Backlash

I agree with everyone about that scene with Leonard Strong as the bum or hobo, a sort of philosophizing, theatrical proto-beatnik. Ad-libbing perhaps? And well shot. It's the only reason I came here to rate this. The rest was largely throwaway by comparison. I've watched the film noir titles from the '40s, and that part is worth watching, but perhaps it is improved by the comparative dullness of the other scenes.

Backlash is a pretty decrepit programmer built upon a nifty premise: A jealous husband so hates his wife that he frames her for his own murder. He's a successful lawyer, middle-aged, grey and sporting a Thomas E. Dewey mustache, and, as such, indistinguishable from just about every other adult male in the cast (which may be among the most anonymous in the history of movies; the collective Q-rating of Backlash would be in the negative numbers).

When a burned-out car with a body in it turns up in a ravine, the police potter around trying to find out first who was killed and then who killed him. There was a cop-killer the lawyer saved from a murder charge; his law partner who owned him big money; the district attorney who may have been seeing his restless younger wife; another temptress connected to both the partner and the cop-killer; and so on. In fact there are a few too many red herrings squeezed into this compact (66-minute) can.

Surprisingly, Backlash boasts one fine scene which looks as though it was cut from a much better movie and spliced in by mistake. In a railroad yard at night, one of the principals meets up with a drifter who offers to share his bottle and some philosophical musings. It's filmed as an extended, highly shadowed two-shot that grows tighter and more oppressive as the talk turns to the murder case that dominates the headlines - and then to more urgent concerns. It's a sequence that makes Backlash almost worth a look.

Where to begin? Well, it's not good, that's for sure. It's flawed in so many ways, it's hard to find much of anything good to say about it.

1) The premise is contrived. One of those movies that must have been written backwards with earlier scenes created afterwards only to help somehow find their way to the climax that was the only thing pitched to the studio to get approval to make it.

2) The plot is far too convoluted for its 66 minute run-time. Again, the whole movie is meant to lead us to the final act, whether it naturally leads there or not.

3) The dialog is ridiculous - stilted and overly dramatic.

4) Character development is nearly non-existent. Most everything we learn about any of them comes almost strictly from others' descriptions of them awkwardly jammed into the script to save time.

5) The male actors are fairly indistinguishable from each other. If you don't pay close attention it's easy to lose track of who's who.

6) Female lead Jean Rogers couldn't act her way out of a paper bag. She's very pretty, but her acting is wooden and she delivers her lines as though she's reading the script for the first time as practice for her elocution coach.

7) Supporting actress Louise Currie can't act either. Also pretty, though in that cold, slightly trashy sort of way. You know, the kind of girl you might want to see, but never be seen with.

8) The soundtrack is generic, and like the dialog, often becomes overly dramatic and even inappropriate - at times more irritating than properly mood setting.

9) The cinematography and sets belie the flick's obviously low budget.

10) The two bright spots, as far as players in the movie goes, are wasted and get the least screen time - Sara Berner as the maid and. Wynne Larke as the detective's wife.

This is strictly a late night TCM diversion when there's nothing else on and you can't get to sleep (it may help).

"Backlash" is clearly a B-movie. Its short running time (a little over an hour), absence of big-name stars and overall plot practically scream B! And, as far as B-movies go, it's okay...just okay.

John Moreland doesn't like his life nor his wife, though he's kept this very much to himself. So, when he sees an opportunity, he fakes his own death AND implicates his wife as his murderer! Naturally, the plan doesn't go off without a hitch, as the film was made during the era when crime certainly did NOT pay!

The story isn't bad but the film often resorts too much to talk...and the talkiness of the picture didn't help it. In addition, it features one of the worst and most over-used clichés in mystery films...the guy who calls up and says "I can't tell you over the phone...can you come over here right away?". You just KNOW that the guy'll be dead before anyone arrives to help him or hear his evidence! These are reasons why I think this is a purely average time-passer and not something with a bit more to offer.

This is a lightweight noir from 20th Century Fox's B division -- competent players, no major stars, Eugene Forde directing, with a nicely tangled plot. John Eldredge is dead and the obvious suspects are his wife, Jean Rogers, and his his business partner, Robert Shayne. His doctor reports he's been dosed with poison a couple of times, but he has not reported it at Eldredge's insistence, and Shayne owed him a lot of money. But there are some complicating factors and as cops Richard Benedict and Larry Blake follow the clues, the district attorney takes an interest. Is that actually Eldredge's corpse?

Fox would shut down B production the next year -- Sol Wurtzel, the division head, was almost universally despised as a vulgarian, and only the fact that his movies always made money kept him in business. However, the long post-war downturn in movie-going was starting, and Wurtzel would retire in 1948.