Blind Spot

Like Decoy, this distinctive low-budget noir has fallen through the cracks and deserves resurrection. It's another masterly essay in irony from the pen of Martin Goldsmith of Detour fame. The plot involves a desperate, alcoholic writer who sarcastically pitches a "locked room" murder mystery to his publisher, then sees the plot occur in real life (with himself as chief suspect, of course). Despite the lack of his presence in the credits, Cornell Woolrich's novels are an obvious influence here - themes of urban paranoia, loss of memory, disconnected characters, etc, were his stock-in-trade. The ripe dialogue borders on self-parody, and the entire exercise could have easily been directed as a satire of the genre. Instead it becomes a double-density noir. Morris and Geray are rather miscast, but peek-a-boo blonde Dowling is striking (particularly visually) as a potential femme fatale. The moody cinematography is engagingly oppressive, lingering on beads of sweat and trapping us in confined spaces. Director Robert Gordon worked mainly in TV and never had much success in film. The "locked room" mystery, a staple of the detective novel genre, was most memorably committed to celluloid in the early talkie classic The Kennel Murder Case.

While there is an obvious borrowing from The Kennel Murder Case, Chester Morris does an excellent performance as the author-on-a-bender who might have murdered his publisher. Morris' character, who is identified as a novelist who writes intellectual psychological stories, speaks more like noir style detective.

The story is a locked room murder supposedly carried out by Morris who devised the idea, but he can't remember how the murderer did it. And no matter what Morris does to try and remember his solution the more it looks like he did it.

Blind Spot is an entertaining whodunit with a supporting cast of well-known character actors. This is a film to enjoy on a rainy night or while being stuck at home during a winter storm. I came across this film on Hastings Mystery Theater on YouTube, and I was surprised at how good it was as a B+ B movie.

A neat set up: Chester Morris is an author of "serious" books. He hates his publisher, but is forced to go to him and ask for an advance. Having worked up his nerve by downing several drinks, Morris arrives at the office to find the publisher in conference with a popular mystery writer—whom Morris promptly insults as a writer of pap. Writing a mystery is simple work, Morris drunkenly insists…he could invent a murder plot in a snap. A murder in a locked room.

Some hours later, the publisher is found dead….murdered in his locked office. And Morris can't quite remember two things—the locked room murder plot he had invented, and whether or not he actually did the murder. He sets about investigating—but it's not easy with the police figuring him as the prime suspect.

Morris is very good, especially after his character sobers up and we can watch him piece together events and the motives and actions of other characters. (During the first fifteen minutes his slurring and stumbling get a bit tiresome….as drunk people tend to do.)

Steven Geray is fun as the rival author; his thick accent adds to his vaguely exotic and sinister aura. Constance Dowling is hard and slick as a possibly dangerous blonde—the publisher's secretary who eventually teams up with Morris. She may be seeking the truth; she may be running away from it. Both the mystery writer and the secretary have their own reasons for wishing that publisher ill.

The film develops some great situations—like when Morris and Dowling meet up in his dark basement apartment, each thinking the other committed the murder. Some great camera shots: she steps slowly from the shadows, pausing where all is dark except her ankles in the light. Some cheesy but undeniably fun dialog: thinking she's trying to fool him with romance, Chester tells the girl, "You've got the wrong chump. Violins hurt my ears. And when the temperature's up I drink a bottle of beer…."

An excellent B mystery that moves fast, contains plenty of suspense and never takes itself more seriously than a murder mystery should.

"Do you really think I killed Small?" – A pause, then a hard kiss, finally an answer.... "Yes."

This film is a must for fans of noir and b-movies. The hero is a semi-alcoholic writer, wrongly accused of a murder committed while he was drunk.

The actor plays this drunk so obnoxiously that he will have you cringing in your seat, begging for him to finally pass out. It's the acting equivalent of fingernails on a chalk board. What saves the movie and makes it worth seeing are the incredibly over-the-top lines the writer cooked up.

These include: "the heat sapped my vitality like ten thousand blood-thirsty dwarves," "a ghost-writer is like drugs," "plagiarism is inscribing my name on another man's pen," and "when I want poetry, I read Walt Whitman."

Good for a laugh.

Jeffrey Anders is a down-on-his luck mystery writer who drunkenly blunders into his publisher's office one day with an idea for a new story. He has concocted a story where a dead body is found inside a locked, bolted room. He also has a simple solution for the mystery. Unfortunately, later his publisher is found dead inside a locked, bolted room and Anders can't remember the solution he told when he was drunk! Of course, Jeffrey is the main suspect since he was the last one to see the guy alive. He starts seeking out people he may have told the solution to. Then, those people start turning up dead as well. I liked this movie a lot. The suspects are pretty easy to narrow down once the love interest is cleared (she was the receptionist for the dead publisher and he always put the moves on her), but there's enough to keep your interest for 70 minutes and the acting is pretty good. Worth seeking out.