"Phantom Lady" by Robert Siodmak (1944)

Since recently I have been overdosing on 1930s movies (besides I don't have so many of them left in my collection) I decided to have a peek at 1944. film noir with Franchot Tone. What a difference! Everything looks so much different, specially clothes, fashion and yes,acting. People actually talk like real people and not wooden caricatures (Katherine Hepburn anyone?) besides this is film noir so everything is painted with sharp black & white contracts, characters walk trough shadowy streets, danger lurks everywhere, good old fashioned fun.

By definition film noir is a shadowy mistery/crime story and yes,there is a interesting story here - man is accused of murder and the only person who can prove that he was indeed spending that evening with her is mysterious lady in a fashionable hat, who disappears not to be seen anymore. He is imprisoned (mumbling about "lady in a funny hat") and now its up to his provincial secretary and a detective to solve the mystery. Secretary must be very provincial and in love indeed, because she puts herself into some very dangerous situations, following people she suspect are hiding the secret. The movie focuses so much on her that at certain point I wondered "hey,but where is Franchot Tone in all this?" - he, the biggest name here is finally appearing half way trough movie and in a role completely different from his usual charming smile performances (camera focuses on his hands so much that I freaked out, its very pure german expressionism). Unfortunately the mystery is solved way too soon so we already know who was the real murderer,for the rest of the movie its all about naive secretary finally discovering the truth.

Visually its very interesting - interiors of the apartments and houses are well lightened but outside everything is scary, shadowy and dark. Particularly when secretary visits her accused boss in a prison,it looks like inside some gloomy gothic cathedral. Its surely not the actors fault that script has him being very cranky, self-obsessed and completely oblivious to the fact that girl is in love with him.

The most famous scene is one where secretary "incognito" follows a drummer who must have seen "Phantom lady" - convinced she is just a good time girl who wants to sleep with him, drummer takes her to some underground place where jazz musicians have "jam session". In a completely bizarre scene, while other musicians play, drummer is banging on a drums covered with sweat and the looks between him and the girl are pure pornography for 1940s standards. As opposite to "clean" music played in a respected clubs earlier (some silly tropical comedy that supposedly entertains mainstream audience) jazz is shown as dangerous and probably connected with drugs. Oh well. And what they are playing is actually old time dixieland.

Besides Franchot Tone who has interesting role, acting is really just so-so. Alan Curtis looks like Clark Gable's young brother but his role of man accused of murder is quickly pushed aside as the story focuses on a secretary and there is nothing interesting about young Ella Raines. In fact, supporting roles of Thomas Gomez (detective), Andrew Tombes (elderly barman) and Fay Helm (Phantom Lady) are far more interesting than main characters. Makes you wonder what would someone like Hitchcock do with this story. Director Robert Siodmak later went on to make famous "Spiral staircase".