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On the same VCI "Hammer Film Noir" disc as "The Glass Tomb", is "Paid To Kill" (1954). This film, also known as "Five Days", is another unlikely venture for the credited Montgomery Tully. It is also excitingly photographed (for around half its length anyway) in true noir style by Jimmy Harvey.

This one doesn't have the same all-pervasive noir mood of "The Glass Tomb", but mostly reserves these effects for the action scenes.

On the other hand, the premise, whilst somewhat outlandish, is a rather suspenseful one, even though those of us who are used to the twists and turns of the average whodunit, will probably guess the solution.

Nonetheless, the acting is solid, especially from delightfully seedy Paul Carpenter in one of his best roles ever as the "friend in need", and from Thea Gregory as the glamorous wife.

Dane Clark walks through his role as the distracted company director with his usual assurance, while Howard Marion Crawford has a ball as an eccentric Egyptologist.

Newspaperman, film critic and novelist Paul Tabori wrote the suspenseful story and screenplay.

Irony meets Film Noir in this study of an anxious C.E.O. who, believing he is on the verge of financial ruin, plots his own murder so his philandering wife will get the insurance money. But as fate has it, his fortunes turn, and he must stop the hit-man he hired to kill him before it is too late. "One way or another, I'm gonna get ya!" could be the theme song of one sequence where the killer goes after him in a variety of ways, and after these several attempts fail, he learns the truth.

An above average entry in this series of Hammer Film Noirs (many of them less than mediocre), it is a variation of the old "D.O.A. plot where the victim tries to solve his own (possible) demise. A faithful secretary is his only confidante, and there's always a doubt as to who the real culprit is. Dane Clark may seem an odd choice to play a corporate executive (especially one in England), but he's actually quite good. There's a very funny sequence involving a rare Aztec vase being protected by a nervous assistant to the over-the-top Sydney Greenstreet like archaeologist whose denouncement at the very beginning of the film sets Clark's plans into motion.

If Paid to kill had had a more complex leading man, a sharper and less careless script, better actors, a director who knew how to sustain tension and a show-down that was considerably less over-wrought, there might have been a competent and tension-filled noir. Faint praise, I know. Yet there are the bones for a nasty little thriller here; it's just that the flesh on those bones is weak.

James Nevill (Dane Clark) is president of a British company that does something we're never sure of. The name is Amalgamated Industries. He's a hard-charging gambler, successful, and confident to a fault. When a major deal falls through, his company teeters on the brink of bankruptcy. So does he. No one knows this except himself and his loyal and attractive secretary, Joan. So he does what so many chief executives facing public failure would do...he arranges to have himself murdered so that his insurance will go to his wife. Then when the deal turns out to be a success, Jim can't locate the killer and tell him to forget it. Soon, Jim is being beaten on the head, chased down by a car on a lonely street and nearly blown up in his office. Joan, in whom he has confided, is determined to help the man she secretly loves. Jim's wife, on the other hand, may not be trying to help Jim. It all comes together late at night in the garden house of Jim's mansion. Let's just say that there are no surprises as all the key cast members show up.

Dane Clark was a short actor who came across as intense, confident and tough. To my way of thinking, however, he was never entirely convincing winning a fist-fight with a bigger guy. In Paid to Kill, I also wonder what sort of direction, if any, he was given. His hard-charging, hard headed American CEO of a British company is almost a caricature. It's a one note performance. The other actors fare little better, with acting that's awfully close to soap opera standards. The premise of Paid to Kill is intriguing but the execution leaves a lot to be desired.

James Neville (Dane Clark), the MD of Amalgamated Industries, is double crossed on a business deal by the archaeologist Cyrus McGowan (Howard Marion Crawford) leaving his firm on the brink of bankruptcy. He arranges to have himself killed so that his wife Andrea (Thea Gregory) can claim his substantial life insurance. He blackmails his friend Paul Kirby (Paul Carpenter) into committing the crime over a murder he undertook some years ago. Neville testified at his trial that it was self defence and was acquitted as a result, but the deceased's widow has since sent him some letters proving that it was actually murder one. Neville has put them into a sealed envelope with instructions that they are to be delivered to the police should he still be alive within forty eight hours. Naturally, he has arranged what should be a watertight alibi for his would be assassin. However, in a strange twist of fate, McGowan announces that their deal is back on and Neville is now faced with the dilemma of finding his killer before he can kill him. The trouble is, he has vanished. Aided by his loyal secretary, Joan Peterson (Cecile Chevreau), who is madly in love with him, he sets out to find Kirby. Several attempts are made on Neville's life before he visits his girlfriend at a Soho pub where she works and he learns that he has skipped the country as a result of getting cold feet over their contract. So who is using the contract for their own ends and who else could have known about it?...

