User Reviews

The first 30 minutes are terrific. Three navy buddies are returning from combat in the Pacific. The trouble is that Buzz (Bendix) now has a plate in his head and doesn't think too well, while Johnny (Ladd) has a faithless wife (Dowling) who welcomes him home with a party for her boyfriend (de Silva). The party scene is especially well done with the girls looking like they've emptied Paramount's best wardrobe racks. Now Johnny's angry and footloose, while poor Buzz keeps hearing "monkey music" in his plated head. So when the faithless wife unsurprisingly turns up dead, the cops are looking for Johnny and we're wondering who really did it.

The trouble is the story meanders after this promising start, while Ladd fades somewhat into the background, and Chandler's screenplay seems unsure what to do with Veronica Lake. After all, what's the point of the lengthy diversion with the two "heist" guys and the fleabag hotel, or Dad's blackmailing of Harwood, both of which detract from the central plot of who killed Helen. Marshall's direction doesn't help either. Note the deliberate pauses in too many of the dialogue exchanges that slows down the action when what's needed is more snap to match Chandler's often clever lines. Then too, for what seems like noir material, there's not much matching atmosphere. Ultimately, the movie's really more of a meandering thriller than a compelling noir.

There are compensations, however. Bendix really delivers as the brain-damaged ex-sailor. His scenes are the movie's real core and have lost none of their original force as he struggles painfully to fight through the mental fog that the war has cost him. This may be the only post-war film to portray the ravages of his type of injury, albeit in a non-rehabilitative context. We wonder what will become of him. I gather the screenplay originally set him up as the culprit, but navy authorities objected—too sensitive for returning vets, I would guess. It may also be worth noting that even though Buzz's injury evokes sympathy, he's none too likable—something of a surprise given Hollywood's tendency to sentimentalize. Nonetheless, he's often belligerent and abusive toward strangers, a boldly realistic move on both Chandler's and Bendix's parts.

I guess no commentary would be complete without remarking on the Ladd-Lake pairing, perhaps the most perfect visual match-up from Hollywood's so-called golden era. They're like two exquisite blond dolls with wryly brittle personas to match. I'm just sorry the script got sidetracked into not giving their pairing the amount of screen time they deserved. And speaking of visual perfection, was there ever a better embodiment of an unfaithful wife than Doris Dowling with her cruel eyes and drop-dead sexy gown. No wonder she cuts through even Buzz's mental fog. With her unusual appearance, it's too bad Dowling left Hollywood at the height of the Mc Carthy investigations. Too bad also that Ladd's career was plagued by his lack of height 5'5''. In fact, like Cagney 5'6", Ladd could project the authority of a much taller man, a real tribute to his abilities. Nonetheless, note how in giving a description of Johnny (Ladd) in the movie, all his physical characteristics are included except his height!—a rather glaring omission.

Anyway, the movie remains an interesting period piece, even though it lacks the coherence and snap of a first-rate thriller.

"The Blue Dahlia" is one of the more high profile film noirs of the mid-forties, with a screenplay by Raymond Chandler, direction by George Marshall, and starring performances by one of the more famous romantic teams of the era, Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake. It sounds like a classic but plays out as just somewhat above average. Chandler put Ladd down as not in Bogart's class, a small boy's idea of a tough guy, but Ladd is strong in his role of the returning veteran. The real weakness is Lake, catatonic in a bland role with little dimension or mystery. We know from the get go that she didn't do it, which may have been a mistake and no reason is given for this sweet girl-next-door being married to a gangster. Their meeting, with Lake picking up Ladd in the rain followed by an instant romance, is beyond contrived.

The plot is a sort of sour take-off on "The Best Years of Our Lives" with three returning servicemen heading back into civilian life. While Fredric March came back to perfect wife Myrna Loy, Ladd finds an unfaithful Doris Dowling drunkenly laughing in his face over being responsible for the death of their son. Ladd threatens her with his gun but, in another contrivance, leaves it and her behind as he walks out into the rain. The next morning wifey is found shot dead with Ladd the obvious suspect. With help from Lake, he eludes the police and tries to ferret out his wife's killer, another contrivance as she meant nothing to him and his motivation is a pale copy of Bogart's logic from "The Maltese Falcon."

The solution to the mystery is no great shakes, but the movie plays well because of some crisp dialogue by Chandler, plus interesting and well-acted supporting characters. William Bendix shines as a wounded serviceman with mental problems, Howard Da Silva as a smooth gangster with a hidden past, Will Wright as an extremely sleazy bungalow peeper and blackmailer, and Tom Powers as a sarcastic cop.

