Deadline at Dawn

A young sailor on leave wakes up at midnight in a newsstand with bundles of money in his pockets and no recollection of his time spent with the wrong woman. Of course she turns out to be dead and he has until a bus leaves at 6am to discover the culprit or he gets the rap.

I like films with concentrated wandering, this one has it, the entire film like a slow ride across New York after hours in the backseat of a cab with windows rolled down, it's the middle of August, the macadam breathing out the day's heat again, or like lounging by the open window of your apartment with lights turned off, glimpses of strange figures stalking the empty and sweltering streets below and imagining mischief from them.

It has mood above all, latenight paranoia being sweated out from pores in the skin. Everything looks a bit unhinged in that magic-desolate way that is summer in the big city.

But this is deeply noirish in a key way, the way of the dumb guy's dream that crystallizes the essence of noir. Our man was out at night dreaming but has no recollection what about, except it involved offers of sex and illicit money. We presume he's innocent because of his naive blond looks and because he's the one telling the story, and is bewildered as he does, because more likely suspects are paraded, stories are piled, testimonies, conjecture, a drunk man uncovers hidden truth, a cab driver reflects about love, but the puzzle persists, the puzzle that is the night of life; we cannot really know, there is a blank spot at the center. Emptiness behind the stories that we make up to narrate our private worlds.

You will need no more eloquent parallel about what this is all about than a blind pianist among the suspects and being - mistakenly - sussed from his melodramatic reaction.

So we have sinister happenings back in the waking world, itself rendered as something you wake up from. Then our film as a dream attempting inner balance, so of course thick in coincidence, in strange but kind souls assisting, capped off with a miraculous revelation in the end that absolves guilt.

This is truly wonderful stuff that has burned itself into my visual imagination. It's clean and dark both, the shadows all in having traveled, having dreamed the night away.

Little know post-WWII Film-Nior gem set in New York City on a hot sweltering summer night with one of the most unusual murder mysteries you'll ever see. The movie starts out with Sleepy Parsons, Marvin Miller, pleading with his estranged wife Edna, Lola Lane, for the $1,400.00 that she owes him. Edna after insulting the poor blind and very sick man Sleepy finds out that the money, Sleepy's $1,400.00, that she had in her purse is gone! what happened to it?

Earlier that evening Edna met this young sailor Alex, Bill Williams,on leave at a restaurant that her gangster brother Val Bartelli, Joseph Calleia, owned. After getting him drunk Val cheated him, playing cards, out of his pay. The story got even weirder when Edna telling Alex that she'll pay him to goes up to her place to fix her radio, Alex is a radio repairman in the navy, and got the poor slob even more drunk where he lost consciousness. waking up at a news stand after being given a cup of strong coffee by the newspaper man to clear his mind Alex staggered up on his feet a wad of $1,400.00 falls out of his pocket, where did it come from?

Going to a dance-hall later that night Alex gets very friendly with a local dance girl June, Susan Hayward. After June finished dancing with the costumers Alex goes with June to her place to have a bite to eat. At June's place Alex gets this bright idea to go back to where Edna lives and return the $1,400.00 ,which he feels is hers, with June coming along for the ride. When both get there they find, to their surprise and shock, that Edna was murdered, who did it? was it Alex? was it Sleepy? was it about a half dozen other suspects who had some connection with Edna? All I can say about the movie is that it will floor you with an ending that you won't see coming and even when it does! It will take you a while to realize what you missed in the clues that were so skillfully dropped leading to it all throughout the film.

"Deadline at Dawn" is one of those films that just sticks with you right from the start. Even though there's a number of flaws in it you easily overlook them when you realize that it's going in a direction that will more then make up for them, with it's almost unbelievable ending. Paul Lukas as NYC Cabbie, Gus Hoffman,is at first just an innocent bystander who picks up the couple, Alex & June.

