Oh he is, folks, it show die.
People say good money to see this movie.
When they go out to a theater, they want cold sodas, hot popcorn, and no monsters.
In the protection booth, everyone pretend podcasting isn't boring.
Ut it off.
I'll tell you it's no good.
I'm not kind of get involved involved in what?
How stupid do you think I am?
You hate that one.
Some days, SMO. I ain't gonna hate her enough to kill her.
Someone tried to murder me.
She was lying there, The room was full of gas. I pulled her out in the air. The office said soon out because he didn't hear me. I thought she was coming too.
So I left her to turn off the gas and the key was gone. Well, as she claimed, somebody trying to murder her.
She was a steric.
I would want to murder her.
You kidding a woman with her.
Kind of money?
You can be so sweet at times. I'm not going to rush.
Welcome to the Projection booth. I'm your host. Mike White joined me once again. Is mister Jedediah Airs.
Good morning.
Also back the booth is mis Lexie van Dyck.
Hello, happy to be here.
November twenty twenty four continues with a look at Otto Premager's nineteen fifty two thriller Angel Face. The film starts Robert Mitcham as Frank Jessup and ambulance driver who gets mixed up with the posh Tremaine family. He's torn between the dangerous Diane Tremaine played by Gene Simmons and his
best gal Mary played by Mona Freeman. We will be getting more into the mix as we go along, So if you don't want anything spoiled all the twists and turns of this film as we go along, definitely turn off the podcast and come on back. We will still be here. And if you come back right after that ending, Holy cow, right, Jedediah, when was the first time you saw Angel Face and what did you think?
I actually saw it for the first time when you asked me to be on this episode. So obviously I'm a big crime guy and I love classic film noir, and it's hard to believe that I'd never seen this one, but I saw for the first time earlier this year, and then I've watched it several times since, and I have to confess it's not my favorite to rewatch.
It's one that.
I admire in a lot of ways. I like it thematically a lot. I like a lot of elements of it. But if I were going to rewatch, especially like an Autopremenger Phil Noir, I'm much rather rewatch Fallen Angel or over the Sidewalk in something like that. But I have a lot of respect for it thematically. I'm really eager to hear what you guys have to say because it's new to me still and I'm appreciating it more with each re rewatch, but not one I'm gonna pop on first thing.
If I'm looking for a moody film noir and LEXI, how about yourself.
I saw this for the first time for this podcast.
I Parmenger is someone who I'm very interested in.
But his work is extremely vast, so it's hard so I can get through everything in one go like some directors.
But this one is so interesting because it is Have you guys seen Bonjoorge Tristee his later film.
Yeah, I saw that one.
There's a lot of this movie.
They feel like this is his first step for making that movie because a lot of the concepts and stuff are very similar. The story is very similar, the characters are very similar, So I just felt so much this is like reflections of like how he's going to make another movie down the line.
This was the first time viewing for me, and I really don't know that much auto premature. I'm trying to remember why I picked this one, but I'm glad I did, because I, again was unfamiliar with it. Really, I always enjoy Herbert Marshall, even though he's only in here for not very long. And maybe it was the strange psychosexual stuff that attracted me, or maybe it showed up on a list of weirdo films noir, but this one just scratches an itch. I can see where you're coming from, Jedediah.
This is a tough one to watch multiple times, especially after you see the big murder and the end scene. Where do you go from there? So going back to the movie, I will pick out more things as I see it a few more times than that. But yeah, it's not one that I'm going to keep digging into. It's not Laura. But I do have to say I'm not an expert on films noir by any stretch of the imagination. So when you're talking about where the sidewalk
ends and Fallen Angel. I'm just like, yeah, I still got to see those two.
Those really show off Freminger's incredible gifts for just really lush moody at Atmospheric Films. They both starre Dana Andrews, who was some he used a fairmount and.
Angel Face is often daylight.
And when these kind of big gosh mansion and it's a different stripe of noir. This is not the dark streets, dark alleys of film noir, of the sort of hard boiled variety that I'm especially attracted to. But it is Mitch of playing He's the greatest film noir sap right dies for love because he meets the wrong woman and he can't resist her, even as it becomes increasingly apparent to him that he should. And he remains cool, even as he is the biggest dumbass in the world, still
somehow want to be that guy. Jay Kinkson, one of my favorite writers the Phone Noir, in his book The Blind Alley, described Angel Face as the third part in the ultimate Robert Mitcham The sap Who Dies for Love trilogy, starting with Out of the Past in forty seven and then His Kind of Woman in nineteen fifty and Angel Face in fifty two, and he says.
