The Crooked Way

The plot for "The Crooked Way" is far-fetched but that isn't a problem if the film is well made. It begins with a soldier (John Payne) talking with his doctor. It seems he was gravely injured during the war and took some shrapnel to his skull. He will live and the doctors have done all they can--but Eddie (John Payne) has no memory before the injury. And so, he sets out for what he thinks might be his old home in order to learn who he was. The trouble is, he might not like who he was AND there are some folks there who might just beat his brains in or worse!

This film represented a big departure for John Payne, as up until this film, he was mostly known as a pretty guy--nice and safe. Here, however, he's a man out to destroy...or be destroyed. Because of this movie, he'd soon go on to make other excellent noir films such as "99 River Street" and "Kansas City Confidential".

As far as the quality of the plot goes, it's generally very good--though you do wonder why the now nice guy Payne's character has become is so pig-headed and intent on nearly getting himself killed. But, with a great (and very tough) plot and characters, and especially a very strong ending, it's well worth your time.

By the way, look for Rhys Williams as the police lieutenant. There's no trace at all of his native Welsh accent here! Nice job, Rhys!

The Crooked Way an independent production released by United Artists finds John Payne in the role of an amnesiac who makes his way to Los Angeles with a different name and no memories of what he did before the war injuries. He got a silver star for service, but that tells him nothing of his past before World War II.

It turns out that he was a gangster who doublecrossed a confederate played by Sonny Tufts who took a prison rap for a couple of years in which time Payne left Los Angeles. Payne also finds the woman he was married to, Ellen Drew who pretty much repudiates him and who he was and now is. Of course that changes over the course of the film.

This film was Payne's introduction to the noir genre and it's all right, though not as good as later films like Kansas City Confidential and The Boss. Payne's career paralleled that of Dick Powell who had given up musicals for noir and action films a bit earlier.

The real revelation in The Crooked Way was Sonny Tufts who at Paramount in the Forties played leads that exuded a kind of goofy charm to them. He was outstanding in his part as the villain of The Crooked Way. He might have overacted a bit, but the part did call for it. He should have reinvented himself with this film, but his career would be petering out gradually during the Fifties.

The story has things wrapping up just a tad too neatly for Payne in the end, still Payne definitely showed he had a career in noir with The Crooked Way.

The story, about a returning war veteran with amnesia discovering his criminal past, is remarkably similar to SOMEWHERE IN THE NIGHT from a few years earlier. Plotwise, it's not nearly as compelling as its predecessor. The amnesia angle really isn't exploited well and what's left is a rather uninteresting gangster story with bland characters. Decent performances from Payne, Tufts and Drew, but only Percy Helton really stands out. However, this has to be one the best-looking noirs out there, thanks once again to the talents of John Alton. Incredible shocks of bright light amidst deep shadows, unusual framing, dramatic angles, gritty locations... the entire picture is simply gorgeous, textbook noir. It's a shame that such impressive visuals aren't attached to a more engaging plot, but it's still a delight to behold.

In the series of tough crime melodramas he made during the late 1940's and early 1950's John Payne invariably seems to be looking for something. In Kansas City Confidential (1952) it was the stolen loot from a robbery. In 99 River Street (1953) it was the thug who framed him for murder. In The Crooked Way (1949) it was something much more basic -- his very identity.

Payne plays Eddie Rice, a WW II veteran recovered from the physical effects of a head wound but suffering a complete and permanent amnesia. He has no memory of his life before regaining consciousness in a hospital. All he knows about himself is what the Army has told him, that he enlisted in Los Angeles. When discharged from the hospital, he takes a train to L. A. to try and find out who he is. What he finds is more than he really wanted to know! That he was a hoodlum named Eddie Riccardi. That he has a wife (Ellen Drew), but she now hates his guts. That his former gangster partner, played with evil oozing from every pore by Sonny Tufts, is bent on beating him up, framing him for murder, and even more nasty things.

How Eddie muddles though this dark nightmare of a past coming back to haunt him and how it is presented by director Robery Florey and cinematographer John Alton adds up to a classic forgotten gem of a noir thriller. The Crooked Way exhibits the classic elements of film noir -- a morally ambiguous protagonist, a femme fa-tale, a grim, brutal story, and the most starkly shadowed and obliquely angled cinematography found in any movie. Most of the scenes are at night, and Alton's camera throws a tenebrist gloom over every shot with only the speaker's face lighted. Sometimes all figures are silhouettes, then the face gradually comes to light. A tall man looks down at a short man, and the view is as from a second story window. All this dark, oblique cinematography is not only arty and thrilling on its on to noir groupies, but it works perfectly to portray the dream-like state Eddie is experiencing. The story moves along briskly under Florey's direction and Frank Sullivan's editing. The action is explosively sharp and brutal.

John Payne was perfectly cast in the part of Eddie, maintaining a blank, confused expression you would expect from an amnesiac, even when getting tough. Getting tough was an item that John Payne, an ex-boxer and a WWII veteran in real life, was good at in spite of his mild, laid back manner. He was at this point starting to mature as a tough guy actor after abandoning his original song and dance career at least in part because he got too weathered and muscled up. Payne seems to be an acquired taste amongst present day lovers of classic movies, but I've acquired it and am now looking for all of his pictures.

The Crooked Way, while a cut below Kansas City Confidential and 99 River Street, is one of John Payne's best.

Amnesia is not the most original plot gimmick in film. From "Random Harvest" and "Spellbound," from "36 Hours" to "Mirage," from "Memento" to "The Bourne Identity," characters have wrestled with memory loss and struggled to find out who they really were. World War II veteran Eddie Rice has a piece of shrapnel lodged in his brain that has caused his loss of memory, and, once released from the hospital, Eddie heads to Los Angeles, where he hopes to find people who knew him in the past. Handsome John Payne is Eddie, the man in search of his identity in "The Crooked Way," a brilliantly photographed, but otherwise routine film noir. Adapted from a radio play, the derivative plot utilizes voice over to convey Eddie's thoughts and depends on improbable coincidences to bring characters together. Needless to say, Eddie quickly runs into his past, and what he finds plunges him into a murky underworld of gangsters, gunfights, and murder.

With his dark brooding looks, Payne is credible in the undemanding role, and he has solid support from Ellen Drew, the forgotten wife with a new life; Sonny Tufts, a tough gangster boss with a long memory; and Rhys Williams, a policeman who digs into Eddie's criminal past. However, the lazy plot and solid cast are enhanced by John Alton's masterful black-and-white cinematography, which evokes Martin Lewis etchings in its use of light and shadow. Deep black hallways and streets lead to glaring white lights, the slats of Venetian blinds throw bars of shadow across faces, heads are silhouetted while speaking, the lettering on a plate glass window casts words across an office wall, characters are lit from below, white-hot hanging lamps illuminate gaming tables. Alton's outstanding work demands to be studied for its composition, lighting, and focus. Although Alton won an Oscar for his color work on "An American in Paris," his images on any number of film noir and especially this one should have garnered him numerous nominations and wins. Alton's cinematography defines the best in film noir.

While the "Crooked Way" is often cliched and predictable, a solid cast and especially John Alton's images lift the film to essential viewing. John Payne fans should also be pleased, as well as aficionados of amnesia movies. Evidently, loss of memory is more prevalent among characters in Hollywood movies than among the general populace.