The Blue Dahlia Alan Ladd

Directed by George Marshall
USA 1946

Sterling film noir from the pen of Raymond Chandler. Alan Ladd stars as a war veteran framed for the murder of his own wife. Veronica Lake plays the requisite femme fatale.

This Raymond Chandler-scripted slice of film noir may have been a bit overshadowed by Howard Hawks' The Big Sleep (released in the same year) but merits viewing nonetheless.

Ladd stars as Johnny Morrison, a disillusioned ex-servicemen who discovers the infidelities of his wife (Dowling) - he catches her kissing Eddie Harwood (De Silva), owner of the Blue Dahlia club - on the same night that she is murdered with his gun. Naturally he becomes prime suspect in the killing, not least because he'd pulled his gun on her before walking away.

Unexpected help comes in the shape of Joyce Harwood (a sultry Lake), a woman with a surprising connection to the murder - she's Eddie's ex for starters. She lends a spot of glamour to what is otherwise a very dark tale. The Blue Dahlia is smartly plotted and unpredictable enough to keep the killer's identity a secret. Classy stuff.

Excerpt from Channel 4 located HERE

****

Ladd's returning war veteran stalks stoically down those mean streets once more in search of the killer of his wife (Dowling), a faithless floozie undeserving of his concern. Raymond Chandler's script never quite recovers from the Navy Department's objection to having Ladd's war-wounded buddy Bendix, wandering around with a steel plate in his head and intermittent amnesia, turn out to have done the killing (out of outraged loyalty to his friend, then blanking it out in his memory). The plot rewrite involves one or two arbitrary connections and a much less satisfactory conclusion. A fine hardboiled thriller for all that, with excellent dialogue and performances, and much more apt direction from Marshall than one might expect.

Excerpt from TimeOut Film Guide located HERE

Poster

Theatrical Release: April 19th, 1946

Reviews More Reviews

DVD Review: Universal Pictures UK - Region 2,4 - PAL

DVD Box Cover		CLICK to order from:
Distribution	Universal Pictures UK - Region 2,4 - PAL
Runtime	1:39:20
Video	1.33:1 Aspect Ratio Average Bitrate: 5.55 mb/s NTSC 720x480 29.97 f/s
	NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate:
Audio	English (Dolby Digital 1.0)
Subtitles	English, None
Features	Release Information: Studio: Universal UK. Aspect Ratio: Original Aspect Ratio 1.33:1 Edition Details: DVD Release Date: February 12th, 2007 Keep Case Chapters: 16

Comments:

Overall, I am now not as disappointed as I was expecting to be. We had already heard that The Big Steal, also released in this DVD Noir grouping, was the Turner colorized edition, not - as advertised - the black and white original. So the noir-aficionado community was getting its collective back up in regards to the quality of these releases. But I have had to subsist on a VHS-to-DVD bootleg of this film for a while. It was not badly done at all and even included a trailer but this new Universal UK transfer is certainly superior (see comparison sample below). It is sharper and shows a little more information the frame, is not as heavily contrast boosted, has far less artifacts and offers optional English subtitles. This is by no means a strong transfer - very minor combing is there (although almost invisible), more muddy than I would like, and cue blips (see last capture) and speckles are prevalent - but it is the best we have seen this Noir staple digitally to date. Audio has some minor hiss. The shame of it is that this film deserves an Eddie Muller commentary - or the like - and this new edition is bare-bones.

With Chandler's smooth street-wise dialogue, Ladd's silent-type good looks and Lake's wispy chemistry (the girl was built for Noir) this remains one of the defining films of the stylistic reputation of The Black Cinema. A must-own, in some form, for fans of the style.

NOTE: Favorite Hugh Beaumont plays another important bit part in a strong Noir classic.

Gary W. Tooze

DVD Menus