For You I Die

Actually, For You I Die is kind of a sweet movie, though very low budget, directed by John Reinhardt. The biggest name in the cast is Mischa Auer, though Cathy Downs became well known in sci-fi circles and Paul Langton became known on the TV show Peyton Place.

Langton plays Johnny, a prison trustee with one year left on his sentence when he is forced to take part in a prison escape. The convicts separate - Matt (Don C. Harvey), the ringleader, sends Johnny to a road house where his girlfriend Hope (Downs) works with a message for her.

Upon arriving, Johnny mistakes the floosie-ish Georgie (Jane Weeks) and identifies himself. But then he realizes that the girlfriend is Hope, which surprises him as she doesn't seem the type to have the coarse Matt as a boyfriend.

Hope has found a home at Maggie's, as have some others. Maggie (Marian Kirby) is maternal and caring. Soon Hope and Johnny fall in love. The police, also Maggie's patrons, haven't recognized him, but Johnny knows he is on borrowed time, and Matt will be showing up any day.

Wish it had been better directed with more money behind it. It had some good elements and nice acting. Mischa Auer provides the comedy.

This is one of those great B-features with only B-actors that achieve a better result than most A-features. The acting is perfectly natural and convincing, the story Is as fascinating and sustained as any noir, and this is yet another testimony of the fact, that the art of the film reached in the noir genre a higher level of sustained drama and quality than almost any other cinema genre. To this is added the very special quality of Mischa Auer, a great comedian with dark undertones, who here as usual shows off his musical abilities. The music of the film is surprisingly good, there is even an excellent performance by Cathy Downs with castanets, dancing to Schumann's "Aufschwung" played on a primitive gramophone but nevertheless conducted by Mischa Auer. This is a great minor thriller, and just the beginning promises in its very dramatic tension something of a classic. It is minor, but nevertheless outstanding.

Paul Langton and Don C. Harvey escape from prison. Harvey threatens Langton if he squeals, and sends him to a motel, where Harvey's old girlfriend, Cathy Downs, will cover for him. When Langton first arrives, he mistakes thrill-crazy Jane Weeks for the girl, but as time goes on, the collection of kindly characters and Miss Downs, who has come to despise the woman she used to be, begin to have an effect on him.

It's definitely a film noir, but it reaches back to the poetic realism roots of the movements with its collection of character studies. Alas, those characters are drawn with a few bold strokes, making them caricatures, even as the actors try to inhabit them. It's not simply the obvious cheapness of the production. I attribute the lack of depth to screenwriter Robert Presnell, but more to director John Reinhardt, one of the emigree directors who came to the US during the War and returned to Germany after it. His handling renders the movie an impressionist work, and while cinematographer William Clothier gives him a fine visual interpretation of the noir world, there's no subtlety in the handling of the movie. It turns out that the plot seems to drive the characters' changes more than they drive the plot. It's always interesting, but never surprising.

For an independent film produced on a dental floss wide budget, For You I Die will leave quite the indelible impression. That is mostly due to the moody atmosphere of the film and the sincere playing of the leads Cathy Downs and Paul Langton.

Langton is a prisoner who was forced to participate at gunpoint to accompany Don C. Harvey on a break. Harvey's a vicious killer and Langton is intimidated by him. They split up with Harvey telling Langton to go to an out of the way motel camp run by Marian Kerby and her husband Roman Bohnen.

But when he gets there after a few false starts, Langton finds a strange contentment and a bit of romance with Cathy Downs who is a waitress in their small restaurant. The place is so isolated it kind of brings on a strange kind of peace. But always hanging over their heads is the threat of Harvey's return.

Cheap hardly describes For You I Die. But the performances are great and the atmosphere created so fits what the actors are doing.

This one's a sleeper and a keeper.

Its basically the old story of some prisoners on the run but manages to rise above what you would expect. The leads, little known Paul Langton and beautiful smoky-voiced Cathy Downs, are terrific together and deliver quality performances. All of the acting is generally good and as the film progresses you will get interested in the characters and what happens to them.

Much is said about the darkness of the film's available prints but it takes place mostly at night and to me the dark nature of the story is suitable for old faded dark film stock, but yes it does need a good restoration someday. The copy I bought was viewable and good enough.

Somehow this film, rather than the usual claustrophobic look of many studio-bound cheaply made films of the era, has managed to convert the closeness and night into an intimacy and immediateness that uses the "smallness" to its advantage. Very few small films are able to achieve this.

Taught and well-acted by an ensemble cast, "For You I Die" breaks out of the black and white cheapie mold and is far above being just another obscure second bill throwaway.