Hollywood Story

This film truly is a Hollywood story, employing real actors from the silent period and filmed on real locations throughout Hollywood and Los Angeles. There are views of buildings up and down Hollywood Blvd., including Grauman's Chinese Theatre and the Roosevelt Hotel, Charlie Chaplin Studios on La Brea Ave., the Sunset Strip, Universal Studios, and the Hollywood Christmas Parade. It appears that more silent film stars shot cameos than actually made it into the film, but it still salutes and highlights the early days of Hollywood. Art direction is top notch, the acting is fine, and the story is really entertaining. The mystery is well thought out and keeps you guessing until the end. This is much more serious and top notch than the typical William Castle film.

My position is exactly the same as that of bsnmsn. I saw this on "The Late Show" (for me, a locally-operated movie slot following the post-prime time news), where I saw numerous great, old films. Then, years later I learned about the William Desmond Taylor murder and recognized the parallels to this movie. Just couldn't be coincidence. I think I've seen "Hollywood Story" once since then, either on local TV in the late 70s to early 80s, or on a cable channel (TBS, WGN, WOR) in the early 80s. I keep scouring the listings of Turner Classic Movies for it, but so far no luck. BTW, I gave it a 7 out of 10, dropping a little because I remember it as looking somewhat low-budget; it IS an early William Castle effort.

This is another film I think is incorrectly billed by YouTube as a film noir. In fact it's an intriguing, well-made mystery, made by William Castle in the first phase of his career. From 1943 to 1956 he made a string of B movies: having seen this one and "When Strangers Meet" (1944, with a young Robert Mitchum) I'm keen to see more. After a couple of years in TV Castle made "Macabre", the first of the horror films which he advertised using outlandish marketing techniques, and it's for these, and his producing of "Rosemary's Baby" that he's best known.

"Hollywood Story" was made the year after "Sunset Boulevard", which had revived interest in the silent era. While Gloria Swanson and von Stroheim had leading roles in "Sunset" the old stars who appeared in "Story" (I confess I'd only heard of Francis X. Bushman) had the briefest of walk-ons, as themselves. While the screenwriter in "Sunset" was handsome young William Holden, the one in "Story" is played by Henry Hull as a drunken wreck, living in squalor, who hasn't written a film since the coming of sound, so has never written dialogue, which makes you wonder why the hero hired him. Fred Clark, BTW, was in both films, and Swanson's character was called Norma Desmond, combining the names of silent movie director William Desmond Taylor and his lover Mabel Normand, one of several people suspected of his murder in 1922, which remains unsolved to this day.

Independent producer Larry O'Brien arrives to make his first Hollywood film and on a tour of the old studio he plans to use becomes fascinated by the story of the murder of a silent movie director called Franklin Farrara who was killed in a bungalow on the lot. He wants to film the story, but to do that he must solve the mystery. People try to dissuade him, including one who takes a shot at him. Richard Conte may be ethnically incorrect casting as Larry O'Brien (Edmond O'Brien, also big in 1951, would have been more appropriate) but he makes a very personable hero, and Richard Egan is wonderfully laid-back as a sympathetic cop: in those days actors playing cops worked hard at being tough and unsmiling. There's admirable support from Clark, Hull, Jim Backus and Houseley Stevenson, and the photography is excellent.

All in all a most enjoyable film. A bit naughty, though, to pretend that the fictional Farrara directed the 1925 Lon Chaney "Phantom of the Opera" and that the heroine's mum was Chaney's co-star. Still, Rupert Julian was dead and Nora Philbin had been a recluse ever since the coming of sound and probably never saw "Hollywood Story."

I got this film because I like 40s/50s mysteries, because I like Richard Conte, and because it was directed by William Castle and thus HAD to be interesting. Actually, it is an excellent little mystery. New York-based producer Conte comes out to LA to make some films and rents an old studio building that hasn't been used since the silent era (which was only 22 years ago at the time of this film). The last year of silents, 1929, a major silent director was killed at the studio, and the case has never been solved. Conte decides to research the director and the murder for a film plot--he digs up a few of the people who worked at the studio and learns more about the mystery... while a new mystery starts to develop and the guilty party from 1929 starts to cause trouble again. It's as cleverly plotted as the best Columbo or Perry Mason episode, and Conte as always is powerful and sympathetic. He was one of the great post-WWII stars and his work should be revived today--watch THE BROTHERS RICO sometime! Great supporting cast with Jim Backus, Richard Egan, the lovely Julie Adams, and silent star and 30s independent-film regular William Farnum. It's always good to be pleasantly surprised by a film that delivers much more than you expected, and this is such a nice little mystery. It's not on video or DVD, but keep your eye out for it.

Producer Richard Conte comes to Hollywood to make his next picture. While he's figuring out a subject, he rents an old studio. The guard tells him about a director murdered at the dawn of sound, still unsolved. Conte decides that will make a terrific picture. High school friend and now Hollywood agent Jim Backus hates the idea, as does Conte's partner Fred Clark. Julia Adams, the daughter of a movie star with whom the dead man was linked, asks him to drop it. Even police detective Richard Egan comes by to quiz Conte and tell him it's a terrible idea. conte persists, even hiring the dead director's washed-up screenwriter, Henry Hull. Then there is another murder...

It's a canny, nostalgic movie directed by William Castle, who knows how to evoke old Hollywood without getting trapped in antiques. The studio that Conte rents is Chaplin's studio, and there cameos for a Betty Blythe, a Francis X. Bushman, and William Farnum. The mystery, although far from the William Desmond Taylor murder that inspired it, is nicely constructed, with some decent red herrings. It's a fine example of the unassuming picture that does everything you so right that that it becomes a minor masterpiece.