Thursday, June 17, 2010

365 Movies: The Dark Corner Review


The Dark Corner stars Mark Stevens, Lucille Ball, William Bendix, and Clifton Webb in this 1946, Henry Hathaway film. After her boss, a private investigator, is framed for a murder, Kathleen(Ball) tries to clear his name. Brad's(Stevens) ex-partner is keeping a very close on him and it makes Brad very uneasy, and he tries to keep Kathleen out, but she wants to help him. His ex-partner Anthony(Kurt Kreuger) is very shady and tries his hardest to return a little favor to Brad. When Anthony turns up dead, the only suspect is Brad, and the only person, who believes he's innocent is Kathleen. Clifton Webb plays a very uptight and precise art collector, who is involved in the whole mess, and he plays it brilliantly. Aside from him, I loved the performances of Lucille, Mark, and William. I really think that the more I see of Mark, the more I look forward to seeing him. I definitely think he's overlooked today, and his performance in this, is marvelous. He plays the stone cold private investigator brilliantly. I'm used to seeing Lucille as a comedienne, but in this she's very serious, and she does it wonderfully. Not only amazing in comedy, but also with serious material, Lucy could do it. The film really had me pulled me in throughout and kept me guessing, as to what was going to happen next. Just like Mark, I think this film is quite overlooked as well.



Review for Tomorrow: Arrowsmith

1 comment:

Lolita of the Classics said...

I agree with you on this subject! I loved this film when I saw it, and it puzzled it a bit too - are you with me that The Dark Corner somehow makes fun of the film noir genre, while still keeping to it? And well, Clifton Webb should have been in more films over all, he is fabulous.