Nocturne

Tough and dogged detective George Raft investigates a composer's death. It was ruled a suicide but Raft doesn't buy it. Despite being ordered off the case, he continues to look into it and tracks down some of the women the composer had "relationships" with.

George Raft gets a lot of flack for being stiff or playing the same role over and over, but I happen to like most of his movies that I've seen. He had no pretenses about being a Shakespearean actor. He knew what he was good at playing and worked with it quite well. His earlier WB successes in gangster movies and the like were always fun. Here he's playing a film noir detective, which isn't too far removed from those older roles come to think of it. He's quick with a snappy comeback and doesn't back down from anybody. It's a part Raft plays with ease but that shouldn't be taken as a put-down, as is often the case. Several tough female roles in this one. Lynn Bari and Virginia Huston (in her film debut) get the juiciest parts but honorable mentions should go to Myrna Dell as a wisecracking maid and Mabel Paige as Raft's mom, who helps him with his investigation.

Good script with some punchy noir lines, interesting characters, and a good ending. A nice fight scene, too. By the way, the film's title refers to the song the composer writes for his latest conquest. The guy wrote songs for all the women he screwed. They had a classier kind of douchebag in the old days, I guess.

There are some nice touches in this noir if you can get past Raft's non-acting. For a cop obsessed by a murder, he really needs more than one frozen expression. It doesn't help that the script sticks this 50-year old man with a 60-year old mother (Paige), even if she can wisecrack with the best of them. She's a hoot, but he still looks more like a brother than a son.

That opening sequence, however, is masterful and a testament to RKO's artistic team. A night-time camera swoops down from high above the Hollywood hills into a swank, ultra- modern glass house where a handsomely attired man noodles on a piano while a mystery woman sits in the shadows-- and the plot sets up from there. It's done in a single take and is quite riveting.

So who did kill the noodler (Ashley). Maybe it was his bad piano playing. More likely it's one of a hundred women who've visited that swank bachelor pad. Anyway, detective Warne (Raft), after viewing the glamour photos on the wall, is obsessed with finding out. His sleuthing takes us on a entertaining tour of LA area hotspots, circa 1946, including a ship that never sails. The attraction really isn't in the whodunit, which proves difficult, anyway. It's in the characters and the settings and some nice touches. There's the brassy blonde "housekeeper" (Dell) who assures us she sleeps alone, the fashion photographer who can't stand his model, the hulking gorilla (Hoffman) who KO's Warne amusingly off-camera. Most of all, there's Mom who may make you rethink nice old ladies. Then too, I like Joe Pevney as the moody, laconic "Fingers"; his smokey joe seems just right.

All in all, it's an interesting, if uneven, movie with some good dialogue, but with a wrap-up that sounds like it was thrown together on the way to the studio.

This would have been a better film. It opens with that stunning shot of L.A. then slowly zooms in on the composer in his hilltop home for a mesmerizing beginning, but spends the rest of its running time spinning its wheels. Part of the problem is the confused script which lacks urgency and never brings the story into any kind of focus. There's the occasional flash of excitement or an injection of atmosphere, but then it drifts. It's a film with a very short attention span; it doesn't seem to care much about its own story and seems to be in search of anything it can find to distract it.

And then there's Raft. He was adequate in the similarly well-shot 1945 noir Johnny Angel, also directed by Marin, because in that film he's motivated by a thirst for revenge against the man who killed his father, a simple and rather easy emotion to play. But here he's a detective who's supposed to be obsessed with finding the murderer of the playboy composer, who is killed in the middle of writing one of his songs (a nifty little premise) though the police believe it's a suicide. This is a trickier set of emotions to play and Raft can't pull it off. Why does he care so much? Is he a frustrated musician? It's never explained. There are no layers to Raft, no sense of vulnerability, no dimension or mystery - he's about as wooden as they come. He's only effective when he's acting tough - pushing a guy into a pool or taking on some thug twice his size. When he's asked to do more than that he's not so much lost as he is simply unwilling or constitutionally incapable. He just doesn't have it in him.

One of the pleasures of noir is watching a tough guy getting in over his head and discovering to his horror that there are some foes he can't lick, or allowing his commitment and dedication turn into obsession. A Bogart or a Dick Powell or a Ralph Meeker or a John Payne or a Dan Duryea or even a Mark Stevens could've supplied the necessary psychological complexity to make the detective in Nocturne a memorable and tragic figure. Raft, unfortunately, isn't in their league.

One last thing: the most interesting presence in the film is piano player Joseph Pevney, who later went on to become a very busy TV and movie director. He's only in two or three scenes, but he makes the most of them.

I found this movie in my local video shops "film Noir" section. It is considered so rare I had to plunk down a hundred dollars in deposit just to take it out the store. It was worth it! Lush characters, a wardrobe to die for, it's a charmer. There's a hardboiled detective, a sassy, sarcastic maid, a lovely starlet, and plot twists to die for! At times the banter is so sarcastic and cutting you just can't help but laugh, a pulp novel comes alive, and worth every penny! Though the mystery is a bit formulaic and at times you feel you are spinning your heels a little, there are more than enough moments to make up for it. My favorite moment is when the detectives mother, and another older lady try to figure out how the crime was made to look like a suicide, it's like having two Mrs Marples on screen, very funny!

A piano composer is killed in an apparent suicide, and George Raft is a detective who searches for the truth among the composer's many past girlfriends. Lynn Bari plays opposite as a dark haired, beautiful prime suspect.

The plot needed a bit of work. Even after seeing the conclusion of the film, it is difficult understand exactly what happened. Despite this one shortcoming, the film is really watchable and moves well. The dialog is sharp and a lot of nice details are worked into the film. Look for Myrna Dell, who plays the "Tehachapi Debutante" in a supporting role.

Joan Harrison was the producer, and the film bears her unmistakable stamp. This is a noir film, though not as dark as her earlier "Phantom Lady", which was a superior film in terms of acting and overall dynamics.

The opening shot is technically interesting for a 1946 film as it opens up on the night skyline and continuously glides into the the composer's penthouse living room as he plays piano.