Destination Murder

If you find yourself up all some stormy Tuesday night with a bad cold, this movie may be just the thing to go with your hot toddy. It's a grade C or maybe D movie with a couple of good lines, plot twists and not-too-bad performances. A young(ish) lady home from college witnesses her father's murder by a delivery boy; when the police don't move fast enough for her, she turns sleuth herself. Most remarkable is Hurd Hatfield (the charmless star of The Picture of Dorian Gray five years earlier and virtually the only recognizable name in the cast), now come to this poverty-row sump of the movie industry. Destination Murder qualifies as film noir, but just barely; Noir can be cheap, but it's usually a little better than this.

**SPOILERS** Using the intermission between two movies at a local theater as cover Blue Streak Messenger Jackie Wales, Stanley Chements, goes out to big-time businessman Authur Mansfield's, Franklyn Farnum, home with his gangster boss Armitage(Albert Dekker) behind the wheel to murder him and get back,to the movie house, just in time for the second feature.

Mansfield was a torn in the side to Armitage's nightclub rackets and by getting ride of him and then framing his murder on his business rival Frank Niles, John Dehner, was a stroke of genius on Armitage's part; knocking out two threats to his criminal operations with one stone.

One thing that Armitage didn't count on was that Mansfield's young daughter Laura, Joyce Mackenzie, was at his home visiting from out of town and the greed and brazenness of the person who did his killing messenger Wales.

After recognizing Jackie Wales in a police lineup Laura, who got a glimpse of the fleeing gunman, starts to work on Jackie by getting overly friendly with him. This lead her to the nightclub that his boss Armitage runs. Getting a job as the cigarette girl there from the real boss Stretch Norton,Hurd Hatfield, who feel in love with her. Laura was now in a position to get the goods on both gangsters, Armitage & Norton, and at the same time solve her dad's murder.

After Jackie gets the hell beat out of him by Armitag, who likes to do his beatings to the sound of music, for asking for more money for the "hit" he did for him he later writes out an "insurange policy" by confessing in writing to Mansfield's murder. Jackies policy implicates his boss Armitage in case he, Jackie, ended up dead and then stupidly goes back to blackmailing him. Jackie gets this idea from Armitage's mob-doll Alice, Myrna Dell, who didn't realize that he was only a stooge to Norton, not visa versa, and together with Jackie, ends up getting murdered by him. While all this is going on the police are using Laura, without her knowledge, and Frank Niles, with his cooperation, to trap both Armitage & Norton in order to get "The goods" on them in Mansfield's murder.

Laura who fell in love with Norton who unknowing to her had her father murdered didn't find this out until the end of the movie when Niles, with the police and Laura listening in and recording the conversation, got Norton to spill the beans on him and his operation. This was to make him, Niles, a partner after he earlier murdered his former partner Armitage, who was getting a bit drunk and a lot out off line, and made it look like self-defense.

Decent film-noir with both Joyce Mackenzie and Hurd Hatfield doing as good as they could as two star-struck lovers who up until the end of the movie didn't really known that much about each other even though they were planing to get married.

The plot of this little crime drama was excellent, minus a few plot holes. The execution was not so great mainly because of the blunted acting. There are mainly B players in this one, and the only one I immediately recognized was Hurd Hatfield of "Picture of Dorian Gray".

A man answers the door one night only to be shot by a messenger boy, or at least somebody who is dressed up like one. His daughter, Laura Mansfield, (Joyce MacKenzie) gets a fleeting look at the assassin, but not good enough for a positive ID. Meanwhile, Frank Niles is arrested for the crime because he was a business competitor of the murdered man and his car was in the neighborhood at the time of the murder.

This entire thing boils down to Laura trying to solve this crime from the bottom up, once she becomes convinced that the person she thought did the actual shooting is guilty (Stanley Clements as Jackie Wales). The police ignore her attempts to help and her tips because they are interested in the "Mr. Big" who ordered the hit. So why did the police have a lineup of messenger boys if they had no intention of arresting one? Plot hole number one. So Joyce gets hired as a cigarette girl at a club, "The Vogue", that she is sure is involved in her dad's murder.

Meanwhile there is so much back stabbing and double dealing among the actual criminals you must pay attention or you will get lost, for this is a pretty fast paced film. And the weird thing is that none of them seem unnerved about a murder victim's daughter nosing around their nightclub.

This thing has great atmosphere, a good pace, and a pretty good story, but the acting is flat and mediocre, making it hard to care about the characters that much. Plus, no reason is ever given as to WHY anybody would have killed Laura's dad in the first place - Plot hole number two. It is a passable time killer, though, if you are a student of noir.

"Destination Murder" makes for an enjoyable 70-plus minutes, assuming you're a noir fan and are not bothered by the sort of unlikely plot developments so characteristic of this genre. Notable are the solid performances of Hurd Hatfield (whose name will always be linked with "Dorian Gray") as a sleazy but debonair nightclub manager, the beefy Albert Dekker (whom I will always think of as "Dr. Cyclops"), and Joyce Mackenzie -- a really classy beauty in the sort of wholesome Jane Wyatt mode -- as the plucky heroine who, Nancy Drew-like, disguises herself as a nightclub cigarette girl to help solve the mystery of her father's murder. Also notable is the odd relationship -- odder than we initially assume -- between the Hatfield and Dekker characters. There are several clever plot twists and some interesting little bits of directorial business (e.g., a scene in the ladies' powder room of the nightclub, which offers an unexpected little study in social pecking order when two women ask for a glass of water; and a player piano that's activated when violence is going to take place). What stays with me longest is the memory of Mackenzie's gorgeous eyes and cheekbones.

This nifty little programmer from the post-World War II era gives viewers a chance to see several second-lead actors strut their stuff. The weasel-eyed Stanley Clements who made a living playing gunsels and Bowery types gets a chance to play, yes, a playboy hit man. It's a good thing he had money and a sporty-looking car to supplement his looks. Albert Dekker as Armitage does fine in a difficult role, having to play two facets of the same character. Alice Wentworth (Myrna Dell) turns out to be a femme fatale failure in the movie, but not in the acting department--seems the blonde bombshell is just not smart enough to pull off her double dealings. The lead part of Laura Mansfield is portrayed by Joyce Mackenzie, sort of a poor woman's Barbara Hale. Then there's Hurd Hatfield as the sneaky Stretch Norton, a pivotal part that fits his talents perfectly.

The story involves a murder man's daughter tracking down the person responsible for her father's death, since she is led to believe that the police aren't really doing their job. She begins dating the trigger man, hoping he will lead her to the mastermind. The trail leads to a nightclub operated by mobsters. The nefarious Armitage has a nasty habit of torturing and killing his victims to the tune of Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata." He is also adept at using his belt to silence those who disagree with his methods or who attempt to extort money from him. The plot has a major twist toward the middle of the film. It's surprising that other writers and directors haven't expropriated it (politically correct for stealing).

As with most noir-like films of the period, music serves a vital link between story and character development. "Moonlight Sonata" has already been noted. Listen to the words of the songs sung by the popular jump and jive group Steve Gibson and the Redcaps (early doo wop). At times the musical selection can even be ironic. For example, just before Armitage gives Jackie Wales (Clements) the treatment, the Redcaps blast away with, "Let's Go To A Party."