Détour

This is one of the all-time great examples of film noir. It can practically be used to define the genre: shadowy black and white cinematography; a star-crossed protagonist ("...fate sticks out a leg to trip you."); a femme fatale (the unforgettable Ann Savage as Vera); cynical voice-over narration; ambiguous morality. All these elements are brought together magnificently by director Edgar G. Ulmer, who incredibly made this movie in several days on a shoestring budget. His direction is so masterful that the low budget sets only add to the film. This is a great masterpiece and one of the marvels in film history.

One recurrent thought passes through my mind as I watch "Detour." It is that I do not believe a single moment of its story-telling. It isn't because of the incredible coincidences or the bitter irony but because of the simple goodness of the main character. Characters in film noir are not role models or good people placed into bad circumstances. They are bad people who believe that they're good.

The characters in "Double Indemnity," "Body Heat," or "The Talented Mr. Ripley" do not think of themselves as bad people. They believe they are forced into their crimes by the world, which is the essential difference between crime movies and noir. As pointed out by Roger Ebert: "the bad guys in crime movies know they're bad and want to be, while a noir hero thinks he's a good guy who has been ambushed by life."

"Detour" is told through the central character, Al Roberts, who recalls his story as one made through impossible coincidences and horrible luck. But there is something not right about his story. The audience can pick out the incongruities and flaws as soon as they're told. Was Charles Haskell's death really the result of bad luck or simply a murderer trying to convince himself that it was? We wonder if it is possible that a person as innocent as Al says he is can be forced into such immoral activities. However, the explanation is quite clear. Al is retelling the story not as a true confession but as a man reviewing his defense to the police.

Watching the movie, I was reminded of Tanazaki's "The Key," a novel in which the main character deliberately lies to the audience as a way of reaching the story's conclusion. We do not see a real conclusion to "Detour," but we sense that the police will find the same flaws in Al's story as we do. And that is not a fatal form of story-telling but a way of looking into the mind of a true noir character and seeing the darker depths of his soul. That is why film noir is so haunting and why this movie is so definitive in its genre.

When the pianist Al Roberts gets tired of being miserable and missing his girlfriend who traveled across the country to seek her fortune in Hollywood, he decides to leave New York behind. He has no money to pay for the trip from one coast to the other, so he decides to hitchhike, something that proves to be his downfall. A man who picked him up dies during the journey and Al panics when he pessimistically expects to be accused of the death. He steals not only the man's car, but also his identity and stows away the corpse in a ditch. He then decides to pick up a hitchhiker named Vera, but he will soon regret it because she seems to know his dark secret and will not hesitate to take advantage of it.

The story feels more than a little strained on more than one occasion. It's hard not to fall in love the hopelessness that constitutes Detour. A low-budget thriller directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. Sure, it's an extremely simple B-movie, but it is packed full of interesting quotes, friendly cynicism, pitch black darkness and at least as much rain. It is insanely entertaining to see Vera and Al throw sharp barbs at each other while the tones are so miserable that they find it hard to laugh at them.

With a playing time of over 70 minutes says Detour goodbye long before it has time to start to feel tiring.

I'm not as fond of DETOUR as some of the other reviewers on here, purely because I found it an entirely depressing viewing experience. It's one of the darkest film noirs out there, leaden with a dreadful atmosphere throughout, full of foreboding, darkness, and misery. And I guess those are the reasons why it's so well remembered.

The film is directed by THE BLACK CAT director Edgar G. Ulmer in much the same way he would direct one of his horror pictures. Tom Neal makes for a rather unlikeable hero, trying desperate to hitch-hike from one end of the country to the other and coming unstuck when he falls in with a seemingly friendly driver. He takes a chance and thinks he's made it when in fact he's just about to meet Ann Savage's Vera.

Savage is the stand-out feature of this film and I hated every element of her angry, vengeful, selfish character. She's the worst femme fatale I've ever seen, a noxious character utterly devoid of redeeming features, to the degree that I found the movie hard to watch whenever she was around (which is most of the time). I admit that I thought the climax was excellent given what's come previously, although the only thing I came away from this feeling was relief, relief that it was over.

It's a tribute to Edgar Ulmer that "Detour", made for about thirty thousand dollars, still keeps an interest with new fans who discover it. According to some comments, "Detour" has not been seen in this country in quite a while, but we recall the first time we saw it when it was presented at New York's Film Forum as part of a Film Noir festival in the late eighties. The copy shown recently on TCM has a poor quality, while the print we saw at Film Forum was in better condition.

What makes "Detour" a must see, is the clever way its narrative unfolds on the screen. Al and Sue are seen first in the small bistro he plays the piano and she sings, in Manhattan. Sue sings a happy rendition of "I Can't Believe You're in Love with Me", and Al shows he can improvise on a theme by Chopin as he jazzes it up. When Sue decides to pack it and move to L.A., Tom promises he'll follow. The tragic mistake he makes is to intent crossing the country hitchhiking. Even in the forties, it's a miracle he made it alive!

In Arizona Al meets the kind Charles Haskell, who happens to be going all the way to L.A. and offers him a ride. The two men develop an easy friendship until the point when Haskell dies of an apparent heart attack. Al disposes of the body and keeps going, assuming now, Haskell's persona. At the nearest gas station he sees a pretty woman, Vera, who appears is hitchhiking, and offers her a ride. This will prove to be his biggest mistake.

Vera turned out to be Al's worst nightmare. She knows Al is not Haskell since she, herself, knows the man. Al ends up a virtual prisoner hiding in the apartment they have rented in Hollywood. He can't escape. When Vera realizes there's a lot of money to be made by having Al pretend to impersonate the dead Haskell, he refuses. She threatens to call the police and he is left on the other room pulling the telephone cord...

The film works because all the elements are in place in this satisfying 67 minutes work and because of the great performances Mr. Ulmer got out of Tom Neal and Ann Savage. Edmund MacDonald and Claudia Drake played Haskell and Sue.

"Detour" was shot in two sets and it shows. It's a small film that doesn't pretend what it's not, and that's basically why audiences seem to like it as it's discovered.