Le ballet du désir

When I first read Fredric Brown's 1948 novel, I was mesmerized. I have read it a few times since and have no intention of stopping-- it's really one of those forgotten classics of the hardboiled genre. Also being a Fellini fan, I have long been curious to see the film, Anita Ekberg's first starring role, (La Dolce Vita was two years later.) I know that Fellini was a pretty big fan of Brown-- at one point he planned to adapt his sci-fi novel What Mad Universe-- so I'm pretty sure he discovered Ekberg in this film.

Though I think the above reviewer was kind of harsh on Oswald and the cast-- especially Harry Townes, who understates the creepy obsessiveness of Doc Greene very well-- the fact is the movie falls short of the book by a considerable margin. I would put most of the blame on screenwriter Robert Blees, who had previously scripted the giant monster movie The Black Scorpion. But for all its faults (unfortunately, the ending is one of the things they botched) the film has its charms. Not only the cinematography but the music performed by Red Norvo captures the mood of the novel very well. And there are scenes that they actually get right. So I guess it's a love/hate thing for me.

Before I go, one last sidelight. Gypsy Rose Lee, who's featured in Mimi, was an exotic dancer in the forties and wrote one novel, The G-String Murders-- also about a killer who stalks strippers-- which was adapted as Lady of Burlesque, with Barbara Stanwyck.

This is a reasonably faithful adaptation of the 1949 novel by Fredric Brown. Reasonably, that is, by 1950s Hollywood standards -- all of the essential story elements are there, although most of the subtleties of the novel are missing. For instance, Sweeney the reporter (Philip Carey) spends most of the novel in a constant hangover, having just come off a drunken binge; and the true relationship between Yolanda (Anita Eckberg) and Greene (Harry Townes), made explicit in the film's opening scenes, isn't revealed until the end of the novel. This is largely because the film presents the story in a straightforward, linear fashion, whereas in the novel, such vital information comes out gradually, via Sweeney's investigations. The film also, understandably, tones down the more lewd elements of the novel: Yolanda's strip-tease becomes merely an exotic dance.

I can't help wondering what Alfred Hitchcock would have done with this story. Hitchcock was certainly familiar with Brown's work -- four of his stories were adapted for the TV series ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS ("The Cream of the Jest", "The Night the World Ended", "The Dangerous People", and "Human Interest Story"). If Hitchcock had directed THE SCREAMING MIMI, it would surely have become a classic on a par with PSYCHO.

As others have commented here, I strongly recommend reading Fredric Brown's original novel. (I re-read it recently, just before seeing the film for the first time.) Brown was a very prolific writer of mystery and science fiction from the 40s through the 60s. (He died in 1972.) He was a master of the short-short story, and of the surprise twist ending. Though most of his works are currently out of print, they can easily be found on eBay or abe.com.

A footnote: The book NIGHTMARE IN DARKNESS, a limited edition of previously uncollected Fredric Brown stories, includes the original, unpublished ending of the novel, in which Sweeney is actually killed by the Ripper.

Somehow surmounting a creaky script rooted in some crackpot psychiatry, Screaming Mimi creates a somnambulistic, doom-laden mood that keeps you watching, bemused. And that's not easily explained.

The director, Gerd Oswald, was one of the lesser expatriates from Germany, a pedestrian workman who the year before helmed Crime of Passion, a jejune noir starring Barbara Stanwyck, Sterling Hayden and Raymond Burr; it's hard to extinguish the sizzle in that kind of cast, but Oswald did a pretty fair job of it.

In Screaming Mimi, he was saddled with the sort of rounded-up cast that doesn't incite box office stampedes. Anita Ekberg, - the Swedish bombshell with the storied bosom - proves oddly affecting in the numbed-out role she's called on to play. And society stripper Gypsy Rose Lee supplies a welcome bit of sass as proprietress of a nightclub called El Madhouse. But the male leads emerged from the La Brea tar pits of Hollywood anonymity. Philip Carey passes as sort of a poor man's Gary Merrill (that is to say, absolutely penniless), while Harry Townes, an even more faceless actor, makes up the roster.

