He Walked By Night
by Alfred L. Werker, Anthony Mann
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: James Cardwell, Richard Basehart, Roy Roberts, Scott Brady, Whit BissellDirector: Alfred L. Werker, Anthony Mann
Brand: Sony
Cinematographer: John Alton
Producer: Bryan Foy
Producer: Robert Kane
Writer: Crane Wilbur
Writer: Harry Essex
Writer: John C. Higgins
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language); Spanish (Original Language)
Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 79 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-12-02
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
Movie Reviews of He Walked By Night
Movie Review: One of the best crime dramas of the film noir genre
Summary: 5 Stars
"He Walked by Night" is a 1948 black-and-white film noir crime drama that was shot in semi-documentary style and inspired one of the film's actors, Jack Webb, to create the radio and later television program Dragnet, which the film clearly resembles. This movie seems to be ahead of its time in several ways. Unlike other crime dramas of the thirties and forties, there is a lack of hammy dialog, no girl with a heart of gold standing behind her man - either criminal or police officer, and no background information given explaining the criminal's motivation, or any of the other plot gimicks that run from the early talkie gangster films into the crime dramas of the post-war era. Also, there is no mystery for the audience to solve, as the actions of the police and the criminal are clearly shown to the audience. The only question is when and how their paths will finally cross.
Richard Basehart, who portrays criminal Roy Martin in this film, really owns the movie. He shines as a relentless sociopath whose only tender spot seems to be for his own dog. Because he doesn't associate with known criminals and lives quietly, he is exceptionally hard to track down. Basehart actually has very few lines, but he is great at expressing his state of mind through his gestures and facial expressions. The film's excellent cinematography surrounds Basehart's character with cold, deterministic pools of light and darkness so that he really does seem like some type of shadow of evil that has descended upon the city. The killer in the film was actually based on real-life criminal Erwin Walker. However, wanting to concentrate on both the crime solving techniques involved and the habits of the criminal, this interesting and lengthy backstory was omitted to keep the film tight and fast paced.
Erwin Walker was a brilliant student at the California Institute of Technology, a radio dispatcher for the police department in his native Glendale, and something of a hero as a lieutenant in charge of a radar unit on Okinawa during World War II. Walker returned from overseas duty deeply disturbed, and set out on a crime spree of more than a dozen holdups and burglaries to raise money for construction of a "death ray machine" that he thought would somehow make another war impossible. Twice Walker shot his way out of police traps, escaping through the labyrinth of storm drain pipes under Los Angeles and eventually killing a police officer. He was sentenced to death, but was later found to be insane by prison psychiatrists, and his execution was postponed indefinitely. California governor Pat Brown commuted his sentence to life in 1961, and in 1971 Walker was granted a new trial due to his original confession having been found to be coerced. Remarkably, he was acquitted at the second trial, changed his name, married, and took a job as a chemist somewhere in Southern California, never to be heard from publicly again.
Thus, just or unjust, the inspiration for this movie had quite a different outcome than the villain in the film. Of course, in 1948, nobody would have dared write such a screenplay and have expected to ever work in Hollywood again.
Normally, I would recommend one of the Film Noir boxed sets that includes this movie, but I can't seem to find one that has all of my favorites - "Asphalt Jungle", "Scarlet Street", "He Walked by Night" (of course), and "Clash By Night". One of my favorite film noir epics that doesn't show up anywhere - either in a box set or an individual DVD or even VHS - is "Nora Prentiss", which is truly a classic.
Summary of He Walked By Night
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