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76.1.163.157
Tom Neal in the lead. His life was as interesting as the character he portrayed: he graduated from Harvard Law, was a superior boxer, and later in life killed his wife, shooting her head off from behind with a .45 caliber handgun (he served six years). Earlier, Neal had beaten Franchot Tone to a pulp, breaking a cheekbone, smashing his nose, and giving him a concussion as they fought over a woman.
In "Detour" however, even the real life Neal would have met his match.
A man picks up a hitchhiker and, soon after, the driver dies accidentally. The hitchhiker takes the car and picks up a woman, but she instantly--- in one of those coincidences--- recognizes the car as that of a man she briefly had known. A deadly game of blackmail ensues. The femme fatale coldly is played by the striking Ann Savage (what a perfect stage name!).
This is a no-frills noir film that wastes no time in extraneous scenes or character development: we see the characters' most brutal, raw emotions exposed and then we see them scratched and ripped to pieces.
A violent, ugly, and utterly fascinating film.
Follow Ups:
From Edgar G. Ulmer, considered the greatest "poverty row" director ever. His work is so good that many film critics classify his work as "auteur".
Check out "Bluebeard" (1944), "Strange Illusion" (1945), "The Strange Woman" (1946), and "The Man From Planet X" (1951).
My personal favorite is "Strange Illusion". This film is intensely surreal. I'd bet my last dollar that Luis Bunuel saw it and that it influenced him.
Edgar G. Ulmer rules!
better than the first.
Neal and Savage really had an anti-chemistry thing going, beautifully!
I actually found the very few soft spots in her character intensely tragic, touching.
Neal was an underrated actor, too.
This film is just about perfect; I couldn't imagine changing one thing, kind of like a Miles Davis solo.
Ann Savage's femme fatale inflicts cruelties upon Tom Neal's hitchhiker, and he seems to like being on the receiving end as much as she relishes dishing it out.
A wonderful, nasty little noir, reputedly shot in only a week.
You wondered a few days ago if anyone else here like noir.
I do. A lot. I'm a sick puppoy for likeing as many of the bad guys and gals as much as I do.
I sometimes have trouble deciding if a certain movie is a noir, or crime drama, or thriller or something else altogether. Where do you put something like Ossessione? Then there's proto noi like Renoir's Le Bete Humaine. What exactly is Suspicion - noir? Drama? Melodrama??? Strangers On A Train? Among modern films, where do you classify Miller's Crossing? (At least I know where to put Blood Simple.) I often see The Third Man listed as noir but I personally don't feel that it is, not truly, although it is a great film.
So here are most of my faves:
The Maltese Falcon
The Asphalt Jungle
Pick-Up On South Street
Kiss Me Deadly
Ace In The Hole
The Big Sleep
Out of The Past
Notorious
Shadow Of A Doubt
On Dangerous Ground
In A Lonely Place
Criss Cross
The Big Heat
Scarlet Street
Night & The City
Rififi
They Live By Night
Nightmare Alley
Act of Violence
Born To Kill
The Setup
The Killing
Touch of Evil
Bob le flambeur
Stray Dog
Favorite modern noirs include:
The Grifters
Blood Simple
Chinatown
LA Confidential (yeah, I know, the ending)
Also enjoy but not love...
Body Heat
Red Rock West
The Last Seduction
begins with a decent list of best noir.
One should never make arch statements that one doesn't believe.
SF
the *great* movies we'd miss out on if that was true; right, Benny?Grins
a
In your post about No Country For Old Men, and then your subsequent comments about Detour...
They seem to be somewhat contradictory.
SF
SPOILER:
The Neal character doesn't give up, SF. He keeps going as long as possible, damn the odds. The film, in other words, is fatalistic but not nihilistic.
... it doesn't need to as humanity does a wonderful job debasing itself.
nt
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