Calcutta

Neale Gordon (Alan Ladd), Pedro Blake (William Bendix), and Bill Cunningham are fellow pilots flying the mountain route between Chungking and Calcutta. Bill is newly engaged to Virginia Moore (Gail Russell) and gets murdered. His friends start digging.

This has a bit of exoticism. It has Alan Ladd. It has some noirish elements. Virginia should be played like the damsel in distress or even a femme fatale, but Gail Russell can only play her like a neighbor's wife. I also don't like her description of the relationship with Bill which cuts it down at the knees. For the exotic element, they are using too many Chinese people. It's supposed to be Calcutta after all. There is some good turns and Alan Ladd is playing up the noir. Mainly, I would like Gail to change her performance.

It's the stars that make this film watchable: Alan Ladd and Gail Russell.

The story is OK but these days with all the brilliant crime/mystery movies and series on TV and cable, "Calcutta" comes across as pretty lightweight.

A couple of pilots, Neale Gordon and Pedro Blake played by Alan Ladd and William Bendix, who fly cargo over the mountains between Burma and India just after WW2, investigate the murder of fellow pilot Bill Cunningham.

Neale Gordon is suspicious of the motives of women young and old, but falls for his dead friend's fiancé, Virginia Moore (Gail Russell), while keeping his former romantic interest, Marina Tanev (June Duprez), on hold. After a lot of punching and some surprising slapping around of Miss Moore, things get sorted out.

The film was set in a fairly convincing backlot Calcutta, but it could have been set just about anywhere. The strongest influence on the film seems to be "The Maltese Falcon", especially the ending. In fact, Edith King as Jewellery dealer Mrs King is somewhat of a Sydney Greenstreet character.

I must admit I am still an Alan Ladd fan dating from many a Saturday matinée back in the 1950s. He had a quiet confidence that projected strength, and although this film is a bit blah, he carries the picture. Apparently he was one of the genuine nice guys and loyal; more than a couple of people always got work on his films, but he was also a tragic figure - gone too early aged 50.

But there is an even more tragic star in this film, Gail Russell, who died aged only 36. This was fairly early in her career and critics at the time thought she was miscast. However that sense of hesitancy and innocence was fine for the role even though her performance was pieced together from short takes; she was so nervous she could hardly get her lines out. In a recent biography by Steven Glenn Ochoa, "Fallen Star", he tells how she had a nervous habit of ringing her hands, which directors tried to stop, but it's obvious in one of her early scenes in the film. Ladd was very good with her on set but not everyone was like that in her career.

It's these two charismatic stars and their unique screen presence that still makes "Calcutta" worth a look.

This film, which actually was one of Ladd's most financially successful films of the 40's, is a fun ride. Surprisingly, it's reputation has been one of a potboiler. It moves swiftly and has many good twists and turns. Gail Russell is wonderful and breathtakingly beautiful as the mysterious femme fatale. Alan Ladd was very well matched with Gail Russell. More so than Veronica Lake with her stony blonde beauty. The beautiful darkness of Russell and the Blonde Ladd was much more interesting. They were close friends and it shows in their two feature films together. A lot of the TV prints of this films have scenes missing that are crucial to the plot so if you can get a hold of a complete version of Calcutta you will be very lucky. A fun film from the 40's that you should try and catch up with.

Routine mystery suffers from Ladd's seeming indifference to his character in the lead and Gail Russell's unsuitability for her role. Add into that the fact that they share almost no rapport on screen and it hurts the picture. Gail, a lovely actress whose looks had not been destroyed by her extreme alcoholism at this point, is too gentle a presence to be convincing as the sort of femme fatale that was Ladd's frequent partner, Veronica Lake's stock in trade. The best performance comes from supporting player Edith King, in her screen debut, as the shady but very fun Mrs. Smith who though it's never stated outright is obviously the local madame as well as involved in other shady doings. The picture comes to life whenever she enters the scene. It's a pity her role isn't larger. Otherwise this is a standard actioner, which despite the title could have been set anywhere since it's mostly set indoors, that the studios pumped out weekly to keep product in the theatres during the Golden Age.

Three buddies, who are commercial pilots based in Calcutta, regularly fly cargo across the Himalayas between India and China. When one of them is murdered, the other two set out to find the killer. Beginning with a suspicious bank deposit and a carved diamond pendant, the pair uncover the victim's mysterious fiancé, a suitcase full of jewels, and another murder. Set in an exotic location on Paramount Studio's back lot, director John Farrow's "Calcutta" looks fabulous and has a competent cast, but the story is little more than a routine whodunnit, highlighted by John F. Seitz's rich black-and-white cinematography. Despite a few colorful supporting characters along the way, the plot develops without surprises, and viewers will guess the villain and the outcome long before the hero does.

Not the most expressive of actors, Alan Ladd plays Alan Ladd in the guise of Neale Gordon, the pilot who investigates the murder of his friend; Gordon, who is already involved with a Russian singer, becomes intrigued by his buddy's fiancé, played by Gail Russell. Gail Russell is not all that expressive either, and Pedro Blake, the third pilot, is William Bendix as William Bendix. Fortunately, the parts are undemanding, and the emphasis is on action and unraveling the plot.

Nominated for seven Academy Awards over his career, Seitz lensed such classics as "Sunset Boulevard," " The Lost Weekend," and "Double Indemnity." Seitz made movie stars glow like movie stars, and, in this film, he lavished his attention on Alan Ladd's blonde good looks and, to a lesser extent, on Gail Russell's dark beauty. Ladd even whips off his shirt to give audiences a look at his trim abs, although he radiates his handsome best while dressed in a white dinner jacket. Fans of Alan Ladd will relish "Calcutta" and savor the opportunity to freeze-frame several glamor shots of the star that are literally breath taking. While the film is not bad, just predictable, "Calcutta" is passably entertaining and a sturdy vehicle for Paramount's reigning star of the 1940's, Alan Ladd.