As the movie goes on he becomes more and more central to the story by being more of a detective then a taxi driver as well as having the knowledge of a Ivy League Collage professor! whats this guy doing driving a cab? As the trio slowly work together time is running out to find out not only who murdered Edna but to also clear Alex of the crime, in which he's the prime suspect, and at the same time make it possible for Alex to catch the 6;00AM bus to Norfolk Virginia to report to his ship.

Powerful and surprising ending that has elements to it that you just rarely see in movies today and never in movies back then, in the 1940's. It really has you thinking about what is really good and bad in the world. Like I said before the ending just floored me not that it was so surprising, it was, but that it shows just how human and imperfect people are in the movie as well as they are in real life.

The real star of this underappreciated noir is Clifford Odets' dialogue, which you either love or you hate. I love it. Really terrific performances, and even the bit players are memorable. Look for Group Theater vet Roman Bohnen in a tiny role as the building janitor with a dead cat-- "she could practically speak." Or Jerome Cowan, a B-movie actor in a zillion Forties flicks, wonderfully slimy as a Broadway producer. Filmed on a backlot, but it seethes New York more than most location movies.

Deadline at Dawn (1946)

If you can overcome, or overlook, the slightly stilted plot and the improbability of the events (in an O'Henry kind of way, if you know his clever short stories, though the actual writer is Clifford Odets, whose politics are not very visible), you'll be able to catch the really fine acting and directing here. And the nicely felt night crime drama that is really just a beautiful sappy love story (the best kind). The cast is small, the plot twists unreasonable but still enchanting, and the effect, in the end, is tightly wound.

While you might think the murder is the central premise (and it's key, for sure), or the sailor's blackout is the main event (and it isn't, really), you will eventually see it's the sailor himself, his utter innocence, that is both the core of the film and the driving force. This is the Odets part of the writing, character driven, and the sailor, through some effect of drinking we assume, has had a brief blackout, and he comes to his senses on the streets of New York with a lot of cash in his pocket. He's troubled, but we sympathize. Then a woman he was with is found dead. Still, this sailor is such the definition of innocence, there's no doubt--almost no doubt--that someone else did it. But who? And how can he defend himself?

Enter Susan Hayward, playing at first a kind of professional dance companion (the innocent side of prostitution, and a good match for our man). After work, she wants to help him because he's so clearly a good person, and then a cabbie strangely gets involved, too, sucked into the idea that justice will go wrong if the real killer can't be found. The dead woman had a couple of unsavory friends, and these two get into the plot in stages, and what we end up with is half a dozen clearly defined people all fighting for some small piece of personal clarity and internal well being.

It helps that all the actors are first rate small time contributors (Hayward is the one star, and is terrific). It also helps that the whole scenario is limited in time and space, so we get to feel like we are there, in New York, in this small neighborhood at night. It's great stuff on that level alone. The director? It's his one and only film. But the cinematographer was an old pro at the peak of his career, Nicholas Musuraca, who did a whole slew of noirs and dramas, some worth seeing just for the photography ("Spiral Staircase" comes to mind, but see the IMDb list). So whatever the small time credentials of much of the cast, there is some seriousness here that won't let go.

If the plot is a little preposterous, it's only because it's trying to package things too neatly. The writing is first rate, beyond plot structure, with some classic quotable lines that are either film noir staples or philosophical nuggets (the latter from the cabby, in particular). A film that would reward a second viewing just for the details of dialog and camera-work.

This is a strange little movie, which I'm sure is primarily due to Clifford Odets bizarre screenplay, but I freely admit that I really enjoyed it! The plot is somewhat convoluted (although not as hard to follow as some make out) and the ending is a little 'feel good' for a noir but Odets' dialog is what will bring you into it - or push you out. I still can't figure if the way his characters speak is closer to real life than 'regular' movie dialog, or nothing at all like anyone speaks; it somehow manages to be a little of both. One thing for sure is this is not how people normally speak in movies. Strong performances by Susan Hayward and Paul Lukas contribute to the fun; and that's what I found it to be. You've got likable characters, clever dialog, a mystery to solve before dawn, and Susan Hayward looking as good as I can remember. What else do you need?