The Chase

This is one of the most off-beat noirs you will ever see.It ranges from tension to turmoil in short bursts because it is, ah, different.You may have to run parts of it back to see if you missed something - but chances are you didn't. It's that kind of film.

The heavies are the best part of the cast. Steve Cochran may have done his best work here, and Peter Lorre does what he does best.Michele Morgan is lovely, and Bob Cummings seems as confused as the rest of us. I enjoy plot twists to a point, but the whole picture is a plot twist.

You may have to struggle with the continuity and the sound track, as the film was assembled piecemeal and the restoration is not as good as could be hoped. Against my better judgment I gave this a 7, although on balance it's not that good; it's just so - how should we say - bizarre.

The first time I saw this film, I was mesmerised by the moody cinematography, the perfect casting of all the players and the unexpected twists and turns of the plot. Similar to the Noir classics, DOUBLE INDEMNITY and OUT OF THE PAST, the hero (Robert Cummings) is drawn into a web of intrigue by a beautiful woman (Michele Morgan), but in this case she turns out to be a legitimate "dream walking." The film was even better the second time around, as I could savour the various clues sprinkled throughout. Even by today's standards, Steve Cochran, Peter Lorre and their canine friend have to rank high among the screen's most vicious heavies. Vastly underrated, THE CHASE will set your heart a thumping! (According to the 2001 Maltin MOVIE & VIDEO GUIDE, it is now available on video)

In just the first scene the noir schmuck, an ex-GI back from the war, is wistfully looking at a man frying bacon behind a shopwindow, looks down, where —lo— in a sardonic twist of noir fate, he discovers a wallet full of money. Being a straight-up guy, he shows up at the mobster's place in Miami to return it, where he's promptly hired as a driver, falls for the unhappy wife, and elopes with her to Havana, the place of desire.

It's a dreamy setup worthy of the most profound noir, but the movie outright fails — the acting is stiff, the romance is forced, the pace is lethargic, the camera is uninteresting. We simply have second- grade talent doing poverty row work for a quick pay.

But even botched Woolrich is something, and this one's just so bizarre.

The narrator, our GI schmuck, suffers such intense anxiety (possibly related to the war, as often in noir). Midway through the narration breaks down and re-arranges the world. This is preceded by his very own death following a very murky chase through Havana, another deeply noirish twist. Anyway, it turns out that he was never in Havana, though he has the two tickets in his pocket.

We have obvious hallucination but the weirdest thing is as follows: 'when' the hallucination starts is undefinable and the ensuing 'real' story picks up from some point in it and culminates in another previously hallucinated moment in Havana. It's strange, because nothing is really done with it. But as clear explication of noir—as with Woolrich's Fear in the Night, almost too clear for my taste—this is straight to the point.

Noir Meter: 3/4

This is an exciting film noir with good performances & a tough script by Woolrich (anytime you see his name associated with a movie, it's a sign of quality, even for low budget series like Robert Dix's "The Whistler"). Robert Cummings gives one of the best performances of his life, because he avoids all those "Love That Bob" clichés he used to do so well (but sometimes, so inappropriately). Steve Cochran is very menacing & very sick as a sadistic mobster who wants to control everyone & everything around him (wait til you see his car, it's really neat!). Peter Lorre is prime Lorre, in a menacing role as Cochran's henchman. Michele Morgan is suitable as Cochran's sultry wife. The plot is not new, we've seen it before (& after), about an unhappily married wife who uses a friend to escape her husband. But the story's done in an interesting way, with some unusual aspects to it. There's plenty of shadows & lots of the movie takes place at night. The Chase moves at fast pace for the first 50 minutes or so, then slows down to catch it's breath, & then speeds up again near the end. I rate it 8/10.

The Chase is directed by Arthur Ripley and adapted to screenplay by Philip Yordan from the novel The Black Path of Fear written by Cornell Woolrich. It stars Robert Cummings, Steve Cochran, Michèle Morgan, Peter Lorre and Jack Holt. Music is by Michel Michelet and cinematography comes from Frank F. Planer. Plot finds Cummings as World War II veteran Chuck Scott, drifting and skint, he finds a wallet and returns it to the owner. The owner is one Eddie Roman (Cochran), an apparently wealthy and thriving business man who repays Chuck's honesty by giving him a job as a chauffeur. Nothing from here on in will ever be the same....

The Chase is one of those films that fell in to the public domain, got a cult following in spite of the number of bad prints out there, and now arguably deserves a place on the must see list of film noir enthusiasts. Bad prints aside, The Chase deals in oppressive atmosphere and lives in the void caught between a dream and a nightmare. Ripley (Thunder Road 1958) crafts his whole film in a dream state, keeping it mostly nocturnal, he and photographer Franz Planer thrive on Woolrich's premise and use slow pacing and shadow play to smoother the characters. It feels stifling, odd even, but with a couple of tricks up his sleeve, Ripley garners maximum impact by disorientating the viewer for the wonderfully absurd ending. Some may call out cheat, others are likely to enjoy its Wellesian feel, either way it's certainly a film that can't be called dull.

Cummings is fine as the good guy suddenly finding his world shifting sideways in a blur of pills, sleep and perfume, while Morgan registers nicely - even if ultimately she's underused and often her character is just there to make a romantic point. Cochran, in only his second year of acting, is a dominating and frightening force as the handsome and oily Roman. It's a menacing portrayal of a character who slaps his women around and literally will stop at nothing to get his way. But even Cochran is trumped by yet another weasel turn from Lorre, standing on the side of his boss spitting flem as well as sarcastic quips, Lorre alone is enough to seek the film out for a viewing. Good secondary support comes from Jack Holt in an important small role.

It doesn't push any boundaries or hold up as being hugely influential in the film noir cycle. But it's a relevant piece of work in that cycle, and certainly recommended to those interested in dream like oppression. 7/10