Not really a noir - the femme fatale turns out not to be, and there's a happy ending. Glenn Ford (The Big Heat, Human Desire, Cowboy), Rita Hayworth and George Macready are all good. Dialogue is crisp and ironic, especially from mens' room attendant Steven Geray, who acts as a kind of Greek chorus. Sophia Coppola picked the scene where we first meet Gilda as one of her favourites. Emotional obsession and destruction well depicted. Good Rudolph Maté photography. Maybe one Rita song too many in Montevideo (or wherever they are) - interrupts the momentum of the film. Joseph Calleia familiar from Touch of Evil and The Glass Key, Joe Sawyer is the heavy.
Story: EA Ellington, adaptation Jo Eisinger, screenplay Marion Parsonnet (and, uncredited, Ben Hecht). Liked some of Charles Nelson's editing, e.g. when Ford and Hayworth are dancing, as well as their meeting scene in which Macready is entirely cut out - it's just about these two.
Rita (or rather Vidor) does that snap into shot again later, in one of the dance numbers. She's iconic, whether acting or strutting her stuff, e.g. in 'Put the Blame on Mame' - - who's Mame?
Columbia. Didn't recognise Macready, from My Name is Julia Ross, The Big Clock, The Great Race, up to Count Yorga Vampire! He kept reminding me of the dummy in Dead of Night!
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