In each one Mitcham goes from is.
Diminished and diminished, like Out of the Past is the most romantic, and he gets to choose to die or love at the end. And then in his Kind of Woman, he's pretty much gottency. He's bashed over the head and he's loozy and he's just this the theem fetales puppet throughout and he's duped and.
He doesn't die, but she tries to kill him at the end.
He's just kind of a dupe. He doesn't get to be noble or anything. And then in this one he kind of sees it coming and lays down and then pays the price for it. But yeah, and each one just stripped and of the sort of doomed romanticism of film noir.
But he's still pretty cool. I don't know how I pulls that off.
He's incredibly cool. I love these little one liners that he has, these little zingers that he gets in there. Oh, I don't trust you, but I'm still going to do this anyway, right, Frank, are.
You're accusing me? I'm not accusing anybody. But if I were a coup and not a very.
Bright coup at bet I'd say that's your story was as phony as a three dollars.
Some of those lines that he just tosses off like nobody's business. Yeah, he's super super cool, but yeah, also such a dope. And he's got Mary there and it's come on, dude, she's right here. You've got the perfect girl right here, but treats her like shit and ends
up going with Gene Simmons. Though I should say, we should probably talk a little bit about the origins of this movie and just that this was shot so incredibly quick, just because Gene Simmons had a deal with RCO and Howard Hughes, the guy who was running RKO, and she had a three picture deal, and they had what eighteen days left on her contract or something, and they had
to get that last picture done. Hughes was just like, you're not getting a free picture, you're not getting off Because apparently Hughes just and I wasn't really aware of this whole idea of him signing starlets so that he could bang them, and he really had the hots for Gene Simmons, and her husband at the time was not very happy about that. She wasn't happy about that. She cut her own hair super short so that she wouldn't be able to star in this movie, and just to
stay away from Howard Hughes. She openly hated this guy. And yeah, he was very much a cat. He's very much a creep. A lot of the stories about Howard Hughes that you hear are one true. And yeah, he hired Premager because he said, you can get this done really quickly, so bang it out, let's go.
I think she's really good in this movie.
I love film noir because it feels like moral details without any judgment, and that's what this film sets up as it's a very.
Quick film, like it moves really fast.
Which I appreciate, and it just sets up everything so you see right away Jeane Simmons has her eyes on him, she gets in, she gets her claws in, and the whole time you really don't feel he loves her at all, at least in when I was watching, that raw chemistry that you have with someone who you're attracted with but
you don't necessarily see a future with. And she, on the other hand, is this kind of spoiled rich girl who sees what she wants she sees a way to have her cake can eat it too by taking care of her stepmom and having her dad and this guy at the same time. And so she's very manipulative. It has her designs on him. And also the other thing I felt is like it didn't feel like there was a ton of animosity from the stepmother towards her.
Which I find very interesting.
It feels like this very one sided, like she hates me, she hates me, she's making my life miserable, when everything we see is her just being like a doting stepmother.
Yeah, it's just a real interesting, edical thing going on there. It's not really played up as a sexual relationship with her father, but very much loves him and wants to murder her stepmother, who does not have it coming. Everything we see about her is that she's great, she's rich, and she is annoyed that her husband is just spend money. I'm the one who has to tell him not to be contemptuous of money.
Don't throw it around. It's nothing, it's got value.
She's irritated because her stepdaughter clearly despises her, but she's trying to be a good step mother, creatiate herself and meet her halfway. But yeah, I do love Gene Simmons' performance in this, I will say with every rewatch the introduction to her characters. She's sitting at the piano playing Robert Mitcham plays an ambulance driver who has come to their home because Geen simmons stepmother has almost died from
inhaling carbon monoxide or some gas. And he comes down the stairs from having treated mom, and Jean Simmons is playing piano very sad tune at the piano, and he's immediately just fixated on her, and then he tries to comfort her and says, it's okay, she's going to be all right, She's just fine, and Gene Simmons bursts into tears, and you know, first viewing, of course is read as, oh, she's so relieved, she's been, you know, so upset up that and she can finally let go of this, and
of course we come to realize second viewing it's pretty funny because she is really upset that her plans, her attempts to murder her step mother have not worked out. And I really do enjoy her performance in this. It is funnier and funnier every time, just how right on the surface, nasty and cold and everything she is. She's really catty with Robert Mensm's girlfriend with Mona? Was that Mona Freeman playing the girlfriend who I got to say,
I really like. Typically in these films more the good girl or the non sense a. The straight girl is kind of drab, boring, and you can see why the hero or the anti hero is such a sap for the sexy bad girl. But I really like Wonna Freeman in this one. I think she gives as good as she gets. She's got a great relationship with Robert Mitchmond's screen that both what's clear they're involved sexually. There's nothing, as you were saying, Lexi, there's no judgment about that
in this movie. It's he's using her and she's using him, and they both like each other. But when he's going off with another girl, she just moves on, goes off with another guy, and it's very casual and adult and.
