Noirvember Watch: Saigon (1947)

Watched:  11/27/2025

Format:  BluRay

Viewing:  First

Director:  Leslie Fenton

I was pretty psyched to see a new-to-me movie starring Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake.  And one that was set in a post-WWII Saigon.  I was very curious how they'd handle the dynamics of the French colonialism, Japanese occupation, rise of Communism, etc...  

Well, the answer is, none of that comes up.  In fact, I don't think there's a single Vietnamese person in this movie.  That's... wild.

I *do* like the basic idea of the plot.  

Three Army Air Corp soldiers in post-War China are getting discharged.  One of them doesn't know he has only 2-3 months to live due to an ailment (cancer?  something else?) but will likely just die suddenly.  So, the other two decide to show him the time of his life, which they can do if they take a lucrative but shady gig flying a businessman from Shanghai to Saigon.  

But when they go to get the plane and fly him out, the cops stop the businessman, while his secretary, Veronica Lake, jumps in the plane and they fly off.  The plane crashes in Vietnam, and they make their way to Saigon.  Along the way, the dying man falls for Lake (reasonable) while she spars with Alan Ladd.

Oh, and she has a briefcase full of cash.

And, as Lake humors the dying guy, she and Ladd start to fall for each other.

Anyway, it's super weird.  They treat it as if everyone in Vietnam is French?  Or vaguely European?  There's only one Asian person in the movie at the very beginning who sounds very Southern Californian.  

The movie is fine.  It'll never be a favorite, but when I was thinking "I don't think this is working", it kind of changed directions a few times and saved itself.  It fits into that "it's fine" category, but closer to "it's good".  But I just wasn't 100% on board.  But I maybe need to give it another shot.

Hallmark Holiday Watch: Holiday Touchdown - a Bills Love Story (2025)

Watched:  11/25/2025

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  First

Director:  Dustin Rikert

So, for reasons beyond my understanding, the NFL has entered into an alliance with Hallmark to produce movies about super-fans of their teams falling in love at Christmas.  

In no way will this get repetitive after 32 movies.

Despite some real star-power (for Hallmark) the first movie was a complete mess.  And I expected more-of-same.

Holiday Touchdown: a Bills Love Story (2025) actually solved some of the issues of the first movie but then blew my mind by trying to create a sort of MCU of NFL-themed movies by showing the characters from the first movie in this one.  And the magical Santa is in this one mucking with people's lives.

The last movie had some star power with Diedrich Bader, Richard Riehle, Ed Begley Jr., Christine Ebersole, et al.  What it didn't really have was much actual representation by the Chiefs players.  

This one had Joey Pantoliano playing a version of himself as a wacky uncle.  Our stars are Woman (Holland Roden) and Man (Matthew Daddario, who I didn't know, but people keep fan-casting his sister as Wonder Woman, and... fair).  They're childhood friends and neighbors, and the running gag is everyone knows he's pining for Woman.

There's lot of Bills-specific humor which I vaguely get, and lots of regional-specific stuff, which did not lose me, but sure felt like them making sure we knew they were in Buffalo and not doing the usual "we filmed in Vancouver, but please believe this is Arizona" thing Hallmark will do.

The pair find out Joey Pants has been receiving gifts every year from an anonymous source, going back to when he was drafted and this same anonymous person also sent his family groceries and money.  The movie is them solving the mystery.  

Along the way, they fall in love, blah blah blah...  but there's also LOTS of Bills players and coaches and owners and whatnot.  And the main character is a project manager on the new stadium, so there's lots of discussion about that.  But none about how expensive tickets are supposed to be in the new stadium.

I dunno, like a lot of the new Hallmark movies, it's actually kind of funny.  Not gut-bustingly, but I had a chuckle or two.  It feels more like a sitcom than a Hallmark movie.  And that is not a complaint.  Anyway, they fixed a lot that didn't work in last year's offering.

Happy Birthday, Tina Turner

 

Today marks the birthday of Tina Turner, one of the greats of R&B and rock.  

Y'all put on her Simply the Best collection and thank me later.

Rockettes at 100

1925 marks the founding of what was then the "Missouri Rockets", in St. Louis, who would swiftly move to New York City and become The Rockettes.  

The Rockets were a Midwestern response to someone seeing a Ziegfeld Follies show and saying "I could maybe do that".  And, indeed, Russell Markert brought his vision to the stage in the Midwest and a sensation was born.

If you've never checked out the remarkable history of the Ziegfeld Follies, it is weird, wild stuff.  There's nothing like it in 2025 (and who can say if we're better or worse for it).  But suffice to say, Florenz Ziegfeld made an impression that echoes through to today in more ways than we can count.  

Circa 1932, the Missouri Rockets moved to New York's Radio City Music Hall, renamed themselves The Rockettes, and by 1933, they put on their first Christmas Spectacular, which dazzles to this day.

Thanksgiving Watch: Squanto - a Warrior's Tale (1994)

Watched:  11/24/2025

Format:  Disney+

Viewing:  First

Director:  Xavier Koller

I don't know that I've ever seen a movie make me decide, while watching an uplifting story that's part of the well-worn self-mythologizing of America, that the hero is 100% wrong.  But that's where I landed with Squanto: a Warrior's Tale (1994).   

And maybe that's what director Xavier Koller truly felt we should think.  He's Swiss, not American, and based on the script Disney gave him, it really isn't a compelling argument that Squanto was right that what his fellow locals needed to do was put down their weapons.

Before we get rolling, I have not thought about the narrative of Squanto since I was probably eight years old and we had a children's book about his life, which I can safely say:  I do not remember anything from that book, just that Squanto helped keep the Native Americans and the Pilgrims from murdering each other which led to the first Thanksgiving.  I also vaguely remembered he was not part of any tribe.

As the movie starts, Squanto is having a good week.  He just married Irene Bedard, which is a check in the win column.  But no sooner do they go for a lovers' leisurely stroll than he sees an early 17th Century British ship pulling up to his beach.  He's promptly kidnapped by the Brits who take him back to England, along with a warrior from the neighboring tribe.   

Doc Watch: Selena y Los Dinos (2025)

Watched:  11/24/2025

Format:  Netflix

Viewing:  First

Director:  Isabel Castro

Living in Texas in the early 90's, if you had your head up at all, you heard about Selena.  While I didn't listen to Tejano or Cumbia, she'd become so big that a dumb Anglo kid like myself heard Bidi Bidi Bom Bom somewhere along the way, and I admit that I probably paid more attention to Selena because she was very pretty with a Colgate smile.

I could tell you pretty much exactly when I figured out who Selena was from the cover of her album Entre A Mi Mundo.  The cover art was everywhere.  

Candidly, in the 1990's and now, the names of most Tejano acts were just not known by Anglos and English speakers.  But Selena was rapidly breaking down that particular divide through sheer force of scale - she was selling out the Astrodome, something reserved for the biggest acts on the planet - and wildly popular local acts like ZZ Top.  

As a Texan whose first language was English, it seemed like Selena was about to cross-over to a larger audience the second she put out a record in English (see: Shakira).

But then, in 1995, at the age of 23, Selena was killed.  

As popular as she was at the time of her death, it's very hard to quantify the scope and duration of the public mourning that spilled out.

Chabert Holiday Micro-Watch: Maybe This Christmas (2025)

Chabert may have signed an exclusive deal with Hallmark for making movies and selling some lovely products in Hallmark stores, but after last year's slam dunk ad with Philosophy, she's now got a gig with Maybelline.  And while we don't believe she could possibly have a blemish, this year she's re-teaming with Dustin Milligan to sell concealer.

Over a handful of 30-second episodes, we get more story than most Hallmark movies.

All 5 episodes in one convenient video:

Noirvember Watch: Ace in the Hole (1951)

Watched:  11/22/2025

Format:  Disc

Viewing:  First

Director:  Billy Wilder

If you ever wanted to crush the human soul with a pair of slick mid-century movies, you could do worse than to schedule this movie alongside The Sweet Smell of Success.  

The movie probably seems a little over the top in some ways, but holy christ, you kind of know it's more accurate about our relationship with the media and how the media keeps us invested than any of us really want to admit.  

Kirk Douglas plays a talented journalist who has been run out of every decent newspaper on the East Coast.  He rolls into town in Albuquerque in a broken down car and takes a job at a small paper that insists he publish only the truth.  

A year later, he's sent to go cover a rattlesnake roundup but en route stumbles across an accident.  At a roadside shop and restaurant they find that across the way the owner of the place has gone into an old cave where he often finds Native American artifacts, and the place had collapsed on him.  Douglas smells a story, and calls it in.  It's the first time he's really been able to cut loose with some real sensationalism, and the story gets picked up by the wire.

Udo Kier Merges With The Infinite

Udo Kier, an actor who has been in a ridiculous number of movies, has passed.

Kier was in some of Andy Warhol's films, Suspiria, and a handful of Lars Van Trier movies.  But also appeared in comedies like Ace Ventura: Pet Detective,  TV classics like V.I.P. and no shortage of German films.

"Hallmark Channel's Christmas Concert" (2019) might be the Hallmark Channel's Star Wars Holiday Special

This item does not appear on the IMDB for Ms. Lacey Chabert under "actor", but under "self" so I'd initially missed it.  But it popped up on Hallmark as an option, and I wasn't going to not watch it.  

So, what is it?

It's a bizarre artifact of where Hallmark was in 2019, I guess.  And the watchword for the whole show is "awkward".  There clearly was a lack of rehearsal time, and a spirit of "we're pros, we'll wing it" that doesn't play particularly well.  No one here is Bob Hope and keeping this on the rails.

The show is *not* exactly a concert, but kinda, sorta framed like one of those old-school Christmas specials where a celebrity pretends they're in their house.  Lacey Chabert is throwing a party where other Hallmark stars are her guests, but she's also acknowledging the camera (and sometimes awkwardly looking at it).  

One-by-one, a series of Hallmark stars come in, and then they each sing a Christmas standard in what I assume is not actually Chabert's livingroom and kitchen.  But it's not a set - I'm pretty sure that's a real house.  No set would be this poorly designed for television coverage.

Happy Birthday, Jamie Lee Curtis

Today is the birthday of Signal Watch favorite Jamie Lee Curtis.  

Happy b-day to actor, director, writer, etc... et al...  Ms. Curtis.  

Happy Birthday, Ingrid Pitt

Today marks the birth of actor and author Ingrid Pitt, born this day in 1937 in Warsaw, Poland.

If that date and location seem a bit ominous, Pitt was also Jewish and spent time in a concentration camp.  She and her mother escaped.

Pitt became an actress in Europe and tried her hand in America.  Her largest success was in England, especially in horror films.  In the US, she's a cult horror figure, famous for appearances in The Wicker Man, The Vampire Lovers (one of my favorite films), Countess Dracula, The House That Dripped Blood and others.  She also appears in British action movies, including the dynamite film Where Eagles Dare (recommended).  

She also penned a few books, including an autobiography and a series of horror-related books.

Her filmography is not particularly deep, and she was never a Bond girl, so her exposure in the states in minimal.  I, personally, think she's great.  In the sea of Hammer's extraordinary talent, in my opinion, she's one of the absolute best to do it.

Pitt passed in 2010 at only 73 years old.

Chabert Holiday Watch: Matchmaker Santa (2012)

Watched:  11/20/2025

Format:  UP Faith and Family

Viewing:  First

Director:  Davis S. Cass Sr.

Job: Baker

Location of story:  Somewhere in California?  Outside of San Francisco

new skill:  Elfing

Man:  Adam Mayfield

Job of Man:  Bitch Boy to a CEO

Goes to/ Returns to:  Goes to

Event:  Christmas tree lighting ceremony

Food:  Cookies

Editor's note: I was unable to find this movie during ChabertQuest2025, but saw it was now available on "UP Faith and Family", and so got a 7 day free trial.

So, new to me and not a Hallmark movie, exactly.  This movie is about a Santa who will stop at literally nothing to make sure Lacey Chabert and her boyfriend break up so that he may force her into a relationship with someone else.  Kris Kringle will bend the very laws of nature, create life, destroy roads...  

This Santa is mad with power.

Anyway, for a long time, and maybe still, a lot of the movies on Hallmark were technically independent movies.  I am unclear how it works now, but basically Hallmark would help fund movies in exchange for North American distribution.  But after X amount of time, these movies were back in the hands of the producers.  And so it was I now am enjoying a 7-day trial of the UP Faith and Family Network.

Part of how Hallmark had so many movies in the years where it seemed like a factory cranking out way too many movies, this was the trick.  Hallmark was essentially licensing very cheap indie movies, and part of them funding those movies was that Hallmark was given script approval for kicking in some percent of the film's budget.  

And, thus, the sameness of Hallmark.  They managed to pull off low-risk/ high-reward for years and people learned to write for them.

Thus, Matchmaker Santa (2012) is also, technically, Chabert's first Hallmark Christmas movie.  So, bit of trivia for you.

But you want to know about Santa and his unstoppable interest in getting people to hook up.

Netflix Watch: Trainwreck - Storm Area 51 (2025)

Watched:  11/19/2025

Format:  Netflix

Viewing:  First

Director:  

So, yeah.  I kind of vaguely remember this occurring.  

In 2019, someone posted a joke online that they were going to "assault Area 51" - ie, gather as many people as they could to "Naruto Run" onto the top secret military base with the idea "they can't stop us all".  

Since X-Files debuted, Area 51 has been part of the zeitgeist.  We all know it's there, it was a major location in the 1990's movie Independence Day, and is rumored to be where the US Air Force keeps downed alien spacecraft.  More likely it is where we test experimental aircraft as that is where the U2 surveillance craft was first deployed, as well as the Stealth Bomber, etc...

The very real Area 51 is in the middle of nowhere and if you cross onto the property and don't stop for the guards, you will be shot.  I guess one might solve the greatest mystery of all as you find out what's beyond this veil of tears.

  

Anyway, the documentary is about how all of this got wildly out of control, the power of social media to attract people with bad risk/reward understanding, and that the kids probably are all right.  Stupid AF, but all right.  It is also about how people who have no practical experience should try to host a million person rave in the desert.  And how relying on the mob can really save your bacon.

Chabert Hallmark Holiday Watch: A Merry Scottish Christmas (2023)

what do you know?  I watched this on the 2nd anniversary of the movie's release

Watched:  11/18/2025

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  Second

Director:  Dustin Rikert

Job: Doctor

Location of story:  Somewhere in Scotland

new skill:  Lording over peasants

Man:  James Robinson

Job of Man:  Groundskeeper

Goes to/ Returns to:  Goes to

Event:  Some underwhelming solstice thing, a banger of a party and a ball

Food:  liquor, really

So, I thought I'd covered this movie because of the image I used for my 2023 Hallmark report when I was moving too fast assembling my ChabertQuest2025 list.  But I had not.  So here we go.

This is a movie about a naive American doctor and her family who inherit a Scottish castle.  However, the diabolical groundskeeper seduces and bamboozles the doctor into falling for him so that he may claim ownership of the lands he's worked since he was a child.  That same labor presumably led to his father's early demise, and this is his revenge.  

With dead eyed smiles, he earns the trust of the stressed out family, offering to take care of everything and let them live off the fat of their inheritance.  

Unfortunately the movie ends just after he's successfully bedded the heiress doctor but before we can put his nefarious schemes into motion, so we never see that part.

(take 2)

Netflix Watch: Trainwreck - Poop Cruise (2025) and Balloon Boy (2025)

Watched:  11/17/2025

Format:  Netflix

Viewing:  First

Director:  

I will never, ever get on a cruise ship.

No, but seriously, it's a minor miracle that no one died on this ship.  Or contracted some awful disease.  

What were the odds no one needed to be evacuated after the second day?  Pretty close to zero, and it sounds like that didn't have to happen.  

What's most wild, that the doc touches on but doesn't really ever explore, is how *fast* society breaks down predictably when the lights are off.  From public fornication to Bible studies breaking out.   It really is a testament to the crew that things felt enough under control that violence was contained.  

But, no, really.  I always assumed Carnival, etc... had emergency plans for this sort of thing, but they sure do not.  Fun!

The "Trainwreck" series of docs is pretty fascinating.  Little hour-long nuggets of "oh yeah, that disaster".  We also watched "Balloon Boy", which is just as frustrating to watch as you'd imagine.  If you have any radar for people who are both full of shit and people who think they can lie to you because they assume you're not as smart as they are, this is a doc about someone living neatly in that intersection.  

Also, everyone needs to get a better idea of how much helium you would need to lift a whole kid and still buffett around like that.  But I guess physics is not on your mind when you think a kid is whizzing through the sky.

Chabert Hallmark Holiday Watch: Haul Out the Holly - Lit Up (2023)

Watched: 11/16/2025

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  second

Director:  Maclain Nelson

Job: Copywriter/ Editor?  She never works during this whole movie

Location of story:  Evergreen Lane - which I think is in Salt Lake City

new skill:  Mastery of the Christmas Arts

Man:  Wes Brown

Job of Man:  Architect

Goes to/ Returns to:  stays in same place (this is the 2nd installment)

Event:  Several ongoing Christmas festivities

Food:  Cookies

Editor's Note:  So, y'all.  Despite my stated goals and belief I'd done a phenomenal job documenting ChabertQuest 2025 (pats self on back), I messed this one up.  Yes, I'd seen this movie, but had I written it up?  I had not.  Thought I had, but that was a lie I told myself, and discovered my error in July.  I felt terrible as we agreed the the deal was I would watch and review all of the movies I could find starring one Lacey Chabert and you'd be like "why are you doing this?"

So, here we are, rewatching this one.  And writing up this movie.  For you, the people.

There were really only so many directions one could go with the premise of Haul Out The Holly (2022), the first film in what is now a trilogy.  

The premise of the first film is that a woman breaks up with her live-in boyfriend and goes home for Christmas, only to find that her parents weren't expecting her and are actually moving to a seniors' condo in Florida.  She's essentially left behind in her parents' McMansion.  However, her own father was head of the HOA, and he set up a very Christmassy set of rules, which Chabert finds herself required to adhere to (despite the fact she does not own the house) and is force marched through the holiday season.  

Guys, she also falls for Man nextdoor along the way.

So... we end the film with Christmas, love, and a 5000 square foot house in which she'll creep around like a Victorian ghost, I guess.  

But what next?  Haul out another holiday?  Tragedy strikes Evergreen Lane?  She casually starts putting out inverted pineapples when the neighbors come over?

Here in the sequel, Emily (Chabert) been gifted her parents house, she's all-in on Christmas madness, dating Man, and helping out with the neighborhood festivities.  

However, as Christmas approaches and events are just beginning, the Jolly Johnsons, winners of a Christmas-themed reality show, move into the cul-de-sac.  To the longtime Christmas-nerds of Evergreen Lane, this is like having your favorite quarterback or rock star move in and they flip out (yes, these movies operate in a cartoonish heightened reality).  

DePalma Watch: Phantom of the Paradise (1974)

Watched:  11/16/2025

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  Second

Director:  Brian DePalma

There's a lot going on in Phantom of the Paradise (1974).  

Here's a pie-chart as shared by The Dug about half-way through the movie (we'd thrown together a last-minute watch party).

And then without about ten minutes left:

Hallmark Holiday Watch: Three Wisest Men (2025)

Watched:  11/16/2025

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  First

Director:  Terry Ingram

Three Wisest Men (2025) is the third film in the very popular (for Hallmark) Wise Men series.  We previously covered the first and second installments.  

The problem with this movie is that we've established not just three characters, but their mom, spouses and partners, children, etc...  and it is not a small cast.  And everyone needs to get a plotline.  So it's a lot of movie.  I couldn't help but notice that this one was an "extended cut", which means whatever aired with commercials had less movie, and I have to assume that made this even more of a jumble.  

From a business perspective, it's a fascinating peek into how Hallmark now functions like an old-school studio with their constellation of stars.  

100 Years of "Phantom of the Opera"

We are somewhere in the year of the 100th Anniversary of the release of Phantom of the Opera (1925), the silent film starring Lon Chaney, man of 1000 Faces.  

I haven't watched it again this year, but I will!  I promise.  

I can't say when or where we are in relation to the original release schedule.  Google is telling me the release date was November 15th, but I'm seeing much earlier in the year on Wikipedia.  In the 1920's the movie would play in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and other major markets.  Then, it might move on to other cities.  This could be several months apart.  Eventually, beat-up prints might leave the country or be sent to podunk towns.  So who knows when or if Phantom of the Opera played most cities.  But 1925 is the year in which the movie was released.

I saw Phantom of the Opera the first time circa 1990 on a lo-fi VHS tape obtained from a bin at Walmart.  As the film precedes 1928, it fell out of copyright, and I found a copy produced by "Goodtime Videos" that set me back less than $10, and as an angsty teenage kid I spent an evening watching my first feature-length silent film while listening to some moody music.  

Frankly, I was blown away.  

I'd expected the movie to just be actors more or less pantomiming in front of shoddy sets, and all in wide shots.  And, instead, a film taking place against the massive backdrop of the Paris Opera House unspooled, with wild visuals and dramatic moments.  What I do not recall is if I had already read the novel of Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux, but I sort of suspect that I had.  I do know I had seen the film and watched the movie by the time I saw a non-Andrew Lloyd Webber stage play of the story toward the end of that same academic year.*

If silent-era films aren't your jam, I get it.  I struggle with them as well and hats off to the folks who've trained themselves to watch silent films that aren't Buster Keaton or Chaplin.  But I think Phantom of the Opera is practically must-see/ assigned viewing.  It gives you an idea of how complex storytelling was handled during the era and the spectacle that could be created on the silver screen with visual tricks, gigantic sets, etc...  It's almost hard to believe it wasn't actually filmed on location somewhere.

Lon Chaney is absolutely brilliant as Erik, which seems trite to say, but every time I watch the movie, I'm stunned by how terrifying he is.  Others are good, no doubt.  One does not dismiss Mary Philbin who plays Cristine and Mary Fabian's Madame Carlotta is terrific.  

Whether I loved the recent Frankenstein or not, what I can say is that I love how it swung for the fences as an epic.  We get one of those every few years in the horror genre, and it feels like Phantom of the Opera is the first of these in America.  And, dang, you owe it to yourself to see this thing.

Happy 100th, Phantom of the Opera!

*I have no feelings on Andrew Lloyd Webber's version as I've only heard it and never seen it

Netflix Watch: Death By Lightning

One of my favorite writers is Candice Millard.  With a relatively modest output compared to other popular historical writers, I would gladly put every one of her books in your hand.

A bit like Eddie Muller over at Noir Alley, Millard manages to humanize and make her subjects deeply understandable despite the gulf of time and geography.  A while back, Jennifer R rec'd, Destiny of the Republic to me, which made me a true Millard fanboy and, these days, I'll happily pre-order any new Millard book when I hear it's available. 

Shockingly, her first book, River of Doubt, is not the book which has received an adaptation.  No post-Presidency Theodore Roosevelt mapping the Amazon for us.  Instead, it's Destiny of the Republic, an account of the extraordinary circumstances that led to the election of James Garfield to the US presidency, and his subsequent assassination by Charles Guiteau (spoilers on basic high school US History).  

Most Americans are vaguely aware we had a president named Garfield, and some know he was killed early on in his presidency.  What gets lost is the fascinating inflection point US politics were in that saw the Ohioan elected after years of prime 19th-Century corruption.  And while some may know Guiteau was, as they say, crazy - until I'd read Millard's book, I sure didn't know how Guiteau scrambled along the edges of society, his story reflecting so much of what they don't teach in school about America in the 19th century and what would come to echo through the 20th and 21st centuries.

Now, Netflix has rolled out a star-studded series roughly based on the book and entitled Death By Lighting.  

Happy Birthday, Louise Brooks

 

Today marks the 119th birthday of silent film star Louise Brooks.  

Here's all of Pandora's Box.

Noirvember Watch: Crossfire (1947)

Watched:  11/12/2025

Format:  Criterion

Viewing:  Unknown

Director:  Edward Dmytryk

Crossfire (1947) is one of the movies they recommend when you're first trying to sort out noir, which is a bit odd.  It's about as far from Maltese Falcon or Out of the Past as you're going to get.  Heck, it's a social message movie, and feels like a prestige film on top of that - earning a few Oscar nominations, including that for Gloria Grahame in a small but powerful role.

The movie is about a murder that occurs, and the suspects are from a group of soldiers waiting to be de-enlisted from the army in the wake of World War II.  There's no obvious motive,just possibilities for opportunity.  

Robert Young plays the cop figuring out who did it, and he pulls in a young Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan and is looking for Steve Brodie and George Cooper.  None of these guys seem to particularly like each other - their grouping is the loose affiliation of their unit, but they all know Cooper's character, Mitchell,is struggling.

Mitchell had really tied one on, and tried to find solace with a girl from a dime-a-dance joint, Ginny (Gloria Grahame).  And, man, is there a lot of story in her relatively few minutes on screen.  There's a whole other noir here about a girl trapped in hell who maybe saw Mitchell as anything from a chance at one night with a decent guy to maybe a way out.

And, kudos to Paul Kelly who plays a singularly weird role as "the man" against Graham.

The victim is played by one of my favorite supporting actors of this era, Sam Levene.  And eventually it becomes clear that the only motivation that Young can figure is that he was killed merely for being Jewish.  

If it's noir, the movie is a post war film reflecting on the darkness waiting for people as they came home, from cheating spouses to the same hatred that fueled the fascism in Europe and Asia that's festering at home.  This is about people already out of control before the movie even starts.  

The look is probably the tipping point.  This movie is *beautifully* shot, and in the version on Criterion, you can really see how brilliantly J. Roy Hunt lit and filmed each scene.  This is a movie that takes place mostly over one night, in the dark of the city, in bars, walk-ups and hotel rooms.  And a few scenes in the balcony of a theater.  As good as the film is story-wise, acting (Grahame was nominated for Best Supporting Actress), directing (Dmytryk also nominated), it's worth watching just for Hunt's work.

Also, the scene where Graham meets Mitchell's wife (Jacqueline White).  Hoo-boy.

In short, I love this movie, but felt I'd watched it several times and could take a break.  But I am so glad I returned to it.  It remains as relevant and powerful as ever, and maybe hits harder in 2025 than it did a decade ago.

Jimmy Olsen is Getting His Own DC Show (Maybe)

I saw Superman (2025) a few times in the theater and have seen a number of reaction videos to the film.  Mostly audiences responded very well to the Jimmy Olsen stuff once they started catching on to what the movie was doing and learned that Jimmy wasn't just a generic reporter guy there to give Lois someone to talk to.  

In the run up to the release of the movie, we'd talked about our enthusiasm regarding the casting of Skyler Gisondo, who we know from a few things, but primarily The Righteous Gemstones.  And while we thought Sam Huntington was pitch perfect for 2006 Jimmy Olsen, Gisondo managed to do the thing where he both made the part totally his own while also being utterly, recognizably Jimmy Olsen to fans of the character. 

It seems fair to say that the Jimmy and Eve Tessmacher stuff was better than it had any right to be, and as a Jimmy Olsen stan (are we saying sicko now?  It seems like we're saying "sicko"), I was absolutely delighted.  It's just funny that the audience was so utterly thrown by everything Eve and Jimmy were doing.  And it warms my cold, leaden heart to know that James Gunn is continuing on his quest to make a DCU of movies based on doing whatever-the-@#$% he wants instead of worrying about selling Batman toys.  

The headline here is that on November 11th I saw some notices that, after some rumors cooking since July, Jimmy might get his own show.  

Look, no one wants a weekly show following Jimmy in and out of scrapes more than yours truly.  But if the current mode at DC is proof of anything, it's that they'll sell no wine before its time.  Gunn and Safran have already canned numerous projects that seemed to have traction, and decided to play it smart rather than standing in front of investors and promising a slate of projects, each more lucrative than the last.  We've all learned from Disney's hubris and the absolute self-own that was Diane Nelson's DCEU.  

Do I want a Jimmy show?  Yes.  Do I want it to co-star Sara Sampaio?  Also, big yes.  

Word is that, as of today, the American Vandal team is looking to produce this, which is a mixed bag for me.  Tony Yacenda and Dan Perrault put out one season of a show I watched and enjoyed years ago, but I didn't finish the second season and have heard nothing from them since.  Whether they actually take this across the finish line or not is an open question as these big properties tend to change hands a few times before they land.  But maybe the pitch was just that good.

Honestly, the answer is Lord and Miller, but they're otherwise occupied.

We'll see what comes out of this.  I am hopeful for the moment.

Wallace Shawn's Birthday

 

It is Wallace Shawn's 82nd Birthday.  May he celebrate with close friends.

Noirvember Watch: Blind Spot (1947)

Watched:  11/11/2025

Format:  TCM Noir Alley

Viewing:  First

Director:  Robert Gordon

A cheap and cheerful B-noir from 1947, Blind Spot is a quick watch that depends on charm of its talent and two or three gags to keep it moving.

The film was programming on TCM's Noir Alley, which I confess I am not watching as much as I should be of late.  The good news is that I found myself, once again, enjoying the intro and outro by noirista Eddie Muller as much or more than the movie.

This film follows an alcoholic writer of novels with an artistic bent (Chester Morris) who, while on a bender, goes to his publisher's office to try and sneak in and tear up his contract, which he has decided is unfair.  While there, he meets a sultry blonde (Constance Dowling) and argues with his publisher in front of a successful writer of mysteries (Steven Geray).  It is suggested that Morris switch to writing mysteries to make more money, and he agrees to do so.

He retreats to the bar in the lobby of the publisher's building and makes time with the blonde, who has just quit after the publisher got handsy.

That night, the publisher is found dead, and Morris seems to be the suspect.  But the evidence is circumstantial.  

It's a lost-time mystery as the now sober Morris tries to pull the pieces together, including possibly condemning himself as the murderer.  It seems the technique he dreamed up for his own murder mystery novel is what was used to kill the publisher.  Meanwhile, both Dowling and Geray are working overtime to assist the writer.

It's no award winner, but it plays like a solid novella or short story, and the characters are colorful.  Morris and Dowling play very well off each other, even if she seems drawn to him for absolutely no reason.  And part of the cost-savings appears in overly long scenes where the same ideas keep getting conveyed as we work to fill the necessary runtime.

It's absolutely not crucial viewing, but you could do way worse.  Oddly, it would also fit in neatly with Criterion's current "Black Out Noir" showcase of film's where a lead is trying to account for lost time while they were drugged, asleep, drunk, hallucinating, etc...