the website to view ticketing options :$25 General Admission, $40 Cinematheque Member Film Noir Party with Dinner, $45 Film Noir Party with Dinner, or $55 VIP Film Noir Party & Dinner with priority seating. General Admission sales end will be sold until 9 PM the night of the event if the event is not sold out in advance. All Dinner party ticket sales end Wednesday, April 2nd at noon!
Egyptian Theatre • Sat, Apr 5, 2014 • 7:00pm
Library of Congress Restoration Double Feature! Newly Restored 35mm Prints! Discussion with Author Mary Ann Anderson!
M / THE HITCH-HIKER
Presented by the American Cinematheque and the Film Noir Foundation
Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation. Discussion between films with author Mary Ann Anderson (‘Ida Lupino: Beyond the Camera’ and ‘The Making of The Hitch-Hiker’) and Alan K. Rode.
M (1951)
1951, Superior Pictures, 91 min, USA, Dir: Joseph Losey
The American version of Fritz Lang’s 1931 classic about a child murderer being simultaneously hunted by the police and the underworld receives renewed impetus in the setting of Bunker Hill locations under the direction of Joe Losey. David Wayne turns in a bravura performance as the killer and is supported by a veritable character actor’s Hall of Fame: Howard Da Silva, Luther Adler, Steve Brodie, Raymond Burr, Norman Lloyd, Walter Burke and Jim Backus. NOT ON DVD!
CRITICS NOTE: Losey’s’ creepy adaptation is as chilling as Lang’s iconic film. Wayne is astonishing as the perverse nebbishy tormented killer. Seymour Nebenzal produced both Lang and Losey’s version of the same screenplay. Luther Adler plays an alcoholic attorney, a character not in the original. Losey extracts sexual innuendo in certain of Wayne’s scenes. Watch for Angel’s Flight, Bunker Hill, and the Bradbury Building. A MUST SEE
THE HITCH-HIKER
1953, RKO, 71 min, USA, Dir: Ida Lupino
A groundbreaking, fact-based story of two pals on a Mexican fishing trip kidnapped by a serial killer who terrorizes both men into delivering him to safety. The only American film noir directed by a woman – the great Ida Lupino – features a trio of terrific performances by Frank Lovejoy, Edmond O’Brien and the odious William Talman.
Egyptian Theatre, 6712 Hollywood Boulevard, Hollywood, CA 90028
To purchase tickets, watch trailers and for more information go to http://americancinemathequecalendar.com/content/noir-city-hollywood-16th-annual-festival-of-film-noir