They still see each other.
But yeah, there's no she's not dowdy, she's not pearl clutching, she's not boring at all. I like her performance, and it's hardest, maybe in this one, to say, why are you sticking around the bad choice.
When she's still there, she.
Goes off with his partner Bill, which probably cuts a little close. And I love Bill played by Kenneth Toby, who I mostly recognize for being one of the air traffic controllers and airplane, but I also know he's in it came from beneath the Sea and the thing from the outer space. He was just in so many things
over the years. But he's got a great face. And I do love the confrontation scene that we have a little bit later on in the movie, if not towards the end of the movie, where Mitcham is having a very open heart to heart conversation with Mary and Bill's there and he's just like, Hey, if it's got something to do with Mary, it's got something to do with me, because now we're hooking up kind of thing. And yeah,
to your point, there's no hand ringing around. Robert Mitcham and the Mona Freeman character were definitely living or cohabitating. It sounds now it sounds like Bill's right in there as well. There's no oh, at my place your place. He does have his own place, but he definitely left some things behind it her place, and that's the only scene. So I read the shooting script of this, and I thought, oh, I'm going to get a good look at some of these uncut scenes and some of this stuff. But no,
it was the shooting script. It was so exacting to what we see, except for the opening. There's a little bit at the opening where it's Frank the Robert Mitchen character and Mary the Mona Freeman character, and I think a little bit of Bill at the hospital and them going back and forth about i'll see it when it shifts over, those kind of things, and then they get the call and then they go to save missus Tremaine.
That's really the only different all of the other stuff, even the little witty the one liners that I was talking about, those were all written in the draft that I read, which was still called The Murder, but somebody had written on the cover angel face.
Yeah.
The whole thing about Mona is that she's so entirely sure of herself and she knows what she's worth, which is something like the most equivalent we get of this a lot of performances like Barbara Stanwick. She's very I know what I deserve, I know who I deserve, and I'm gonna pursue that rather than pursue some kind of foolish man who doesn't really know what he wants.
And I love the idea of.
The whole morals of this being like, he doesn't really love this other woman, but she is keeping him on by giving him the promise of helping him with his garage. He's being a little bit of a a social climber, but he has higher aspirations for himself, and so that's one of the main reasons he's pursuing her, besides the sexual attraction. And Mona stands her ground and she is the quote quote good woman and her performance of that
is fantastic. And I love the scene of Bona and Jean Simmons, Diane's her character seem at the table at the very beginning where they're like, it's like in the Battle of Wills.
It's so fantastic.
Well, and that scene really brings up to me what this whole movie is about, which is class and the different class structure. And you're talking about Mitcham's not really being a social climber. He's so impressed with her car, with Diane's car, this little hot rod, and he it's not like he sees it and goes, oh wow, I
could drive this car. All the time, she's setting him up to be her boy toy, where it's like, oh, here, i'll get you a job, and i'll give you more money towards your garage, and I'll do this, and I'll do this, and that scene with Mona when it's her and Jeene Simmons at lunch and that whole thing where at the end Mona's hey, I'm not going to pick up the check, like I know who's got the money around here, and she just leaves the stiffer with the
check and I'm like, good, yeah, you should, because these rich a holes. And that's so much of this is just this idea of Diane has this money, her stepmother's money because her father isn't rich. Her father's a writer. And I know writers, Jed. I see the mansion that you're living in as a writer. I know you're sitting there on your throne of gold and everything. But like, he hasn't written a word since they got together, and that becomes this huge problem for Gene Simmons where she's
just she's ruining my father. How dare she he hasn't written anything?
How funny because her dad seems more like a social climber because it's probably married her mother who was rich, and then he married another woman who.
Was rich so he could pursue his writing career.
I wonder what.
Happened to her original mother if she had something to do with that. Is she that desperate to get her father by herself that she bumped off her original mom?
Be think she died in some kind of bombing or something like that.
Yeah, they were living in London, or yeah, died in the Blitz.
Yes.
I like what you talked about how this is a studio class of the people who have the money or who have this kind of status don't always use it in a quote unquote classy way. But then you have these people who are of like lower stature, like Mona and stuff, who are doing the right thing and acting in a classy manner.
