Don's debut having risen from the head of the montage department at Warners, where he created 'thousands' of them. It's a historical thriller written by Peter Milne, based on the novel 'The Big Bow Mystery' (1892) by Israel Zangwill, who was a British born writer and supporter of Jewish causes, and wrote an influential play 'The Melting Pot' about the experiences of a Russian immigrant in America.
Anyway, Scotland Yard Superintendent Sidney Greenstreet is understandably upset when a man he has tried and executed turns out to be not guilty. He is dismissed and replaced by George Coulouris. Greenstreet's best friend is Peter Lorre, who lives in a house opposite with two bitter enemies (of each other), Morton Lowry and politician Paul Kavanagh, and when the former is killed, Greenstreet is on the case as much as his newly appointed rival. Into the foggy London mix comes singer Joan Lorring (who also appeared with Greenstreet and Lorre in Three Strangers). Arthur Shields also makes a brief appearance.
I love that laugh of Greenstreet's - it sort of erupts, bellows.
Our Spanish print is I fear darker than Ernie Haller would have liked it, but it makes for a creepy setting of low lit rooms and streets, further unsettled by Friedrich Hollander's music (orchestrated by Leonid Raab).
Siegel brings a certain sweep to proceedings, using tricks no doubt learned from montage work. He was, I read, a very economical director, something he passed on to young Clint.
In a 1968 interview with Peter Bogdanovich, Siegel said that Greenstreet would know every line, whilst Lorre would have no idea what film he was doing, and would just pick it up in rehearsals. "These two incredibly different people, from opposite worlds with the opposite approach to their work, would make poetry together."
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