Marguerite Chapman (Marcia Manning), Dennis O'Keefe (Steve Bennett), Adolphe Menjou (D.A.), George Coulouris (Randolph), Steven Geray (Berotti), Jeff Donnell (Miss Miller), Gino Corrado (maitre d'), Michael O'Shea (Harrington), Ralph Morgan (Jamison), Emmett Vogan (defense attorney), Ralf Harolde (Marsden), George Lloyd (bartender), Joan Blair (Mrs Marsden), Cliff Clark (Captain Lambert), John Kellogg.
Director: ROBERT B. SINCLAIR. Screenplay: Ian McLellan Hunter. Adapted by Ben Markson from a story by Sidney Marshall, suggested by the radio series by Phillips H. Lord. Photography: Bert Glennon. Film editor: William Lyon. Art directors: Stephen Goosson, George Brooks. Costumes designed by Jean Louis. Music: Herschel Burke Gilbert. Music director: Morris Stoloff. Producer: Samuel Bischoff.
Copyright 19 February 1947 by Columbia Pictures. Australian release: 7 October 1947. 7,500 feet. 82 minutes.
COMMENT: Director Robert B. Sinclair had the misfortune to follow his enormous stage success with The Women (1936) by signing to handle Katharine Dayton's Save Me the Waltz (1938) which turned out to be one of the biggest and most expensive flops in Broadway history. Fortunately he retrieved his reputation with The Philadelphia Story (1939). His other Broadway triumphs include Dodsworth (1934), Pride and Prejudice (1935), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1936), The Wookey (1941), Without Love (1942), as well as the smash 1937 Rodgers and Hart musical, Babes in Arms. With such an impressive pedigree, his twelve Hollywood movies are a somewhat disappointing lot. The best of them are That Wonderful Urge (1948) and this one, Mr District Attorney.
Blessed with a great script by Ian McLellan Hunter that seems to have been written with Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford in mind for the leads, Mr District Attorney only disappoints in that neither Ford nor Hayworth were actually available. Fortunately, the support cast is wholly intact. You can't go wrong with people like Adolphe Menjou, George Coulouris and Steven Geray. True, Dennis O'Keefe is no match for Glenn Ford, but he's okay. The big surprise of the picture, however, is the superb portrayal of a Hayworth-type femme fatale by Marguerite Chapman.
The DVD includes an episode from the radio program which is absolutely awful. So don't be misled! This film adaptation is an exciting, suspenseful, edge-of-the-seat noir, despite its genesis in radio- land.
Director: ROBERT B. SINCLAIR. Screenplay: Ian McLellan Hunter. Adapted by Ben Markson from a story by Sidney Marshall, suggested by the radio series by Phillips H. Lord. Photography: Bert Glennon. Film editor: William Lyon. Art directors: Stephen Goosson, George Brooks. Costumes designed by Jean Louis. Music: Herschel Burke Gilbert. Music director: Morris Stoloff. Producer: Samuel Bischoff.
Copyright 19 February 1947 by Columbia Pictures. Australian release: 7 October 1947. 7,500 feet. 82 minutes.
COMMENT: Director Robert B. Sinclair had the misfortune to follow his enormous stage success with The Women (1936) by signing to handle Katharine Dayton's Save Me the Waltz (1938) which turned out to be one of the biggest and most expensive flops in Broadway history. Fortunately he retrieved his reputation with The Philadelphia Story (1939). His other Broadway triumphs include Dodsworth (1934), Pride and Prejudice (1935), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1936), The Wookey (1941), Without Love (1942), as well as the smash 1937 Rodgers and Hart musical, Babes in Arms. With such an impressive pedigree, his twelve Hollywood movies are a somewhat disappointing lot. The best of them are That Wonderful Urge (1948) and this one, Mr District Attorney.
Blessed with a great script by Ian McLellan Hunter that seems to have been written with Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford in mind for the leads, Mr District Attorney only disappoints in that neither Ford nor Hayworth were actually available. Fortunately, the support cast is wholly intact. You can't go wrong with people like Adolphe Menjou, George Coulouris and Steven Geray. True, Dennis O'Keefe is no match for Glenn Ford, but he's okay. The big surprise of the picture, however, is the superb portrayal of a Hayworth-type femme fatale by Marguerite Chapman.
The DVD includes an episode from the radio program which is absolutely awful. So don't be misled! This film adaptation is an exciting, suspenseful, edge-of-the-seat noir, despite its genesis in radio- land.