All in all, I expected it to be better, but certainly worth a look for fans of old crime movies.

War veterans rarely find the return to civilian life a straightforward experience and so it is with two of the characters in "The Blue Dahlia". The aptly named Buzz Wanchek (William Bendix) has a metal plate in his head and certain sounds, such as loud music, trigger painful and noisy reverberations which cause him to become very agitated and angry. He also becomes very bewildered and frustrated from time to time as he suffers from confusing periods of memory loss. Johnny Morrison (Alan Ladd) suffers a different but also common problem when he finds that things at home have changed and not for the better.

Johnny returns from the war, traumatised from completing too many missions, only to find that his wife Helen (Doris Dowling) has become a heavy drinker and is having an affair with Eddie Harwood (Howard Da Silva) the owner of a night club called "The Blue Dahlia". Johnny's anger increases when she tells him that their son was killed in a car crash which she caused by driving when she was drunk. They quarrel so loudly that the house detective calls by to ask them to keep the noise down. Afterwards, Johnny collects his case and initially confronts Helen with a gun but then calms down and throws it in a chair before leaving.

Johnny unknowingly meets Harwood's estranged wife Joyce (Veronica Lake) when she sees him standing at the roadside in heavy rain and then drives him to a Malibu beach inn where he stays overnight. They arrange a morning walk on the beach together but this plan is quickly dropped when reports of Helen's murder are broadcast and the announcement is made that the police are looking for Johnny. He immediately leaves the inn but returns later, meets up with Joyce and tells her that he's got to find the murderer before the police find him because, if that happens, they won't bother to look anywhere else. He initially suspects Harwood but eventually when the police are able to determine the time of the murder, they are able to eliminate both Johnny and Harwood as suspects before the real culprit is identified.

"The Blue Dahlia" is a fast moving and thoroughly enjoyable thriller with a series of plot developments which propel the action along with great pace and purpose. Raymond Chandler's Oscar nominated screenplay contains typically sharp dialogue and was the only one in his career which wasn't adapted from a novel. Some entertaining devices are used, such as, the existence of two characters (Johnny & Harwood) who each use two identities and two couples (Buzz & Helen and Johnny & Joyce) where the individuals are already tenuously linked but initially meet by chance in circumstances where they don't know each other. The theme of doubles also emerges elsewhere in the story as it contains two "cheap blackmailers" (Dad Newell & Corelli), two women (Helen & Joyce) who irritate Buzz with their habits of picking petals off flowers and two men (Johnny & Harwood) who both dump Helen on the same evening.

Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake have great on-screen chemistry and deliver very good performances in their ultra-cool style. The stand out performance, however, comes from William Bendix who strongly displays all the tension, anger, confusion and erratic behaviour that he suffers as a result of his injuries.

For all it's reputation The Blue Dahlia is a disappointing film noir particularly when one considers the talents involved. The story is overloaded with coincidences, the dialogue is flat & unmemorable, and the mystery is poorly plotted. The film had potential and evidence suggests a better story was torpedoed by the US Navy of all groups.

The tale concerns Navy veteran Johnny Marshall (Ladd) who returns to his unfaithful wife (Doris Dowling) and learns the death of his small child was due to his wife's drunkenness and not diphtheria as he had been told. After professing his desire to kill her he storms out of her bungalow and stupidly leaves his gun behind. After several more suspects emerge the wife is found shot to death in the morning and the rest of the narrative concerns solving that mystery.

Among the suspects are gangster Eddie Harwood (da Silva) who was having an affair with the victim while estranged from his wife Joyce (Veronica Lake) and Johnny's war buddy Buzz (Bendix) who is portrayed as a loose cannon permanently comprised by a wartime head injury. The story meanders around and really goes nowhere as we are introduced to some unsavory characters and ludicrously coincidental situations (i.e. Johnny running into Joyce and taking a long drive with her). Ultimately the enigma is resolved in the last 2 minutes when the killer loses his mind and blurts out a confession with absolutely no proof of his guilt having been presented.

Given the yarn was written by the legendary Raymond Chandler it is difficult to understand how disappointing the flick turned out. Evidently Chandler learned the hard way that writing novels is infinitely easier than churning out a Hollywood screenplay. The script underwent countless revisions and Chandler's original ending - which had Buzz unmasked as the murderer; committed while suffering from the effects of his wartime injury - was vetoed by the US Naval Office. Instead of the film making a statement about the debilitating and tragic effects of combat on returning veterans it devolves into a middling potboiler with a ludicrous conclusion.

