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Directed by George Sherman
USA 1948

 

Indicator have released Larceny on Blu-ray in their Universal Noir #1 Boxset in 2022, compared HERE

 

John Payne (99 River Street), Joan Caulfield (The Unsuspected), Dan Duryea (Scarlet Street) and Shelley Winters (Cry of the City) play the old confidence game in the riveting crime drama Larceny. Smooth-talking grifter Rick Maxon (Payne) tries to swindle wealthy war widow Deborah (Caulfield) into giving up her savings for a nonexistent memorial. When Rick falls in love with Deborah he has pangs of remorse, but he must contend with his gang boss, Silky (Duryea), and the tough-as-nails moll, Tory (Winters), who is enamored with Rick but is considered Silky’s girl. Director George Sherman (The Sleeping City, Against All Flags, Big Jake) keeps the twists and turns coming in this hard-boiled film noir. Beautifully shot by Irving Glassberg (The Tarnished Angels, The Price of Fear) and co-starring Dan O’Herlihy (RoboCop) and Gene Evans (Fixed Bayonets!).

***

John Payne is the no-good lowdown rat who tries to capitalize on postwar patriotism and grief. He finagles a war widow (Joan Caulfield) into giving up her savings for a nonexistent memorial. When Payne falls in love with the widow he has pangs of conscience, but he reckons without his con-artist boss (Dan Duryea), who tends to bolster his arguments with muscle and bullets.

Posters

Theatrical Release: September 3rd, 1948

Reviews                                                                                                       More Reviews                                                                                       DVD Reviews

 

Review: Kino - Region 'A' - Blu-ray

Box Cover

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Bonus Captures:

Distribution Kino - Region 'A' - Blu-ray
Runtime 1:29:01.335        
Video

1.37:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray

Disc Size: 31,089,714,721 bytes

Feature: 28,589,776,896 bytes

Video Bitrate: 38.89 Mbps

Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video

NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.

Bitrate Blu-ray:

Audio

DTS-HD Master Audio English 1554 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1554 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 16-bit)
Commentary:

Dolby Digital Audio English 192 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 192 kbps

Subtitles English (SDH), None
Features Release Information:
Studio:
Kino

 

1.37:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray

Disc Size: 31,089,714,721 bytes

Feature: 28,589,776,896 bytes

Video Bitrate: 38.89 Mbps

Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video

 

Edition Details:

NEW Audio Commentary by Film Historian Eddy Von Mueller
Trailers


Blu-ray Release Date:
July 13th, 2021
Standard Blu-ray Case

Chapters 9

 

 

Comments:

Indicator have released Larceny on Blu-ray in their Universal Noir #1 Boxset in 2022, compared HERE

NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were taken directly from the Blu-ray disc.

ADDITION: Kino Blu-ray (July 2021): Kino have transferred George Sherman's Larceny to Blu-ray. Aside from frequent frame-specific surface-scratch marks that permeate the image, it looks excellent with fine grain and layered contrast. Black levels are strong and there are a few sequences with depth. I'd say the texture is a prominent attribute. Discounting the marks (see samples below) it is a consistent and pleasing 1080P image. 

NOTE: We have added 66 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Kino use a DTS-HD Master /dual-mono track (16-bit) in the original English language. It is a dialogue-heavy film without much in the way of aggression and, like the video, is consistently exported. The score is by Leith Stevens (The Time Tunnel, Hercules and the Captive Women, I Married a Monster From Outer Space, Great Day in the Morning, The Gun Runners, Syncopation, World Without End, The Night of the Grizzly, 20 Million Miles to Earth, When Worlds Collide) supporting the sly-crime drama adeptly. Kino offer optional English subtitles on their Region 'A' Blu-ray.

The Kino Blu-ray offers a new commentary by Film Historian Dr. Eddy Von Mueller (co-author of Frankenstein: How A Monster Became an Icon.) He talks a lot of about the film industry post the WW2, film Noir which he sees as neither a genre, cycle or style. It's evenly paced with information on Shelly Winters, John Payne, Joan Caulfield, director George Sherman, the Lois Eby, John Fleming novel and much more. There are trailers but none for Larceny.   

I really enjoyed George Sherman's Noir Larceny. It surely must have influenced David Mamet's House of Games - especially the portrayal of lead character incorporating seduction into the long confidence game. There is deception, sexual-tension, suave John Payne, bad-girl Tory ('Torrid Tory' in the book) played by Shelley Winters, the war-widow 'mark' (Joan Caulfield), mastermind criminal Silky Randall (Dan Duryea), support from familiar Percy Helton, sexy Dorothy Hart and flirty Patricia Alphin... It's great to have on Kino Blu-ray as I don't recall it even being on DVD before now. The informative commentary adds more value. Strongly recommended to 'Dark Cinema' aficionados.

Gary Tooze

 


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Scratch / Marks examples

 

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Box Cover

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Distribution Kino - Region 'A' - Blu-ray


 


 

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