Whiplash

Good, tough noir with an excellent cast. Watching the film it becomes obvious that it was planned for Joan Crawford so closely does Alexis Smith's character follow the Crawford 40's blueprint. Dane Clark's tortured painter turned boxer was surely likewise designed with John Garfield in mind as it adheres to his screen persona as well. For whatever reason those A-listers either passed or were unavailable and the film moved over to the B unit and this cast. As good as the leads are they were considered up and comers at the time and definitely represented the second string at Warners.

Back to the film it is sharply shot with effective use of the shadowy black and white photography. Zachary Scott adds another hissable villain to his vast array, Eve Arden pops up from time to time, once in an outfit that looks like she took the cloth off her kitchen table and fashioned it into an ensemble, to add her special brand of spice to the proceedings and many of Warners stock company, Alan Hale, S.Z. Sakall etc. fill out the cast. While the direction is adequate someone who was more of a stylist, for example Michael Curtiz, could have sharpened some slack edges and made the film really cook. Still as is its certainly worth investing the ninety minutes that it runs.