User Reviews

"Black Angel" is an unjustly forgotten film noir based on Cornell Woolrich's novel. Dan Duryea, tagged in the preview as "he's no angel again!", adds yet another complex, dark portrayal to his gallery of ambiguous bad guys as Martin Blair, the estranged husband of murder victim Mavis Marlowe (Constance Dowling). Mavis is a devious singer who is blackmailing her married lover, Kirk Bennett (John Phillips). Her immaculately decorated apartment, haunting song "Heartbreak" playing in the background, her sheer black gown highlighting what a bad dame she is. Her blackmailer is shrewd, unscrupulous and will stop at nothing to get her way; Dowling's career never fully took off, most likely because of her unconventional screen presence and her independent mind (coincidentally, her sister, Doris Dowling, also appeared in a similar role in another noir of the same year, playing Alan Ladd's unfaithful lush wife in "The Blue Dahlia"). Since Mavis has made so many enemies for herself, it's not surprising that she ends up murdered. As he had the most apparent reason of anyone to want her dead, Bennett is arrested, charged and convicted (on rather circumstantial evidence) and sentenced to death. His loyal wife, Catherine (June Vincent, another under-appreciated talent), vows to clear her husband and enlists the help of Blair, who had passed out drunk after he last saw Mavis, and the pair team up to investigate nightclub owner Marko (Peter Lorre, exceptional performance), posing as a singing act. However, as with many film noirs, there are many red herrings, and things are not what they appear to be. The ending is a surprise and the killer's identity will keep you guessing to the film's conclusion.

I don't know why this movie is barely remembered. There should have been records of the haunting vocal music. June Vincent, the last surviving cast member (she passed away a few years back), retired from show business relatively early, and it's a shame that she did not progress to more roles like this in A pictures.

The DVD looks very good, although it shows faint signs of wear (which is to be expected for a film of its age), and the only extra included is the original theatrical trailer. Any fans of film noir should enjoy this one.

Adultery and blackmail are possible motives for murder in this low-budget mystery thriller based on Cornell Woolrich's novel "The Black Angel". A convoluted plot, flawed characters and an unexpected twist all add to the enjoyment of watching this movie and a race against time to catch the killer becomes increasingly tense as the execution date for an innocent man moves ever closer.

Martin Blair (Dan Duryea) attempts to see his estranged wife on the night of their wedding anniversary but, on Mavis Marlowe's (Constance Dowling) instructions, is prevented from entering her apartment building. After sending her a heart-shaped brooch, he sees another man being allowed into the building to see Mavis and decides to drown his sorrows by getting drunk.

Next day, a man who was seen leaving Mavis' apartment shortly before her body was found, is arrested for her murder. Kirk Bennett (John Phillips) admits that he was one of her ex-lovers and was being blackmailed by her. He's subsequently tried and found guilty of the crime and sentenced to death. His loyal wife Catherine (June Vincent), is convinced that Kirk is incapable of murder and so sets out to prove his innocence. Her investigation leads her to Martin who she finds suffering the effects of a severe hangover and accuses him of killing his ex. When it transpires that he has a cast-iron alibi, she asks for his help to prove Kirk's innocence and her agrees to help her.

Martin, who's an accomplished pianist and composer, is surprised to discover that the man he saw being given access to Mavis' apartment was a nightclub owner called Marko (Peter Lorre) and so he and ex-nightclub singer Catherine decide to audition, as a double act, for work at Marko's club (Rio's). The couple prove to be a great success at Rio's and become convinced that they're on the right track when it seems that Marko may have also been blackmailed by Mavis and could also be in possession of her heart-shaped brooch. When they eventually discover that Marko couldn't have been the murderer and Martin tells Catherine that he's fallen in love with her, she rejects him and he consoles himself by going on another drinking binge. The developments that then follow prove to be a great shock to everyone concerned.