A British crime noir with a fanciful yet undeniably ingenious plot. On the downside, you will not have too much trouble in working out who Dane Clark's would be assassin is, but this is a very rewarding entertainment nonetheless. It quite convincingly recreates the style and atmosphere of American film noir thanks to the solid and sympathetic direction of Montgomery Tully, the excellent b/w camerawork of veteran Walter Harvey and strong performances from the leads - especially Dane Clark.

* Caution - very large spoilers in the next paragraph.*

He plays his part with a real depth of feeling alternating between ruthless brutality in the way he blackmails and bullies his friend into committing his own murder and his loving devotion towards his wife. Despite being a workaholic and letting his high powered job take him over, which means he seldom ever gets time to spend with her, he worships the ground she treads on and, so it seems, vice versa. She sticks with him through thick and thin and the reason Neville devised his elaborate plot was so that he could leave her well provided for and spare her the damage of the scandal and embarrassment that would have surely resulted had the company gone under as a result of him. When he finally finds out that his beloved wife has betrayed him and has a new lover in the form of one of his business partners Peter Glanville (Anthony Forwood) who both plot to kill him using his own contract he refuses to believe it. In the climatic shoot out in which Andrea is accidentally shot dead, he looks down at her and is deeply devastated. He gently picks up her body off of the floor and carries her back into the house saying "I mustn't leave her here, its dark, its not right" suggesting that he will still miss her and love her deeply in spite of everything. Cecile Chevreau is quite good as Joan, although her stern, bossy and schoolteachery character risks becoming off putting, and the look of envy and despair on her face as Neville picks up his wife's body and lovingly caressing it as he takes it indoors is priceless. Indeed, as the film ends we are invited to think that Joan probably did get her man, and that in the best film noir tradition, probably lived a disastrous relationship since she would have been overshadowed by Andrea even though she is dead. Room for a sequel? No, the fact that it is left for the audience to ponder the futures of the main protagonists is more fun and adds to the film's overall impact. Thea Gregory also offers a fine performance as Clark's wife and makes the perfect femme fatale.

All in all, the film succeeds as an atmospheric and diverting triangle of love, deceit, treachery and murder that comes off a whole lot better than I was expecting it to. I am a follower of veteran British 'B' picture director Montgomery Tully's work and this, I think, stands as one of his better offerings. It makes us regret that after his 'A' film career faltered in the late forties that he would remain within the quota quickie industry for the remainder of his career. This is actually an early Hammer film (made in their Exclusive days) and, from the films from this era of their history that I have been able to see, it seemed they tried for quality even when making b-pics and more often than not got it.

This is by no means a great film. It however still holds interest for the politics of the film. The producer, Libert had an agreement with Hammer film studios that he would provide known American actors in British films. Forced into this situation, came this interesting film.

Like the Quatermass films with Brian Donlevy, we are shown two men, who are not identified as I remember as Americans, but we can tell are (though Paul Carpenter was born in Canada) One is at the top of the social ladder, and one more so at the bottom. They are supposedly friends, having that "American" bond.

When Paul Carpenter arrives at Dane Clarks home, a party is going on. Though Clark is not their. People are elegantly dressed, but Paul comes very casual to say the least, which really sets him apart from the other people at the party, apparently all British. One of the guests at the party is one of the people who works at Clarkes company, being in the boardroom, who is earlier accused by a colleague of only having this job because of family connections. Clark on the other hand arrives at this party late, possibly from working late. While he is dressed in a tie, he does not go into the milieu of the party, but views his wife from an opening in a wall. As we can see, he is somewhat the chairman of a board, and believes that he has gotten into a business deal that will ruin his company, and his reputation. He has the intent of hiring Paul Carpenter, as Paul to kill him, so that his wife, who he loves deeply can collect the insurance.

Later of course, Clarke's character will realize that the deal that he failed would fail, has gone through, and will make the company a fortune. The plot of this somewhat implausible story is now for Clark to save his own life.

The interesting thing about the film are the relationships. While Clark loves his wife deeply, I somewhat suspected that she did not return this in kind, and of course this would be revealed in the end, and that she does not love Dane Clarks character, a man we can see somewhat had to fight his way to the top, but the Englishman played by Anthony Forwood, a man born into money. She blames Clark for marrying her for her wealth, and says she despises him.

Here is Clarks character, an American head of a British Company, who is often separate from the rest of his people on the board, who is delusional that his British wife loves him, and believe that he has a British friend, who is actually trying to kill him. On the board he has a member who is antagonistic to him, and does not like the methods of which Dane Clarks character will try to get results, considering them underhanded and dangerous. While he is fat and old, while Clark is young and slim, he seems to take the case of defending British honor against Clark, which will culminate in a Turkish bathhouse scene, which has somewhat homosexual overtones, where the Englishman will express his dislike for Clark, to Clarks humiliation.