Admittedly I'm not a fan of any of the stars in this film and I find most of the performances to be poor. Alan Ladd's work consists of him being impossibly cool most of the time and then suddenly breaking out in a childish fit of temper. In addition he contributes little to the resolution of the crime. Veronica Lake is wooden in a superfluous role and there are no sparks between her & Ladd. Other than them both being short and blonde I've never understood the mania over their supposedly legendary chemistry. William Bendix's character is unlikeable even considering the head injury he's suffering from. The guy is just a jerk even in his sane moments and then Bendix chews up scenery when he goes into crazy mode depicting his suffering. The best performance comes from Howard da Silva as a shady night club owner who is running from a hidden past that he knows he cannot escape. His performance is very subtle and ultimately very sympathetic.

The one area in which the film excels is establishing the film noir mood with seedy sets, pounding rain, and so many shady characters out to chisel each other. Interesting to note that the most trustworthy people seem to be the cops. Even our hero pistol whips a smarmy hotel manager in a fit of rage. Some of these scenes are compromised by terrible rear projection effects but in the overall the noir milieu is faithfully created.

Overall The Blue Dahlia is a disappointing movie particularly given its lofty reputation and legendary talent involved. Most unfortunately the dialogue doesn't crackle like one would expect coming from the typewriter of Raymond Chandler. I'm guessing fans of the stars will enjoy it but objective viewers with no dog in the fight probably won't.

Naval officer Johnny Morrison is on shore leave from the Navy. He visits his wife, who is drinking and playing around and they have a big bust-up. When she is found murdered the next morning, Johnny is at the top of the suspect list. Can he clear his name ?

This is one of four great hard-boiled forties thrillers starring the terrific pairing of Ladd and Lake (the others are This Gun For Hire, The Glass Key and Saigon), both of whom are sensational. This one has the added distinction of being written by Raymond Chandler, and it's a great twisting whodunnit full of intrigue, surprise coincidences and ulterior motives, shot through with his wonderful hardball dialogue (when local bigshot Eddie Harwood asks, "Am I under suspicion ?", world-weary Captain Hendrickson replies, "I dunno. How do you feel about it ?".). The characters are all tough-talking, street-smart players, angling for their part in the drama, and the interplay between them is tremendous. The photography is crisp; simple and stylish at the same time (for example, the shot looking through the chair legs) and all the elements are skillfully brought together by Marshall. A nifty, expertly-written thriller, produced by the great John Houseman (Letter From An Unknown Woman, The Bad And The Beautiful).

Finally, the contractee's voice was heard by studio management. Given the go-ahead for an original suspense thriller, Raymond Chandler set to work on "The Blue Dahlia" (1946).

In many ways vintage Chandler, with lots of atmospheric touches, cynical dialogue, a fabulous femme fatale (Doris Dowling) and an embittered hero (played with an appropriate lack of emotion by Alan Ladd), the completed script hit an unexpected snag.

The Navy Department complained to the studio that portraying neurotic veterans as potential killers violated the senior service's no-no code.

A compromise was reached, forcing Chandler to re-work the ending of the movie.

That he did so under protest is evident by the slip-shod, utterly unconvincing way he "remedied" the situation.

In fact, when he revised his last word on Blue Dahlia, he tore up his contract, vowing never to work in Hollywood again.

(Available on a 10/10 Universal DVD).

My second Ladd & Lake film! I'm working my way through the Universal Film Noir box set and I have just been rewarded with another treat in this very good, very entertaining noir. Returned veteran Ladd is accused of murdering his trampy wife, and his servicemen buddies and a beautiful blonde help to clear his name. Ladd & Lake disappointingly don't get many scenes together, but the ones they do have are wonderful, they had excellent chemistry even if they weren't the world's greatest actors. Bendix gives the performance of the picture as Buzz, the veteran with shell-shock. Howard Da Silva is memorably sleazy, and Doris Dowling turns on the femme fatale appeal. I like how, as in The Best Years Of Our Lives, the problems of returning veterans are dealt with realistically. Chandler wrote the screenplay and he gives us some great noir dialogue exchanges, even if we are asked (as with "The Big Sleep") to believe in a plot with a hell of a lot of coincidences, and rushed and silly ending. Marshall does a good job directing. Its not the best noir you'll ever see, but it is great fun, especially if you like Ladd & Lake.