Deadline At Dawn 1946

The Criterion channel is offering up this month a series of Film Noir classics some great and all very good including this little B potboiler made in 1946 by RKO but filmed on the back lot of 20^th Century Fox. Set on a hot summer night in New York City it starts out with Bill Williams a sailor on leave and cute as a button waking up from a deep dark drunken sleep by the side of a newstand in Times Sq. He finds a roll of bills coming to a total of 1,400 that falls out of his pocket but can't remember anything about the roll or his roll on the night on the town.

He picks himself up, dusts himself off and takes off on the hot summer crowded streets of Times Sq. which are nicely indicated by the swell art direction constructions by Albert S. D' Agostino, Jack Okey & Darrell Silvera and the beautiful noir drenched cinematography by the great Nicholas Musuraca who started filming movies in 1923 and went on to shoot many classics of Noir and horror including Clash by Night, Out of The Past, The Sprial Staircase, and The Cat People along with tons of early tv stuff. Williams is literally pushed into a 10 cents a dance place where he meets up with one of the 10 cents dancer played by Susan Hayward in her 24^th film and tough and tangy as we like her.

She zings and sashays all over the place and she is soon getting the hots for the cute as a button Bill Williams who tells her of his drunken night on the town with some dame who we have met earlier in the movie. She's played by the blowzy Lane sister Lola and is soon out of the film for reasons I will say no more. We also meet in the sweltering small digs of Lola a blind pianist and ex hubby of hers named Sleepy Parsons (I kid you not) acted by Marvin Miller who might be remembered by Baby boomers as Michael Anthony who gave away millions on the 50's hit t.v. Show “The Millionaire.” The plot Thins and thickens as this fast and loose 83 minute thriller moves on the fast track with speeding taxi cabs, odd characters, (Roman Bohmen appears in a brief scene as a grief stricken cat owner who's cat has just died) and other odds and ends still up at 2 in the morning in this sweltering New York.

There is a mystery of course, hell its based on a William Irish also known as Cornell Woolrich novel and plenty of twists, turns and confusion all of which I found fabulously entertaining. Directed by the well known theatre director and co founder of the Group Theatre Harold Clurman, whose only film this was, and with a screenplay by Clifford Odets of all people so there are plenty of great lines and sentences coming out of the actors mouths. “People with wax heads should keep out of the sun”, If she cut off her head, she'd be very pretty” to mention just two.

Also in the cast is Paul Lukas who three years earlier won a best actor Oscar for “Watch on The Rhine” and here he is cast in a supporting but pivotal role as a cab driver who becomes a partner in the chase with Williams and Hayward. Also look for some great character actors including the superb Joseph Calleia who was never bad, Osa Massen,and Joe Sawyer as a drunken ballplayer named “Babe”. Might be on my ten best list for 1946.