Clarks relationship with his secretary however is totally different. She is devoted to him, so much so that when he yells at her, one almost feels a sado-masochistic relationship, that he could probably take somewhere and beat her, and she would feel it is showing her devotion to him. Mirroring this is a devotion from a barmaid to Paul Carpenters character, (a caricature of the Ugly American?)a misguided love, though not in the same vane as Clarks relationship with his secretary. Throughout the film, we are shown a disdain of some of the characters for Americana, and also from others a reverence.

One writer here reviewing the film has suggested that with the demise of Clarke's scheming wife, that he will have free reign with his secretary. While she has stated her love for him while he tried to strangle the true love of his wife. It is interesting the last scene, when he carries his wife's dead body from the garden house to the home. He feels that is where her body belongs, and one still sees, though he should really feel disdain, a misguided love for this dead woman. The secretary who loves him, and has saved him from death, seems to follow him dejectedly into the house. Does the American Clark, really love his dead wife for what she represents, some idea of British wealth. It could be argued that he will really not fall in love with his secretary, as she is in the lower status of the British social order.

FIVE DAYS (1954, titled the much better PAID TO KILL in America) is one of the better Hammer film noirs of the mid 1950s, thanks to a tight little story by author Paul Tabori. The engaging tale begins with Dane Clark pushed to the edge financially when his uncle reneges on a business deal, leaving him penniless and at risk of bankruptcy. He hits upon a scheme to employ drunken associate Paul Carpenter to murder him so that his wife can claim his life insurance policy thus setting herself up for life and saving her from the gutter, but all doesn't go according to plan. Although low budget by genre standards, this is an engaging film with a super-fast plotline, snappy dialogue and twists galore as the tale progresses. Shades of Hitchcock's STRANGERS ON A TRAIN at time but it manages to hold its own against rival bigger budget fare. No great shakes or surprises for fans of the thriller genre who expect this kind of stuff, but it's never dull and the cast work hard to convince. Look out for Charles Hawtrey as an assistant browbeaten by his boss.

After seeing the terrific Nicole Maurey Film Noir Section des disparus (1956-also reviewed) I decided to go for a Noir double bill. Having seen the Hammer Noir The Glass Cage (1955-also reviewed)on a disc with two flicks, I decided to finish the set.

View on the film:

Pushing Nevill into a deep hole of debt, the screenplay by Paul Tabori takes a off-beat path in bringing the traditional hired killer/ money issues plot threads of Film Noir, by Nevill deciding that the one way he can get out of this debt, is to hire a hit man to kill him, so that Nevill's wife can then use the insurance pay out to cover the bills!

Although the tale does disappointingly become more straight forward after Nevill makes a arrangement, Tabori lines this Noir with a black comedy streak, powered by Nevill getting a cash windfall, and now being desperate to cancel his deal. Desperate to find his hired helper, Dane Clark wonderfully captures the wide-eyed panicking of Nevill desperately trying to cancel his payment.

These comments contain spoilers, including major plot details.

This is part of the newest DVD Kit Parker Double Feature, Hammer Film Noir series. The films in the series are British B films, usually featuring a has-been American actor in the lead with a supporting British cast. Because of the American name in the lead, the films were issued in the United States as well as England, usually under a different name in the U.S. than in England.

Today "film noir" is used so indiscriminately to describe films that there's not much point is saying this film doesn't qualify as noir, though in Andrea Nevill, the protagonist's wife, it does have a femme noir or femme fatale who deceives her husband (cliché). And in a wife contriving with her lover to murder her husband, we have a standard noir plot (cliché).

Dane Clark is the has-been American star here, and he does well enough, though he is a fish out of water among all these English actors. I've seen Paul Carpenter in other British films, most recently in "The House across the Lake," another film in this Hammer Film Noir series. He's a handsome, appealing guy, not properly cast here as a hit man. But Thea Gregory as the wife comes across well as a beautiful, upper-class woman. Although Cecile Chevreau as secretary Joan Peterson, secretly in love with her boss Jim (cliché), isn't attractive enough for a romantic leading lady role, she does offer solid support.

For me the icing on the cake here was Anthony Forwood as Peter Glanville. As we all know now from recent reputable biographies, he was Dirk Bogarde's lover, and by the time this film was in production, he and Dirk were living together, though Bogarde continued to date studio starlets to maintain the illusion of heterosexuality. Certainly, Forwood was more attractive than Bogarde was and obviously had a more outgoing personality, able to smooth the waters that Bogarde frequently stirred up with his cold, snobbish personality. Forwood didn't make many films, but I have seen him in some others. As here, he was always competent in his performances, though he never appeared in challenging roles.

At 70 minutes, this is a pleasant enough time waster.