1951’s Cry Danger is just the sort of movie I like best. At 79 minutes, it’s a short and snappy film noir. There’s no wasted space or long lingering pauses. Just Dick Powell out for vengeance on those who done him wrong.
Dick Powell plays Rocky Mulloy who was framed by some of his criminal associates for a heist he was not involved in. Upon his release from the slammer, he’s ready for revenge. The man who done him wrong is played by longtime Adrastos favorite William Conrad who was a heavy both literally and figuratively:
Powell is involved in a love triangle with Rhonda Fleming and her husband who is off screen and in jail as the story unwinds. Initially, she seems like a sweet woman just trying to get by. It turns out that she’s a femme fatale of the highest order. She fools Powell for half the movie, but Dick always cut through the bullshit.
Much of the action takes place in a trailer park in LA’s Bunker Hill district. The chances of a trailer park with a killer view surviving the Fifties are slim and none and slim just sold his Airstream trailer to a sleazy real estate developer. Is there any other kind?
Here’s the view from the trailer park:
Richard Erdman plays a disabled veteran who helped spring Powell from the pokey. Sure, his testimony was false, but Erdman steals every scene he’s in with boozy shtick such as this:
- Jean Porter: You drinkin’ that stuff so early?
- Erdman: Listen, doll girl, when you drink as much as I do, you gotta start early.
Erdman can be seen in the featured image with Powell and Regis Toomey who played the detective determined to recover the movie’s MacGuffin: the heist money. The actor was born John Francis Regis Toomey, which he wisely shortened to the snappier Regis Toomey. That would be an excellent cat name.
I’m not going into more plot details because this feature is called pulp fiction, not pulp spoilers. Suffice it to say that the story makes sense and is full of smart characters and snappy dialogue.
The snappy patter was typical for a film written by William Bowers who was also one of Hollywood’s top script doctors. Bowers did rewrites on two noir classics previously featured in this space, Criss Cross and Pitfall.
There’s a dispute as to who really directed Cry Danger: Robert Parrish or uncredited producer Dick Powell. Co-star Rhonda Fleming said it was Powell. Suffice it to say that he was the auteur of the movie with the able assistance of Parrish and cinematographer Joseph Biroc.
Grading Time: I give Cry Danger 3 1/2 stars and an Adrastos Grade of B+.
It’s poster time.
I’m not sure how well the tagline “Powell’s on the prowl” has held up. It makes the star sound like a stalker instead of a former musical comedy star married to All-American girl June Alyson. As you can see, the prowl thing was excluded from the Australian poster on the right:
Now that we’ve cried about danger together, let’s all go to the lobby:
I hope there’s a bar: Richard Erdman’s character needs booze to keep firing off smart mouth zingers like this exchange with Dick Powell:
- Powell: You’re a pint ahead of schedule.
- Erdman: Only the blind can really see.
- Powell: Well, you’re only half blind.
- Erdman: I’ll fix that.
- Powell: You know, I had another friend once who had trouble with that stuff. He found a way to get off of it.
- Erdman: How?
- Powell: He quit.
- Erdman: Thank you, Billy Sunday.
As always, the lobby cards for this black and white movie are in living color.
We begin with one of the phoniest looking stage punches ever photographed. Maybe Dick Powell pulled his punch because Bill Conrad was such a nice guy. Most actors who play hiss-provoking villains are usually swell fellows offscreen, after all.
The first two images were taken in an Airstream at the trailer park. Let’s hop aboard a different kind of trailer:
The last word goes to Eddie Muller with his Noir Alley intro and outro:
