MisterWhiplash This isn't the best film noir but in a way it's quintessential in this way: I saw this years ago, and I have such a hazy memory that it's almost like I didn't see it... I think (?) It's the kind of movie I used to throw on really late at night like at 2 AM and I might watch all of it or some of it and then the rest the next day, and it has the kind of film noir plot and execution that it blends into many other film noirs. I don't mean to say that as a put down or to its detriment, but this fits so well into how this mood and feel work involving murder and a woman-who-wasn't-there (or seemingly never was) and a mystery to find the missing woman and all of the twists and turns therein.It might be because it doesn't have the top shelf cast of some of the other movies of the period - there's no Barbara Stanwyck or Robert Mitchum or Edward G Robinson or Burt Lancaster or Glenn Ford or the list goes on - and yet I don't remember anyone here being so bad or off-putting that I had to turn it off or felt like I didn't get my VHS rental's worth. Siodmak's a quality director, and this is clearly the forerunner to what he would perfect with The Killers and Criss Cross. I'm sure I should see it again so I can solidify my opinion of it, but in a way I think it's fitting that it's half-forgotten - it's almost like the way that the characters find themselves in this story, a mystery to track down something buried away and not wanting to be found.Or something.

poe-48833 PHANTOM LADY (not to be confused with the Golden Age comic book with art by Matt Baker) comes from the mind of "William Irish" (Cornell Woolrich, who also gave us the stories that became the Noir movie classics THE WINDOW and REAR WINDOW). If anyone knew anything about the Twists and Turns of the Psyche, it was Woolrich (see the biographical information in many of the best collections of his short stories at your local Public Library); that PHANTOM LADY winds its way through a Mystery with so many Dead Ends and What-the-F---s isn't surprising. (On the other hand, like Raymond Chandler himself, Woolrich could sometimes forget or overlook a plot point or two- and so do the Screenwriter and Director, here.) If you're one of those who INSISTS that all one's ducks be properly aligned, you're going to have a problem or two here and there- but, if you can enjoy for the sheer Naughtiness of it Elisha Cook, Junior's "drum solo," you're in for a Fun Ride.

writers_reign This was the third of fourteen novels/short stories by Cornell Woolrich to be adapted for the screen in the nineteen forties. There had been one in 1929, one in 1934 and one in 1938 but the floodgates opened in the forties and though adaptations continued through subsequent decades it was the forties that were the most fruitful. The original novel, published in 1942, had another claim to fame inasmuch as it was the first time the pseudonym William Irish appeared in print - the publishers felt that the prolific Woolrich had published so many novels so quickly under that name - the name on his birth certificate read: Cornell George Hopley-Woolrich - that there was a danger of the public becoming sated, accordingly they suggested a new name might be in order and William Irish was the result. Woolrich/Irish quickly developed his own 'voice' and genre, psychological thriller-cum-terror and just a handful of forties titles adapted for the screen - The Leopard Man, Deadline At Dawn, Black Angel,Fear In The Night, I Wouldn't Be In Your Shoes, Night Has A Thousand Eyes - illustrate this although arguably the finest adaptation, The Window, had a somewhat innocuous title. Phantom Lady is slightly different to the novel though the premise remains the same; following a quarrel with his wife the protagonist meets a woman in a bar and invites her to spend the evening with him (he already has two tickets to a popular show, one meant for his wife) and she agrees with the proviso that they do not exchange names,, phone numbers, or indeed any scrap of personal information. Returning home he finds his wife has been strangled with one of his own neckties and he, with no real alibi, is the only suspect. Tried and convicted his only chance to escape the chair is for someone to locate the phantom lady, whose only distinguishing feature is a singular hat, so that we are now in a race- against-the-clock scenario which, given the date, 1944, will, we know, inevitably resolve itself happily. Director Robert Siodmak created a fine, atmospheric mood, drawing liberally on the expressionistic roots of his native Germany, whilst the cast comprised some of the names familiar to buffs of forties movies, Andrew Tombes, Thomas Gomez, Elisha Cooke, Ella Raines, Alan Curtis and top-billed Franchot Tone, cast against type. Certainly watchable and a reasonable addition to the 'noir' gallery.

rafael105 The wired jazz scene with Elisha Cook banging away at the mad drums is worth the whole movie. Plus, there's Ella Raines, looking lovelier than ever. This movie must have really disturbed 1944 audiences. There's a psycho murdering sculptor with strong hands and a fatal weakness. There's fat nasty policemen who breathe down everyone's necks. There's Aurora Miranda trying to steal sister Carmen's act. There's lots of sweating in the August swelter of New York. There's plenty of bad acting and bad dialogue. But, there are also some really unusual shots of street scenes during the long sequence in which Ella pursues the bartender to his death. Strong stuff, indeed. And, did I mention there's Ella Raines looking lovelier than ever? I think I'm in love.