The plot? Ekberg, an exotic `dancer' who writhes about suggestively in an act with bondage overtones, is visiting her sculptor-stepbrother on the California coast when she's almost knifed by an escapee from a nearby asylum, whom the brother promptly shoots dead. In consequence, Ekberg winds up in the selfsame asylum where her smitten shrink (Townes) arranges her release and, in a development reminiscent of The Blue Angel or Sunset Boulevard, leaves his post to manage her career (as `Yolanda Lang').

Then one night she's stabbed (again), but her vicious great dane wards off the attacker. Carey, a columnist whose curiously broad beat includes night clubs and crime in the night, grows intrigued, and stumbles onto the fact that both Ekberg and an earlier victim possessed strange statuettes called Screaming Mimis....

It's a jumble, all right, but it manages to hold some interest. A large part of the credit must, by default, fall to top-notch cinematographer Burnett Guffey, by far the most talented factor in the movie. (He films one scene in the light from a flashing neon sign, alternating between a two-shot and daringly long intervals of pitch blackness.) The movie shares a restive, oneiric quality with certain low-budget noirs from a decade earlier, that again compelled more attention than they deserved. Go figure.

ANITA EKBERG almost sleepwalks through her role of a disturbed woman who somehow finds herself in the midst of murder and mayhem in SCREAMING MIMI ('58), the title referring to a statue that is some sort of fetish that turns up at every killing. Miss Ekberg is also a statue here, towering above most of the cast except for PHILIP CAREY, the handsome male lead who shares one thing in common with Anita--he's a lifeless presence.

It's hard to get involved with these characters, especially since the story itself is a murky enough affair with some psycho-babble underpinnings in the convoluted storyline. On the plus side, the B&W photography of rainswept streets and dark shadows is impressive and the production aspects aren't too shabby.

GYPSY ROSE LEE manages to be lively enough as a nightclub proprietress, but her shimmy to "Put the Blame On Mame" is a pretty sorry attempt at the song made famous by Rita Hayworth.

The story starts out on a promising note, but quickly becomes an inept psychological thriller under Gerd Oswald's routine direction and moves toward a conclusion that lacks whatever punch it might have had because much of the disclosed information was already revealed.

This is an easily forgotten item that capitalizes solely on ANITA EKBERG's physical charms which are an eyeful for male fans but her acting is sub-par for a story that requires much more from an actress than mere physical presence and an overly generous bosom. She was much more fortunate a few years later to find herself in "La Dolce Vita". As for PHILIP CAREY, his stone-faced approach to acting doesn't help matters here.

Summing up: Hopelessly confusing and dull, when it should have been tight and suspenseful.

One of the 1950s strangest noir films, Gerd Oswald's sensational and twisted 1958 psycho- shocker SCREAMING MIMI was based on a pulp novel by the great Fredric Brown. This is one film that devotees of the truly bizarre cannot afford to miss.

Alcoholic newspaper columnist Bill Sweeney (Philip Carey) becomes entwined in a string of grisly murders that seem to revolve around exotic stripper Yolanda Lange (Anita Ekberg!!). Seems that Yolanda killed a man a couple of years earlier who tried to attack her while she showered. Traumatized by this event, she spends some time in a sanitarium and, upon her release, seeks out the help of psychiatrist Dr. Greenwood (the ever creepy Harry Townes) for some quick and dirty therapy. This "poor man's Svengali" falls in love with her (natch!) and soon insinuates himself into her life, even going so far as managing her career by getting her a job at the El Madhouse, a seedy nightclub run by "Gypsy" Mapes ("Gypsy" Rose Lee!). But before long a series of brutal murders begin to occur and poor Yolanda appears to be the prime suspect. (I won't bother to go into the reasons why; it would probably take longer than the running time of the film.)

Anyone looking for or concerned with conventional logic might likely be put off by this wildly lurid and threadbare melodrama as nothing quite makes sense in this demented Fulleresque nether world. But those hungry for the wonderful cheap thrills only to be found in nightmare B movies of the fringe variety will probably come away from the table more than satisfied. Artfully photographed by Burnett Guffey, SCREAMING MIMI probably looks a lot better than it deserves to, and Gerd Oswald's eccentric direction doesn't hurt either. Oswald, as many might recall, later went on to produce and direct many of the more stellar episodes of TV's "Outer Limits" in the early 60s. SCREAMING MIMI provided him with the most stunningly perfect testing ground imaginable.

Of note to jazz fans: the incredible Red Norvo Trio is featured as the house band at the El Madhouse.