The Blue Gardenia

The Blue Gardenia is the first of Fritz Lang's so-called "newspaper trilogy" (While The City Sleeps, and Beyond A Reasonable Doubt are the other two).

This one is my favorite of the three. It's ironic because Lang himself didn't care for the picture saying, "The story itself wasn't original and the acting wasn't engaging enough to elevate it past being a mild thriller."

I disagree with the master. Lang was coming off some personally turbulent years and was fed up with Hollywood. Perhaps he was not happy with the performance of Richard Conti, the newspaper reporter. Lang wanted Dana Andrews, who would go on to work on the next two pictures of the newspaper trilogy.

But, I think Anne Baxter is great as a jilted woman who impetuously goes out on a date with a wolf, played to perfection by Raymond Burr, and finds herself literally fighting off his sexual attack while in an inebriated state. She blacks out, awakens in her bed unaware of how she got there. Later, she learns Burr's character has been murdered and now finds herself on a journey to discover if she's a killer or not.

Lang's frustration with Hollywood's limitations were starting to show up with his lackluster camera movement (as compared to previous pictures). But, a movie made by a disillusioned Fritz Lang is still a must-watch.

In The Blue Gardenia, Anne Baxter's feeling low and depressed because her GI fiancé in Korea has given her the brushoff. Against her better judgment she goes out with Raymond Burr, full time artist and full time wolf. A few Polynesian Pearl Divers in the local bar which might have been spiked and Anne's not doing so good. But good enough to hit Burr with a fireplace poker and somehow make her way home like Cinderella with both shoes missing.

George Reeves taking a break from Superman plays the Los Angeles homicide detective gets a little unwanted help from Richard Conte, a Walter Winchell like newspaper columnist who's no doubt thinking of the black dahlia murders in LA a few years because a Blue Gardenia's been left at the crime scene and Nat King Cole both sang it live and on record in the film.

In the meantime Baxter's mood swings are being noticed by her roommates Ann Sothern and Jeff Donnell. And Conte's got his own investigation going into the Blue Gardenia murder. It all makes for one interesting and murky film in the tradition of Fritz Lang.

Anne in a sense does a reprise of her Oscar winning performance from The Razor's Edge as a woman being trapped in tragedy. She blamed herself for her family's death in The Razor's Edge and she may or may not have killed Burr. The only difference is that an arrest might lead to an expiation of sin of a sort.

Fritz Lang made a specialty in harassed and harried protagonists getting themselves into some real jackpots whether it was Henry Fonda in You'll Only Live Once, Edward G. Robinson in Scarlett Street and The Woman In the Window, and we can even count Peter Lorre in M. These are people who in fact were guilty. For the first time however Lang's harried protagonist is a woman and Anne gives a great performance.

One scene I really loved is one with Almira Sessions as a brain dead housekeeper who finds Burr's body and then proceeds to clean up the crime scene. After all as she explains to Reeves this is her job and what she's paid to do. The fact she's destroyed all forensic evidence doesn't seem to impress her in the slightest.

On the other hand had she done like a normal person would have and not touched anything, the forensics would have cleared the whole thing up and we wouldn't have a movie.

A date with a ne'er do well named Harry Prebble (Raymond Burr of "Perry Mason" and "Ironsides" fame) leads a telephone operator into a web of deceit and murder in this 1940s-style (actually made in 1953) film-noir classic, "Blue Gardenia." Nora Larkin (Anne Baxter) gets a cruel birthday present in the form of a "Dear Jane" letter from her soldier boyfriend serving in Korea. Prebble, who draws for a living, "hits" on the telephone operators of a local company. He calls the apt. of 3 of the operators who live together in a flat. Nora Larkin answers and impulsively decides to accept Prebble's invitation to drinks and dinner at a Chinese restaurant nearby. The next thing Nora knows, she has a colossal hangover from too many "Polynesian Pearldiver" drinks and she learns her date was murdered. She doesn't remember killing him but she does recall trying to repel his sexual advances, grabbing a fireplace poker and shattering a mirror.

Assuming she did it, she because extremely testy and high strung; her 2 roommates - Crystal Carpenter (played so well by Ann Sothern) and Sally Ellis (Jeff Donnell) - try to figure out what's wrong. Finally, Crystal, a "party girl" figures it out.

An interesting plot twist is the addition of Casey Mayo (Richard Conte, who later went on to play Barzini in "The Godfather"), a hardboiled reporter for the Los Angeles Chronicle. He writes an open letter in the newspaper to the girl dubbed the "Blue Gardenia Killer" and Nora meets him at a local watering hole. She tells him it's a friend who committed the murder but Casey finds out later she is the one. But in the meantime, he has fallen in love with her and he and her roommates work to find the real killer which (unlike the OJ Simpson case) they do.

The real killer turns out to be a minor character and that was a disappointment. But Anne Baxter's portrayal as Nora, a complex character, and Ann Sothern's portrayal as the floozy with a heart of gold, make this a nice, decent little movie. I don't think I'd want to own a copy of this film but I'll watch it whenever it comes on because of the aforementioned performances and because I've always loved Raymond Burr, Nat "King" Cole and the song "Blue Gardenia."

The first part is rather cute. Sothern, Baxter, and Donnell play off one another really well as three girl buddies living together. Of course, viewers like me also have to get used to Raymond Burr as a lover-boy. After so many years as a movie heavy and TV's Perry Mason that takes some getting used to. But the lighter part ends when Burr turns up dead and Baxter thinks she did it. At that point, things turn more mysterious and psychological.

Baxter is easy to look at as she assumes the central role of conflicted woman. More importantly, Baxter the actress wisely avoids her sometimes tendency to over-emote. But the movie's remainder is only mildly suspenseful as Baxter tries to deal with her supposed guilt. Did she really bonk Burr on the head with a poker since she was too drunk to know. And who can she turn to for help. Newspaperman Conte appears helpful, but maybe he's just interested in a big story. And what about Superman's George Reeves as a detective with a moustache, no less.

There are some interesting visuals as one might expect from an artist like director Lang. Nonetheless, the overall result could have been helmed by a dozen lesser directors than the maker of Metropolis (1927) and Woman in the Window (1944). All in all, the movie's an interesting time-passer. But for fans of the German director like myself, it's nothing special.

Norah Larkin (Anne Baxter) is a telephone operator who plans to spend her birthday evening alone with her boyfriend - or rather, with his photograph and a letter she just received from him. The real guy is 6000 miles away in Korea. While her two roommates - Crystal (Ann Sothern), a wisecracking divorcée and Sally (Jeff Donnell), a sweet girl with a taste for bloodthirsty mystery novels - are gone, Norah, wearing a black taffeta dress and sipping champagne, reads the letter and blanches. Her sweetheart has dumped her. She ends up spending the rest of her evening with Harry Prebble (Raymond Burr), a wolf who draws girls for a living and ruins them as a hobby. He takes her to the Blue Gardenia and they listen to Nat King Cole as he gets her very drunk on Polynesian pearl divers. The next morning she wakes up with a terrible hangover, but that's the best part. At work she learns of a murderess soon to be called the Blue Gardenia Girl. The label is invented by a newspaper columnist named Casey Mayo (Richard Conte), who hopes to find the femme fatale before the police. What worries Norah is that he and the police may both be looking for her.

Fritz Lang directed this solid mystery thriller that has our complete attention from beginning to end. A good script and good performances are accentuated by Fritz Lang's camera and his usual sharp eye for detail and way of creating mounting dread.