As the main character in this movie, Martin Blair is interesting because he's a very talented musician who's so driven by his emotions that when he's dumped by Mavis, his work suffers badly and he also resorts to extreme behaviour to try to ease his pain. His habitual drinking stops during the time that he's with Catherine because he enjoys her company and becomes focused on writing songs for her, just as he had done previously for Mavis (who was also a nightclub singer and recording artiste). When his affections then transfer to Catherine and she rejects him, he predictably relapses into his self-destructive behaviour again. Dan Duryea gives a very affecting performance as this sensitive and vulnerable character who instinctively turns to alcohol as a coping mechanism.

"Black Angel" begins impressively with a shot of Martin stood in the street outside the building where Mavis lives and then sweeps up to her floor and continues in through the window of her apartment. This piece of visual panache together with the movie's musical sequences and good supporting performances (especially from Peter Lorre) all contribute greatly to making this twisted whodunit both enjoyable and memorable.

If you are a film noir fan, you'll want to see this for yourself no matter what anybody says. I personally was not that impressed.

First, let me say that Dan Duryea (Martin) is excellent as a decent fellow whose weakness of drinking when he can't face a problem has serious consequences. June Vincent (Catherine) is lovely and sings well. Peter Lorre (Marko) is, well, the reason I rented this DVD. He's a treat (as always) despite his small part (more later after a "spoiler" alert).

Disappointments: Most of the story revolves around a red herring. After the final twist, subsequent scenes just drag out the inevitable. The characters do some dumb things because they need to for the plot to work. Catherine doesn't start her investigating until *after* her husband is convicted (to add that "time crunch" element). Marko holds on to an incriminating letter that any normal person would have destroyed (because the plot needs him to). Although the rest of the actions the characters take are not unbelievable, the implications are not as fully explored as they could/should be--of the premise that Catherine is possibly risking her life to prove innocent of murder a husband who is guilty of cheating on her; of why Martin carries a torch for such a despicable woman as Mavis; of the revelation of who is innocent and who might be owed an apology; of the main twist and what being guilty and the ultimate consequences mean to the murderer. The 81 minute length of this movie may be more to blame than the scriptwriter and director, but a hint that the above situations cause internal approach-avoidance conflicts would have truly raised this film above a "B" movie to a noir classic (Duryea gets the closest to achieving this--but the intermittent drinking bouts the script gives him provide him the opportunity).

The scenes introducing Mavis at the beginning are shot in an effective "noirish" manner, but I found most of the direction to be so-so: close-up inserts (of letters and other clues) are at incorrect angles; the camera pans during a nightclub scene and doesn't end up on anything interesting or pertinent to the plot; the sequence where Catherine is about to be caught snooping is not played out to full suspense; the last of Martin's alcoholic binge montages include a couple of pretty silly-looking shots.

***SPOILER ALERT!!!****************************************************** For those of you who've already seen this movie... I can't believe one reviewer here said Peter Lorre is playing a villain. Come on, now! He's playing a red herring. The only "villainous" thing Marko does is direct Lucky to twist Catherine's arm until she tells where she hid the items she was trying to steal from him. Since he didn't know she was looking for clues to clear her husband and believed she was looking for material to blackmail him (which he'd inexplicably kept!) and his motive is to hide the fact that he is an ex-convict in order to save his married daughter from embarrassment, well, his actions are not much more villainous than Catherine's pretending to be attracted to him in order to get close to his safe and rob him. After the viewer learns he is *not* the murderer, the magic of rewind can show you that, actually, Marko treats Catherine pretty decently throughout the movie and he's probably sincere when he tells her he knew who she was all along but had appreciated (more than other people, because he's an ex-con) that she was trying to make a new start. It's just that soft, "bedroom" voice of Lorre's that allows whatever he says to be interpreted as "menacing," which makes this red herring work. *I*, at least, was taken in. I thought the movie was building toward a confrontation where Marko would discover Catherine was using him and would attempt to kill her with the cry that that was why he had killed Mavis. When this didn't turn out to be the case, I thought Catherine would feel bad about her misconceptions and apologize to Marko as she'd apologized to Martin (in which case her suspicions were *not* misconceptions). She didn't.