I like too, how the scene between Dean Simmons and Mona Freeman. Dean Simmons is trying to drive a wedge and she does very blondely and very easily, between Mona and Frank or Robert Mitchmin. But she offers money. She says, look, I know he's too proud to take it if I just offer it to him. So I'm going to offer you money. And her idea modas is he's not that dump. It's hard, like I couldn't just have this money. And the idea that Jean Simmons Diane has, she just tosses off. Oh,
there's so many ways to get money. Just say you want it on the radio, and that's easy.
Money comes from wherever.
The obvious money person to answer of writing is you can just get money anywhere.
Just yeah, try it.
Why can't poor people buy more money?
Exactly?
There's a lot of.
Fundat little details in the I'm sure anachronism's all over my favorite films noir, but I think in this one they stood out to me because I wasn't quite as wrapped up by the atmosphere of it the whole the opening scene where they come out, the ambulance drivers come out to the house and they find this woman nearly died in her bedroom, and they investigate it. They basically do the job of the cops and they get it
all figured out. They say, this could have been a murder attempt or this could have been suicide, and they go through all the logistics of how the gas leak was discovered, who was where, what was going on, And I knows that's for the movie to keep the movie rolling along, but yeah, it was so odd watching ambulance drivers look for clues and point things out and then clean up and you're like, oh, we've decided it was an accident and that's that's all.
So that was weird.
And the movie's just full of weird little movie tricks that are standing out because I'm not distracted by how cool everything looks this time. Did ambulance drivers wear ties like all.
The way up in the fifties?
Was that a thing?
I'm sure they did. Everyone wore tie n.
I want to take a job in a garage too.
Yeah, the opening of this film with them showing up and investigating this being the rich people's house, I was just like, I'm surprising at Colombo, especially with the way that's, oh, she could have kicked the key immediately Colombo would start doing the whole scratching of the head and looking for a pencil kind of thing, because this just does feel so kinky when they get there, and of course it's like, is it suicide, No, it can't be suicide. And then
I love Herbert Marshway's Oh she wouldn't commit suicide. She's got a bridge game tomorrow.
You know.
I love the way they dismiss the victims is like a hysterical woman when she says someone was trying to murder me, and they just go, now, missus tremain's.
Right, and that's it. That's a fear in this movie seems to be an asylum because the way that when Gene Simmons, when Diane finally confesses everything, and I know I'm jumping way ahead, but once she confesses everything, it's just like, oh, don't talk that way. You don't want to end up in an asylum. Like everyone is there to protect her or like her lawyer, family, lawyers especially to protect her from going away to an asylum. It's just like, no, no, keep it quiet. You don't want
to say that in front of anybody. Just you know, don't be treated crazy. We don't want to put you away.
Yeah, because once you go to an asylum, you have that on your like.
Record.
I guess you could say like people would talk about you, they would gossip, and then everything would just get worse.
It'd ruin your social standing.
Exactly.
It speaks a lot, I think, to very real seminine concerns of the day. And I'm sure they're still here, they've just changed. It's not necessarily an asylum, but the way that you can be swept out of the way through some very easy social manipulations and if you're a too hysterically insistent on someone was trying to kill me, or someone was trying to harm me, or you're playing more passive so that you don't get flagged as a hysteric, and then you're vulnerable to the forces trying to do
you harm. So yeah, it's a I think a chilling assessment of the reality that the women, even rich women, and maybe especially rich women, because they had people coming after them more readily for that money and social standing that they had and could be access to for other people.
Yeah, it's almost like it's really hard to be a.
Woman, is it.
I love how she moves up in her social standing too, after her mom is out of the picture.
And her whole on demeanor changes, like she's stressing like a little girl who wears her hair in a different way. It's a little bit more modern, a little bit more adult. She wears the pants and the blazer. Like everything changes.
Even one of the servants, because they have two servants. And I find this interesting too that the woman in that relationship wears the pants and he even calls out the man of the relationship and says, oh, I thought you Japanese had this all figured out. Yeah, no, not with my wife. She's the one that tells me what to do. But he's the one who calls Geene Simmons Diane. He ends up calling her madam instead of miss I think.
Or yeah, he corrects himself.
Yeah, because now she's the top dog here at the manor and her whole generosity. Oh, try to find another job, but don't worry, I'm not gonna end your income anytime, because again she holds those friggin' purse strings. She's the one that wants to get Frank set up with his garage so that he'll be completely indebted to her for the rest of his life. She's so controlling and just does not like when she's out of control.
