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It starts like The Seven Year Itch and ends like The Wizard of Oz, in between there's a masterly view of the oneiric state as a theorem illustrated. "Some Psychological Aspects of Homicide," a Gotham College lecture, the assistant professor (Edward G. Robinson) considers humanity's "various degrees of culpability." A bachelor again with the family away on vacation, he grouses about the stodginess of middle age and inflames himself reading Solomon's Song of Songs. A portrait on display catches his eye, the camera simply pans from the painted beauty on the canvas to the real thing standing by its side (Joan Bennett), next thing he knows he's in her flat with her lover's stabbed corpse. "I was wondering if we had the nerve for something, something pretty dangerous." The dream gal and the fateful spiral, Fritz Lang's adamantine formulation. The body in the back seat, the lost dime at the toll gate, the smiling patrolman next to the traffic light. The best friend (Raymond Massey) is a district attorney, they visit the scene of the crime and the meek culprit unwittingly leads the way. "Closing in on me, huh?" The blackmailing interloper (Dan Duryea) is an ex-cop and bodyguard, practically leaving a trail of slime as he rifles through the dame's drawers in search of incriminating evidence. (The monogrammed pen inside the glove is just one of the fine points of contact with Hitchcock.) The illicit encounter is staged in a bright hotel lobby between elevator chimes, the skunk knows poisoned scotch and soda when he sees it. "We're just not very skillful at that sort of thing." The magical release is the only escape from the Lang trap, the protagonist exits the private club like a spectator exiting the theater. Fellini's La Città delle donne provides a proper dilation. Cinematography by Milton Krasner. With Edmund Breon, Thomas E. Jackson, Dorothy Peterson, Arthur Loft, and Frank Dawson. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |