"Black Angel" Review

 

by Daniel White

In the film noir, Black Angel (1946)--and yes this IS a film noir, Peter Lorre delivers much of his dialogue with a cigarette dangling from his mouth. It's an impressive feat, and why the Academy didn't acknowledge it with an honorary Oscar that year is beyond me.

Lorre plays Marko, nightclub proprietor and one of the prime suspects in the murder of the "Black Angel" of the title, femme fatale Mavis Marlowe (Constance Dowling). Mavis is a blackmailing shrew who deserves to be offed (we know she's no good, she's mean to her maid!), but the problem is, the wrong man is going to the gas chamber for it.

Black Angel is that rare noir that's also a who done it, and a very good one too. The identity of the killer remains a mystery up until the last ten minutes and the revelation comes as a surprise (at least it did to me).

June Vincent is the "good girl", the wife of the man sentenced to die, who goes undercover to find out who the real killer is. Enlisting the help of the dead woman's estranged husband (the terrific Dan Duryea), the two form a nightclub act and infiltrate the fashionable boite that Lorre operates. It's a clever plot device that allows the lovely Miss Vincent to sing the catchy number, "I Wanna Be Talked About".

Dan Duryea was one of the best actors in Hollywood, who did some of his finest work in film noir (Scarlet Street, Criss Cross). He is in rare form here as the alcoholic composer Martin Blair. Duryea is every bit as convincing in his portrayal of a booze hound haunted by his reckless behavior while tight, as Academy Award winner Ray Milland. Milland won the Oscar two years previous for The Lost Weekend, Dan Duryea wasn't even nominated. I'm not taking anything away from Mr. Milland, he was quite effective in Billy Wilder's ground breaking film. I just think people, like myself, who love movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood would benefit from moving beyond the so called "classics" and embrace the hidden jewels that can be found in the overlooked "B's" from that period.

Along those lines I want to pay homage to the director of Black Angel, birthday boy Roy William Neill (September 4, 1887 - December 14, 1946). Mr. Neill helmed over 100 movies, half of them during the silent era. Prolific and talented (he did most of Universal Pictures, Sherlock Holmes features), Black Angel would be his swan song, he died of a heart attack shortly after completing the flick. Reams and reams of paper have been devoted to John Ford, Howard Hawks, and Frank Capra. It's high time Roy William Neill was given the attention he deserves.

With a subdued Broderick Crawford, Wallace Ford, and a personal favorite of mine, Marion Martin, Black Angel is available on YouTube.