Yeah, I would say, like the most stylistic scene of the movie is like after they have that conversation and she's like walking through this cold house in the windows open and she has the music playing and it's just a couple minutes of her just pondering what she's done and what she's going to do.
Yeah, that was an interesting scene to be the period point on this very non stylistic movie up until this point.
Yeah, it was really one of the best scenes. I think it's something that you don't get now, and I think you would have studio notes on that now would be this is hoki or you need to explain to the audience, and no. Freminger and the screenwriter and Gene Simmons they got this. They understand movie logic. The audience needs to sit with it for a minute to process everything. The music tells you. The Geene Simmons face and pensive expression.
The really nice shots, the most atmospheric shots of the whole film are in that scene, that big empty home, and for just walking around haunting it while she's still alive. It was great. There's no topping The first time I saw the movie, I knew I was gonna watch it more so it didn't grab me right away. I drifted a little. But you can't top the murders in this movie.
They are The two scenes of the killings are just incredible and riveting, So you can't really top those, But that scene of Simmons thinking about it all and deciding her next move is my next favorite scene in the whole film.
Well, and so much of that atmosphere also comes from that Dimitri Tiompkin score, that very heavy piano score, and that is it's so tied to Diane Jed. You mentioned the first time we see her, she's playing piano. When she's thinking about things, she's playing piano. There's an amazing shot I think it's slightly before she commits the murders, where it's her playing and then you dissolve from her face to a clock face and you still get that piano going.
It is so nice.
And yeah, that's the moment where it's just Okay, I'm gonna throw myself at Frank and I'm gonna say that this happened, and this happened. She just lies to him outright so many times this whole like, oh, you brought this business proposal to my stepmother and she just threw it in the trash and I'm like, I don't think she did. I honestly don't think she did. And then the second time she comes to him I can't even
remember what she's lying about. But he's not having it either, which I'm like, okay, good, I'm glad you're not that dumb, but you are still really dumb. Your dick is just leading you around this whole movie.
Yeah, the piano is great as a great tell of something ominous going to happen. And you're talking about how Kreminger trusts the audience, and like, when a director is doing something like that, you can tell that they trust the audience to pick up on these kinds of cues.
And that's what a good movie goes to. A great movie is when directors do stuff like that.
And I love all these mechanisms around the murder and just that because I don't think if memory serves, It's been probably a couple of days since I've rewatched this, but I don't think that Herbert Marshall is supposed to be in that car and he ends up getting in yep, from last minute, so Diane ends up murdering not just
her stepmother but her dad as well. And my god, So the murder in this movie for people that haven't watched it, and I don't know why you'd be listening to us because this was one of the best surprises of my life. Just the way that these two people get in this little roadster and if they hit the gas to go forward the cars in the reverse and just shoot them right off of the cliff. It is amazing.
It's very just sting and not something I was expecting really at all, and then.
They do it twice and it works.
It's so rough looking. I don't know. In the commentary, Eddie Mueller made a joke like I was a stunt.
People really earning their keep on this one, and I just can't believe there's actually people in that. There's definitely human figures in the car, but nobody could survive what that car goes through really brutal crash.
That.
Yeah, it is well worth seeing the movie, even if you're finding some of the rest of a doll.
It's quite a punctuation.
It's a great use of LA and it's hills because I feel like people always think of LA like where you live, like in the flat area, but it's like LA is like so hilly. It's like you have all these houses on these crazy craggy, tiny, windy street wheat streets, and I feel like that's just a great use of it, especially back then whenever it's still in development. The road isn't paved, it looks like it's a like a dirt road.
It's just it's so perfect.
Yeah, it is wonderful. And I think I've seen cascilso Prem and Gerald Soo directed Skadu, which is also a wonderful film in a much different way. But the other film that I'm very familiar with is anatomy of a murder shot right here in Michigan. And so this movie ends up becoming a courtroom drama. For about half an hour.
It was like, oh, I wasn't expecting this either, but suddenly we're in the court and we've got Jim Bacchus, the prosecution and the how I'm trying to remember the name of the actor that plays the defense attorney, Leon Ames. He is great. He's so slimy in this. He reminded me a little bit of mister Drysdale from the Beverly Hillbillies. But he's got, yeah, just a really good demeanor. I think the last time I saw him was in Meet
Me in Saint Louis. I was able to see that one at the Nitrate Film Festival this year, and he was great in that, and he's great in this, and he's so fatherly again in his role, and we're talking about all of the perceptions and the social climbing and all this kind of stuff. I believe he's the one that ends up recommending that Frank and Diane get married just for optics. And it's like one of the least romantic wedding ceremonies you're ever going to see.
