Fear in the Night

As I prepare to launch another film noir marathon, I thought I'd get back into groove with something small, offbeat and quickly sketched, but authored by a guy who was one of the preeminent creators of noir: Cornell Woolrich.

His Deadline by Dawn would make my list of 10 favorites in the genre, it captures the chimeric noir world on the deepest level.

Noir is all about the hallucination, the anxious narration causally tied to the world of the film. This structure is probably more explicit here than in any other noir film, including Lang's: the film starts with the narrator having a nightmare where he kills a woman in a mysterious octagonal room with mirrors, but when he wakes up in his room he finds traces of the murder.

Over the course of the film, bit by bit memory seeps back into his narration. A storm leads him back to the fateful house. A cop brother- in-law and his girlfriend act as conscience, escorting him on the journey of atonement. It's all about guilt, memory and mishaps of fate. But the execution is slapdash, the actor doesn't have any tragicool charisma. It's off.

But how about this as explication of noir dynamics? What we see and the protagonist experiences in the opening scene as the noir nightmare was very much real, but at the same time illusory for him in the moment of experience—double perspective. And how about this as the deeper cosmic joke of the prankster gods of noir? There would be no problem for our guy if only he didn't wake up that morning with the memory. So it wasn't the killing, but memory that causes stuff—being conscious of the nightmare, it acquires reality. Superb Woolrich.

So this is a miss, but right off the bat we have some expert delineation of the noir universe.

Noir Meter: 3/4

This is a sadly forgotten, but fantastic film noir gem released in 1947, and based on a story by the renowned author Cornell Woolrich . The opening is an amazing and surrealistic dream sequence up along with, say, Polanski's dream sequence in Rosemary's Baby. Straightforward plot, good though perhaps not great actors, and decent directing. It was a low budget production which is apparent, albeit not a nuisance.

A remake was made by the same director nine years later. The original had a tenser atmosphere which corresponded well to the surrealistic formula. On the other hand, the remake had Edward G. Robinson starring in a supporting role.

An unnecessary detail in the remake was a musical ingredient that was extended to the protagonist being a musician. The upbeat jazz music, absent in the original, actually interfered with the tense atmosphere. However, this was the style in the mid-fifties cf Hitchcock's remake of The Man Who Knew Too Much (also released in 1956) that featured one of this year's greatest hits, Que sera sera.

Contrary to Hitchcock's successful remaking, Fear in the Night surely didn't need one, and the remake - Nightmare - isn't more of a classic today than its original version.

DeForrest Kelley has "Fear in the Night" in this 1947 low-budget B film, also starring Paul Kelly and Ann Doran.

Kelley plays Vince Grayson, who has a vivid dream that he has committed murder. In fact, he wakes up and finds a key and a button, which were part of the dream, and also blood on his wrist. He tells his cop brother-in-law Cliff about the dream, but Cliff brushes it off as just that, a dream.

Later on, Vince goes on a picnic with his sister Lil (Ann Doran) and husband Cliff. When the rain starts coming down in buckets, they jump in the car and Vince directs them to a house, which turns out to be the murder house, down to the octagonal mirrored room that Vince described to Cliff. Cliff now believes that Vince committed murder and lied when he described the dream.

Very good story that makes use of hypnosis as part of the plot. It is very well done, but you can't help thinking of what someone like Hitchcock would have done with the story.

Instead, we have grainy film and footage of downtown Los Angeles, including, I think, the Commodore Hotel. The shots of old LA are wonderful - sometimes when films are done cheaply there is city shooting and use of the city in process shots, which always adds authenticity to the movie.

When I showed my sister one of the screen shots and announced it was DeForrest Kelley, I thought her eyes would bug out of her head. Yes, he was once that young. He does a very good job, too.

Well worth seeing, and if you're a fan of "Star Trek," it's a must!

Okay, I admit it, a lot of the charm of this really low budget effort comes from Deforest "Bones" Kelley. Kelley's homely mugg was made for b-picture third bananas / villains and this rare, unlikely turn as the goodguy lead (his first credit) is as much the source of FEAR IN THE NIGHT's enjoyment as anything. Kelley gives a nice try in a role he wasn't really built to play, overcoming several overly melodramatic moments with generally naturalistic and believable reactions to the rather ridiculous and murky situation he finds himself in. Direction and other performances are unremarkable, though a little bit of stylistic cinematography in the flashbacks isn't bad.

NIGHTMARE was the slicker remake which came about nine years later with Edward G. Robinson, Kevin McCarthy, and slightly more money, but I would suggest that this earlier version has more suspense and rooting interest (Kelley is far more sympathetic than McCarthy.) More importantly, the flimsy plot holds together better in FEAR IN THE NIGHT, omitting the poorly motivated Edward G. Robinson character entirely. This is far from a great movie; it's not even really a good noir, but Kelley's rare lead performance is fascinating and he makes us care about what happens. Anyone who is into Star Trek classic will probably be as quickly hypnotized by his young non-baggy-eyed presence as Deforest is by the badguys.

How some of these reviews got through vetting. Totally spoiling the entire plot & movie. Even their review headings spoil it. Let alone the blatant spoiling reviews not even marked as spoilers in the reduced red 'Warning: Spoilers' one line version. (Some were though). Revealing the ENTIRE plot. Entertaining enough if stumbled across without reading any of these IMDB reviews first. Looks like old movies don't matter so much to IMDB.

Wonder if the producers did the 'Eric Bana' thing, who shall we get for the role of Bruce Banner, I know lets have Eric Bana. In this case who shall we get for the lead Police detective role, lets have Paul Kelly, how about the younger other guy, let's have the newcomer De Forest Kelley, hardly a coincidence!. Paul Kelly had been around for 30 odd years beforehand, could have been the other way around but I doubt it. Bones had only just about started out in movies, very little had changed in 20 years then, he had umpteen roles in between this and Star Trek. Could have played McCoy straight after this one, he was able to put a lot of vulnerability into his roles as well as playing the heel. A decent enough actor overall, playing his roles with conviction.

Worth a watch if you can find it, but don't expect much. The YT version looks better quality than the Roku sourced one. Didn't quite get the plot in it's full absolute entirety towards the end, but most of it to mildly enjoy it. BTW, The new Commodore Hotel as seen in this movie, built in 1922 is still standing in Los Angeles, now known as the Commodore Regency Apartments.