Ice skater Laura Mead (Belita) finishes serving four years in prison for her part in a robbery. Prolific screenwriter Steve Fisher ( Lady in the Lake, Roadblock, City That Never Sleeps) fashioned a story about an unlikely romance between a cop and a convicted thief. Gone is the impressive art direction and sets of the first two pictures although there is one ice-skating number, it's scaled down from the extravaganzas seen before. In production value and general appeal, Jack Bernhard's The Hunted is a half-step down for Belita. The next year's The Gangster again pairs her with Barry Sullivan, in a moody, almost Eugene O'Neill- like look at the lower depths of life on a mob-controlled fun fair pier. 1946's Suspense is a kinky, stylish noir with Barry Sullivan and some nicely integrated skating numbers (the ballet-trained Belita is quite a sight on skates). This led to a trio of fine Monogram/Allied Artists noir thrillers, now all available through the Warner Archive. Finding that Sonja Heine had cornered the ice rink niche in American pictures, Belita ditched the skating genre and tried her hand at intrigue and mystery. The interesting Belita (born Maria Belita Jepson-Turner) was a former Olympic ice skater. It was released under the new banner Allied Artists. Bernhard then returned to Monogram to direct the latest Belita vehicle, The Hunted. That thriller went exactly opposite the political tide of the later 1940s, with its story of a labor union being taken over by right-wing fascists. Bernhard tried to go partly independent with the Monogram- distributed Violence. When Jack returned to America he brought with him war bride / actress Jean Gillie, and from Stanley's original story the three of them made the hardboiled, rather fantastic film noir Decoy for Monogram. Both Jack and fellow Universal laborer / future major producer Stanley Rubin went to war, Stanley to the Aleutians and Jack to fly bombing missions over Europe. Producer and director Jack Bernhard rose from the ranks at Universal, assistant directing second-rank horror fare like Man Made Monster, and helping to produce the sometimes indecipherable The Strange Case of Doctor Rx. Blake, Cathy Carter, Charles McGraw, Tristram Coffin.
Starring Preston Foster, Belita, Pierre Watkin, Edna Holland, Russell Hicks, Frank Ferguson, Joseph Crehan, Larry J.
The hunted 2014 archive#
Street Date J/ available through the Warner Archive Collection / 17.19
0 kommentar(er)