It's so creepy, it's grutesque.
It made me depressed well, and some of it feels like it's the social thing. Oh, look at how in love these kids are. But at the same time, I'm like, is this so that one can't testify against the other one in court? Because there's always that thing too.
He came out very like Oily, but not like a snake oil salesman, but not in a.
Gross way, but just like in that kind of lawyerly way.
They're always thinking, like in five different directions, five steps ahead.
Yet he's the real villain of the piece. Gene Simmons is psychotic and a chiller, but by the end she has softened, even though she murders again. It's a different motivation in the murder.
She's romantic. She does try to confess and to let Frank off the hook. It's the lawyer who is the most cold blooded, the most nihilistic. He's the one who understands how power works. He's not the top of the power structure, but he understands he's near the top of the power structure. Doing the right thing in several different instances in this film is going to mean a diminished
power place for him. He's the one who is holding it all together and is not concerned at all with what's right and not concerned at all with who is hurt and who is not only concerned with preserving the power structure and keeping.
The money all together.
And yeah, the real villain in the piece. But it's a great performance.
Like you said, he is a kind of likable bad guy, but man, is he just so bad.
Yeah, he's a one of the optics of the social status of everything and how to maneuver things correctly and say the right word the people go. And he's the ultimate chess player. He just knows where to put everything and where to place everything so it all works out.
I mentioned that wedding before and how unromantic it is I did forget about all of the fellow cons that are singing to the married couple. That's a strange scene. When I first saw that, I felt like I was in a dream. Just how odd that was. With the camera going across to all those other women that are in the I'm guessing prison hospital all singing to them. That was wow. That was bizarre.
Yeah, it was a grotesque scene and handled in a way that it sneaks up on you. It's not really hammered in that oh you're watching something really gross here. It just lingers and digs a little deeper into you as the scene goes on. It's really quite nice and quite unpleasant.
And I think that one person comes up and brings them the cake. I think they say, I hope you get off or something like that, and they don't release it, congratulate them on a long life, don't hope you.
Beat the rap exactly.
I think that's a nice touch.
You were talking about those things that are oh dode ambulance drivers wear ties. I've never seen anyone in a courtroom where the jury gets to ask questions and the one guy starts asking questions about this expert witness and it becomes this major thing in the trial. Wow, maybe that was a thing back then, but I really don't remember any episodes of Law and Order where they live.
They people still do, but I think they can submit them anonymously. I think there's like a procedure of doing it, Like you don't stand up anymore and ask your questions. Because my brother was a part of a very intense story trial, I'm not going to say anymore, but I think that he was like the foreman, and I think that they did get to do that.
Did the gloves really fit?
The courtroom drama is also not at all one of my favorite film genres.
There's good examples of it.
You brought up the Anatomy of a Murder, and I'd say, yeah, that's definitely one of the best ones. But it's still not a form of drama that I'm particularly fond of. The domestic noir of it all is nice, and it does have that great atmospheric conclusion Alexi that you we were talking about with the piano stuff. That's again not my favorite type of film noir, but this is a good example of it. There's there's some really nice bits of it, but I like courtroom stuff even less, and
so I really check out during that. And the courtroom stuff does seem really hokey and was on and on in this one. Yeah, that's another aspect of the film that kind of worked against my interests.
In this one, I.
Thought the premeter kept the courtroom stuff interesting with a lot of the angles that he was using. I don't know how many camera setups he has in this courtroom situation, but there's a lot. One of my favorites is it almost looks like Juror number one has been replaced by a camera and Bacchus is very close. We've given a really big close up of him, and then he moves down the line to the other jurors. They keep him in focus the whole time while they're doing that, but
yet the background the gallery all out of focus. I thought that was a really nice way of shooting that. And yeah, he just doesn't allow it to get boring for me. I can see where you're coming from, Jed. I know that I've seen a lot of boring courtroom dramas.
Of course, I'm thinking of all my favorite ones as you're talking about this, But I'm just like, yeah, I'm sure there's a lot of really boring ones, but it's not all Well, even my favorite courtroom drama of all times doesn't really even take place in a courtroom, and that's twelve angry men.
Yeah, there's good examples. What anatomy of a murderer is good? I witness for the prosecute show. Oh yeah, there's some really good ones. I'm just saying. It never occurs to me. I'd like to watch a courtroom drama right now. I'm gonna I'm gonna go ground. I tend to like the more booty German expressionism influenced films, the warm mean.
