The Flanagan Boy

I saw this under its alternate title "Bad Blonde." Though Barbara Payton is billed before the title, I was confused: Yes, the actress had quite a reputation. She had life that was messy and ultimately very sad. It was more sordid and more interesting than the tabloid girls of today.

And the character she played was bad, to be sure. Yet, the movie makes much more sense under its original title: It's primarily about the character played by Tony Wright. Ms. Payton wears some alluring costumes but we hardly ever see Wright with his shirt on. When he's not boxing, he's swimming.

It's a sad story. Sort of a film noir, yes. But we feel bad for the basically decent people who are trampled on because of others' greed and desires. Frederick Valk is excellent as Giuseppi, the man drawn into representing the title character in his fight career.

The plot reminded me, particularly in his character, of Tennessee Williams" "Orpheus Descending." An interesting movie, if ultimately not an especially good one.

The plot is not that interesting but not that lousy either. And it is from Reginald LeBorg, a B pictures film maker whose stuff is always worth seeking, except some Joe Palooka gentle junk, trash. So this scheme of a young prize fighter in love with a blonde femme fatale can be annoying because so many times evoked in the past in many movies, but it' is not a good reason to avoid this rare gem because the story is riveting, tough, you don't wish to stop the viewing. And acting is pretty good for this low budget material. This definitely a noir drama which seemed to have been inspired by a James Hadley Chase's novel.

An ambitious undertaking for Exclusive, strictly speaking based on a novel by Max Catto, but suspiciously resembling 'The Postman Always Rings Twice'; it bears viewing today as a showcase for the ill-fated Barbara Payton and an almost spectral appearance by Selma Vas Diaz as the cuckolded husband's vengeful sister.

Much as 1948's Whiplash was a cross-knockoff of two John Garfield vehicles (Body and Soul, Humoresque), Bad Blonde grafts Body and Soul to The Postman Always Rings Twice, then transplants the hybrid to alien English soil. At a carnival boxing concession, young Johnny Flanagan (Tony Wright, who looks like young John Kennedy) takes up the challenge and reveals himself as quite the pugilist. Concessionaire Sid James, a savvy judge of boxing talent, sees his opportunity to make a comback in the prizefight racket. He gets Wright signed up with rich old Italian promoter Frederick Valk, who on a recent tour of America has brought back Barbara Payton as a souvenir.

When Wright catches a furtive glimpse of Payton smoothing a stocking along her thigh, he's struck tongue-tied. She's not so bashful, licking her lips as she rakes her eyes up his torso, stripped for the ring. Soon, under the guise of training at Valk's country manor, they're having clandestine clinches in the bracken. But, it apparently being true about leaving one's fight in the bedroom, Wright starts losing his timing, and, more urgently, an important match Valk arranges, thus jinxing his career. But Payton has money, or rather will have once her husband goes down for the count. She feigns a suicide attempt and a pregnancy, then dangles the possibility of murder. The diffident Wright, thinking the child is his, falls in with the plan...

Somebody besides Payton must have been obsessed with Wright's body: The camera finds every opportunity to linger over it, in the ring and under the water, in trunks and towels and bathing briefs. Did this male-fixated aspect of the movie, originally titled The Flanagan Boy with Wright its title character, cause sufficient panic to have the movie renamed and remarketed? As Bad Blonde, it capitalizes on Payton's aggressive allures, soon to be available on the open market: The actress would drift into tabloid scandals, check-kiting and ultimately prostitution. Only four more films would remain before her last, Murder Is My Beat, in 1955. Twelve years later she would be dead of alcohol-related causes.

I see many compared this to the Postman Always Rings Twice. I just found it a typical beautiful wife encouraging a young lover to kill her husband. You can compare it to lots of films.

Bad Blonde stars the real thing, Barbara Payton, as the young woman who is married to Giuseppe (Frederick Valt), a fight promoter and businessman.

When she meets his latest find (Tony Wright) there is an instant attraction, disguised as hostility. It then goes the ordinary route. Wright doesn't put up much resistance.

Barbara Payton had one look - bored out of her mind - throughout the film. She was extremely beautiful and desirable - desirable enough for Tom Neal to beat Franchot Tone into a coma.

Payton's best film was at the start of her career, and it was downhill from there.

She wound up an alcoholic prostitute. When offered rehab, she said, "I'd rather drink or die." At age 39, she managed to do both.