Act of Violence / Mystery Street (Film Noir Double Feature)
by John Sturges, Fred Zinnemann
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Bruce Bennett, Elsa Lanchester, Marshall Thompson, Ricardo Montalban, Sally ForrestDirector: Fred Zinnemann, John Sturges
Brand: Warner Brothers
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language); German (Original Language); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled)
Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, DVD-Video, NTSC, Original recording remastered, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 175 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-07-31
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Warner Home Video
Movie Reviews of Act of Violence / Mystery Street (Film Noir Double Feature)
Movie Review: Two Admirable Films from MGM: A Post-War Suspense & a Sharp Murder Mystery.
Summary: 4 Stars
"Act of Violence" (1949) and "Mystery Street" (1950) are both crime films produced by MGM , but they have little else in common. Warner Brothers is billing both films a "film noir", a label that suits "Act of Violence", though that film is not archetypal noir, but is less apt for "Murder Street", which is only superficially or intermittently noir. It's more a straightforward, technophilic murder mystery. "Mystery Street" is very well-plotted, however, and both films offer memorable performances. The versatile Van Heflin plays a man hounded by guilt and then by his past in "Act of Violence". And Elsa Lanchester gives a scene-stealing supporting performance as an over-the-hill schemer and would-be femme fatale if only she were younger and more clever in "Mystery Street".
"Act of Violence" opens as World War II veteran Joe Parkson (Robert Ryan) prepares to kill someone. He is obsessively pursuing Frank Enley (Van Heflin), his former friend and commanding officer with whom he flew 21 missions before spending the rest of the war in a German POW camp. Joe blames Frank for the deaths of his comrades and intends to make him pay with his life. Frank is now a family man and well-liked civic leader in a small California town. Joe stalks him, disrupts his domestic idyll, frightens his wife Edith (Janet Leigh), and eventually sends Frank running to the city, whose back alleys are little consolation as Joe closes in.
This film has a pronounced symmetry: It becomes increasingly introverted and visually dark as Frank succumbs to fear and guilt. Joe, who initially seems unbalanced and blindly obsessive, becomes more rational as the film progresses. One goes up as the other goes down. There are three women who try to dissuade three men from self-destructive paths: Edith tries to protect her husband Frank. Joes' girlfriend Ann (Phyllis Thaxter) tries to thwart his homicidal ambition. And Pat, a haggard hooker made unforgettable by Mary Astor, is also out to discourage an assassin. Nice shadowy interior and night photography by Robert Surtees accentuates the ugly effects of the war on the minds of the two veterans.
In "Mystery Street", a cheeky blonde bombshell named Vivian Heldon (Jan Sterling) is murdered by her married lover. An amateur ornithologist studying sandpipers finds her remains on the beach 6 months later. With nothing to go on but bones, Police Lieutenant Pete Morales (Ricardo Montalban) sends what remains of the skeleton to a pioneering forensic pathologist at Harvard University, Dr. McAdoo (Bruce Bennett), who is eventually able to identify the woman as Vivian. Eager to solve his first murder case, Morales follows the trail to Mrs. Smerrling (Elsa Lanchester), the treacherous proprietress of the boarding house where Vivian lived, and to a hapless man she was with before she died (Marshall Thompson).
John Alton, the best-known of film noir cinematographers -and one that I sometimes find too showy, does some lovely work in "Mystery Street". As is his tendency, he often lets the characters go completely into shadow. He called it "mystery lighting". But "Mystery Street" is a straightforward police procedural with an emphasis on new techniques in forensic science. If anything is striking about this film, it is its occasional foray into the macabre. The cast is unusual for a detective story in that it is an ensemble. Morales is no more prominent than anyone else, and it is Mrs. Smerrling's greed and vulgarity that is most memorable. There is a man wrongly accused as well, so elements common to film noir are incorporated into a conventional, but particularly well-plotted, murder mystery.
The DVD (Warner Bros. 2007): Discs from Warner Brothers' "Film Noir Classic Collection Vol. 4" have no scene menus, making it very difficult for anyone studying the films to find what they are looking for. Both films have a featurette (5 minutes each) in which film critics and historians talk about the film, a theatrical trailer, and a feature commentary. The constant, somewhat manic commentary for "Act of Violence" is by Dr. Drew Casper of the University of Southern California. He discusses the score, performances, pacing, script, themes, how characters are revealed, and more. The commentary for "Mystery Street" is by Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward, who talk about the cinematography, cast, plot, docu-noir style, staging, and scene analysis. Subtitles for both films are available in English SDH and French.
Summary of Act of Violence / Mystery Street (Film Noir Double Feature)
Studio: Warner Home Video Release Date: 07/31/2007Drama DVD Video
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