What about the trial and m Come on, no, I'm just kidding. Yeah, I totally get it. And it can be such a crutch if you're a bad filmmaker and have a courtroom drama taking place in the middle of your movie, or the whole movie can get really tired, really quick. And I'm glad that this one turns into her courtroom drama. And then it's out of it eventually, and then yeah becomes this whole Oh, I actually am
the one that committed the murder. I did it, just like the expert witness was saying, And I removed this spring and murdered my parents and this is really bad and we need to do something about it. Yeah, just keep it under your hat, don't see anything, don't put to the papers, don't call up TMZ.
Yeah, this movie is able to switch those gears so quickly, and.
I see what it did there that you're able to just move on. But then I actually would prefer it if we didn't get the scene of her admitting to the lawyer that she did it, because I feel like that feels almost more like a Noir if you leave that question unanswered and you just know in your gut feeling.
That she did it. Of course, so that was that's my personal opinion about it.
Diane ends up betting Frank that Mary's going to take him back, and and she lets him use her car as the betting chip. And then when he comes back after that conversation I talked about where it's Mary, Bill and Frank all talking skip you won, you won your bet, And I'm like, when did she even have time to change the car to fix it? But I guess she knows how to do that very quickly. And just there's that, and it actually I take it back because I don't
think that she fixes the car. I think what she ends up doing is just throwing it in reverse and reversing them right over that cliff.
Yeah.
And as the witness in the juror in the trial asked, is this a procedure that a novice could do, like.
Even a woman, and even.
A woman, yeah, god's my skin and crawl just a little bit.
I've watched this last little bit of the film. Actually, I've watched it in slow motion a few times, just to see them, the looks on her face, just to see when she makes that decision, because it seems hunky dory for a little bit. And oh, here, let me take you to the bus station, Frank. I know you've got a cab coming, but here I'll drive you. And
he takes all this stuff, throws it in there. They have the champagne, and I love that he pops that champagne like they're gonna be drinking and driving, thank goodness. And there's just that little look that passes over her face where she he stops her. She moves forward at first, he stops her, starts to pour the champagne, and then
just rams it in reverse and off they go. And when I saw this, the first time, I was just beside myself, and I love the little tiny de neu maent of the taxi cab pulling up into the driveway and the guy getting out looking around.
I'm like, oh man, that's a great crutch.
I was breathless when I watched this the first time.
Yeah, she is so determined.
It's like there's no question about it that that would be how she decides to because she wants to be with her dad again. I feel like that's the ultimate thing on her mind, Like why would you kill him of only just to get her last revenge before you go on to better inner pastures with your dad in heaven or whatever.
Yeah, it's almost like if I can't have this guide and nobody else will.
I feel like she knew that the Mona Freeman was going to reject him, but she let him go.
She let him try. She couldn't be a one hundred percent sure he was going to let for drive.
Him to the bus station. She didn't know the cab wouldn't get there before. There are some things that now that you're bringing up, Mike, I am wondering when did she make the decision, because I was just assuming that was her plan all along, but now she's going, Okay, take this one if you can, knowing their long shots. But she is a complicated character because she's psychotic. But her relationship to Frank is unclear. She does manipulate him.
I'd be curious what their life would have been like had the garage been set up and he stayed working for Would she get tired of him and move on or cut him off?
What would that have looked like?
Because she does try to get him off at the end a couple times by confessing and saying he had nothing to do with it, So there's something there.
It's not entirely clear.
How what is really driving her at this point, But yeah, that murderous look she gives as he's the champagne is.
Just fold and sends a shiver down my spine. And yeah, it's a wonderful ending.
But I am unsure is to when exactly she makes the decision to actually do it.
I think that's what that whole scene is about, at least to me, Like when she's walking through her house and it's empty and her dad isn't there and it's like finally hitting her after everything of quiet.
I feel like that's the point where she was like.
Okay, I'm going to do this, And then I think she knew he would get in the car with her, because she's been able to string him along this far and keep him as her puppy dog and doing what she wants this whole time. So I feel like she knew even if she made this one last request, even after everything she's.
Put him through, he would still do it.
Yeah.
I would agree that that's what I was assuming had been but slightly questioned now that like's gone through the forensics of that last scene of she does pull.
Forward in a jerky way and he.
Yells at her, and that's when she gets that really dark look.
And it's not a mistake. She puts it in reverse and does it.
