We’re coming close to the end of our 36-film list of films noir for our upcoming Noirvember draft. (Here’s the entire list.) And, as often happens when you reach the end, we’re finding ourselves at the bottom of the glass, swimming through the dregs. 

Women’s Prison

There’s something special about a women’s prison picture, where a virtual innocent is incarcerated in hellhole of internal rot and administrative corruption. It’s nice to be able to talk about an exceptional example of this sub-genre of noir – that is, if you’re talking about 1950’s Caged, the ne plus ultra of women’s prison films. 

Unfortunately, today we’re dealing with Women’s Prison, and it’s altogether an inferior example. The titular jailhouse is adjacent to a men’s prison, and the opening narration sets up the central theme – that women can get through anything if they have a loving man in their corner. That necessity does not apply to Warden Amelia Van Zandt (Ida Lupino), who is so sexually unfulfilled that it has turned her into a sadistic psychopath. 

Van Zandt has two special targets: terrified innocent Helene Jensen (Phyllis Thaxter), who has received a harsh sentence for vehicular manslaughter because the victim was a child, and Joan Burton (Audrey Totter), whose husband Glen (Warren Stevens), an inmate in the men’s prison, has been sneaking over for unscheduled conjugal visits that have resulted in Joan getting pregnant. Hell hath no fury like a repressed warden confronting women with loving husbands, and Van Zandt tears into both Helene and Joan, with tragic results. Of course, the inevitable prison riot erupts, and all the prisoners – who are depicted as loving, flawed saints with hearts of gold, get their revenge against the horrific heads of both prisons. 

Director Lewis Seiler and cinematographer Lester White were both near the end of long careers, and their work here is uninspired. Women’s Prison is entertaining, thanks to a gung ho cast, but it’s not very good. 

*     *     *     *     *

Hell on Frisco Bay

Policeman Steve Rollins (Alan Ladd) is trying to clean up the San Francisco docks and winds up getting framed by the mob for manslaughter. After spending five years in San Quentin, Steve is released and finds himself alone. His replacement on the force works for the mob, his wife has been unfaithful, and the mob has a firmer grip on the docks than ever. Steve is determined to clear his name and bring down mob leader Victor Amato (Edward G. Robinson.) 

This was optioned from a novel by Ladd’s own company, Jaguar Productions. Ladd wanted James Cagney to play Amato and ended up with Robinson. It’s the fourth film on our list that Robinson is in – not a bad haul for a star who had been “grey-listed” by HUAC – and it’s a pleasure seeing him play the bad guy. He’s easily the best thing in this cliché-ridden film. Robinson hated playing second bill to Ladd and called the whole experience “Hell in Beverly Hills.” 

This is the first color film on our list. It has a slick look and a score by Max Steiner that runs through nearly the entire film in an annoying fashion. The greatest joy for me was that much of the film was made on location in San Francisco, and the scenery is a delight. William Demarest plays the requisite kindly cop and Paul Stewart the hood with a conscience. Fay Wray, who played a crazy lady in Queen Bee, shows up here as a washed-up actress. Jayne Mansfield has a cameo in a nightclub. Joanne Dru plays Steve’s wife sympathetically (she only cheated on him once!) Ladd looks a little long in the tooth here, despite being only 41. But Robinson, at 62, looks fantastic and cuts through all the hokum that caused critic Bosley Crowther to dismiss this one as “hackneyed.” (Believe me – I hate it when Crowther is right!)

There’s one more problem: this film was released in 1956! It is therefore disqualified from our draft, but as it has a lot to recommend it, I will at least rank it below against the other two films. 

*     *     *     *     *

Hell’s Island (a.k.a. South Sea Fury – among other things!)

We’ve watched four films on this list that were directed by Phil Karlson, and one of them – The Phenix City Story – was good. But even when the material wasn’t up to par, Karlson was a propulsive director who kept his films moving with action and interesting camera work.

Until now. 

Hell’s Island is a stinker, and to rub it in our noses, it quickly became obvious that Karlson was leeching from The Maltese Falcon in plot and characterization. Whatever classic inspired the guy, what he ended up with instead was a mess.

John Payne plays Mike Cormack, a gentlemanly bouncer in a Las Vegas casino whose life has gone to hell because the girl he loved, Janet Martin (Mary Murphy) dumped him for another man. When he is approached by . . . is that Sydney Greenstreet? Why no! It’s Francis L. Sullivan doing his second best Greenstreet impression as a wheelchair-bound villain named Barzland. Sullivan is actually important to this blog because he famously originated the role of Hercule Poirot onstage in the plays Black Coffee, Peril at End House, and Wasp’s Nest. He also starred as Canon Pennefather in the original stage production of Murder on the Nile. None of this can excuse wasting 95 minutes of my life on this film, and if you want to see Sullivan onscreen, he specialized in playing Dickensian roles in some fantastic films. Gowatch him play Jaggers in Great Expectations, Mr. Bumble in Oliver Twist or the Reverend Crisparkle in The Mystery of Edwin Drood. 

This is our second film in a row in color and Vista-Vision. Everything about it feels fake and dull, from the meandering plot involving a stolen ruby (if you can’t spot which item will accidentally fall on the ground at the climax, smash, and reveal the hidden gem, you need to turn in your Noir Watcher’s badge) to the ever-present and totally confusing score by Miklós Rózsa, to the most hilariously inept fight sequences where nobody seems to really touch each other, to the multifaceted part in Mr. Payne’s hair. Our leading man is wooden throughout (he’s lucky he turned in a good performance in Miracle on 34^th Street, or I would dismiss him completely), but in fairness he doesn’t have a chance as  his character displays a dimwitted adoration of the most obvious femme fatale ever to spin a web around her prey. The story is mostly made up of flashbacks as Payne lies on an operating table smoking a cigarette  while a surgeon  is removing a bullet from his shoulder and telling the policeman at his side how he got shot. Except we don’t need to know because the shooting was already shown to us under the opening credits! 

The print of the film that I watched was a little jumpy and had a title card that, for no discernible reason, read Dem Teufel auf der Spur, which translates to “On the Trail of the Devil.” This was never a working or practical title for the film, which was also called, by various persons or countries or whatevers, Chubasco, Love Is a Weapon or The Ruby Virgin. 

So many titles, so little to enjoy! 

I am grateful to Wikipedia for including this quote from the New York Times review, which serves beautifully to underscore my opinion:                     

“All to the credit of Hell’s Island — and we mean all—is an unstartling usage of VistaVision, which merely widens some pretty, crystal-clear and synthetic tropical backgrounds. But what a picture! Produced, for no discernible reason, by Paramount’s Pine-Thomas unit, with John Payne and Mary Murphy featured, it arrived yesterday with the Palace’s new vaudeville program … It’s all slow-moving and obvious and exasperating to find Mr. Payne led around so willingly by the nose … Mr. Payne and Miss Murphy remain examples of perfect casting and miscasting.”

*     *     *     *     *

The rankings?
Another trio of films not worth writing home about. How to rank them . . . ???

• 1^st place – Hell on Frisco Bay – ineligible for our draft, I still give it points due to its San Francisco location filming and a solid performance by Edward G. Robinson
• 2^nd place – Women’s Prison – a film that is very lucky to be ranked against the #3 pick!
• 3^rd place – Hell’s Island – a film noir which has the unmitigated gall to be boring through and through

We’re getting closer and closer to the draft. But first, there are three final films to watch. Is it too much to ask that even one of them be any good?