So yeah, anyway, Yeah, Lexi, I'm with you. That's always how I read the film. Whether it's another just slight complication to her character and her motives, or it's a movie trick to throw the audience off that they lurch forward first, I'm not sure, but yeah, great ending.
Yeah, I almost take it as a spur of the moment kind of thing, like the first murder is premeditated. The way that she has to remove that particular spring in order to put the car into reverse when it looks like it's in drive. But the second one, it really just feels like after he quote unquote yells her like, hey, what are you doing? So you're driving so jerky or whatever, she just yeah, the darkness passes over her face. It
just feels like, I'll show you reverse and that's it. Yeah, it's either way.
She's psychotic.
And I really like that we have this psychotic woman character.
It's almost like the actress shearing her hair.
Oh yeah, well, apparently that hair that she's wearing in the movie is a wig. And I was watching one video essay and he was saying, oh, yeah, she looks like a witch, and I was like, I don't really see that. And then later on Mitchem's oh did you park your broom outside? I was like, oh, okay, I guess she does look like a witch. And even if you know also, one of the theories was, oh, Gene Timmins plays it really low energy because she was so
pissed about having to be in this movie. If that's the case, that works for the character, because it is that kind of walking around in a dream type of movement.
This isn't as dreamy as some of the other films more that we've talked about, even talking about this month, but we're talking about a woman on the beach where the whole movie feels like a dream a lot of times, but this one, Yeah, there's a lot of like little who was asleep, who was awake when, like those kind of things, and yeah, just step that kind of almost chiller affect to her voice where she just doesn't have that emotion sometimes that she has to put it on
and put on the act that she's a normal person.
However she's playing it. She feels thoughtful and calculated the whole time. And the only time you see her voice in her mannerisms change a little bit is in that first conversation with Mona. It feels like every other time, especially when she's with her dad or with the richm character, she is playing coy and a little bit coquettish because she's supposed to be very young and inexperienced in a way, and so she's using that to her advantage to stay
in good graces with these people. At least that's what I see. And with Mona, they're able to be female to female have this conversation in honesty and she can let that face down.
A little bit.
That angel exactly.
That is like a great like quick Sunday afternoon bell noir to throw on.
Yeah, and to your point from earlier, Jededdiah, there's a lot of sunlight in this. This is definitely a very well lit film noir.
Yeah, not a lot of shadows. And so we get took that great pondering scene with the piano music.
And at the end, all right, we're going to take a break and play a preview for next week's show right after these brief messages.
It begins with seduction.
What a team will make You won't regret this rule.
It leads to betrayal.
You're working some Anglo.
Don't tell me you're not, because I wrote the book.
It ends in murder.
Yeah, I'm got the stuff.
Fine, John Cusack, Angelica Houston, and Annette Benning in the highly acclaimed thriller from the director of Dangerous Liaisons.
Now you're trying to wrote me.
Who's conning?
Who the Grifters?
That's right.
We'll be back next week to talk about the neo noir the Grifters. Until then, I want to thank my co host Jedediah and Lexi. So, Jedediah, what's the latest with you, sir?
I'm gonna have my first public fiction six years out of a couple of weeks for a Christmas issue of Yonder Magazine. So I'm excited about that. It's been a while I've been writing, but not stuff that can be published, So it's gonna be nice to have something soon.
Where can folks pick that up?
I think there will probably be a kindle version available on the Amazon or something, but you can buy it in person at the Yonder Bar and in.
Raleigh, North Carolina, where you can buy the print version on the Amazon, but up with links to it in my Twitter feed. You're so disposed to follow that out. But yeah, I'm excited to have something new out.
Oh that's great, And let's see what's going on with you?
Not much, just in the throes of everything. It feels like right now we're just in the finish line to January. If it's like we're gonna have November December and then we run the new year, that's pretty much it. You won't have a new season of the podcast till then, just because everything's so busy.
Well, thank you, so much folks for being on the show. Thanks to everybody for listening. If you want to hear more of me shooting off my mouth, check out some of the other shows that I work on. They are all available at weirdingwaymedia dot com. Thanks especially to our Patreon community. If you want to join the community, visit patreon dot com slash Projection Booth. Every donation we get helps the Projection Booth take over the world.
Nay, Joe, and in your.
I never.
Meet you until well I found you, and when you.
Fill an all the while that meet you from my heart, Ay, and when I live in your.
You know that.
Paradies joking A frescious, a sweet head right from your head.
New York girl, Hi Jel, I never knew what I could be too. I too, and we used by a hong time that week.
Week my heart.
Would go by, Hey, Jay, racist and sweet as.
I do.
You'll hand you yod bye