Visiting Film Noir: The Damned Don't Cry

1950 Film Noir

From Warner Bros.

Directed by Vincent Sherman

Starring

Joan Crawford

David Brian

Steve Cochran

Kent Smith

Selena Royle

Hugh Sanders

Jacqueline deWit

Richard Egan

After the success that Warner Bros and Joan Crawford had with 1945's film noir Mildred Pierce, they tried to repeat the pattern over and over again with more B noirs and as many romance dramas as they could conjure up.  For my money the best from that period was 1953's Sudden Fear but this one isn't bad... not bad at all.

Crawford liked the down-on-her-luck-but-just-you-wait stories because she knew that saga well since she had lived it.  She didn't have to act as much as she needed to recall.  She didn't care how she got to the streets paved with gold but by God she was gonna get there.  She would do anything to get what she wanted.  She changed her name, invented a new personality, married into a wealthy Hollywood family and was on her way up.  

Around the late 40s her leading men started getting younger.  Here, Brian is 10 years younger, Cochran is 13 years younger and Egan is 17 years younger.  Smith was the oldest at three years younger.  Here, too, she's a little long in the tooth for her role but she likely dismissed the idea when she read the script to discover she would have relationships with four men.  In two, maybe three cases it went beyond playing characters.

She is given the name Ethel for her role as a dirt-poor wife and mother, living with her parents, in a loveless marriage (to Egan).  After their young son, riding his new bicycle, is killed when he is struck by a truck, Crawford takes her suitcase and leaves. 

With newcomer Richard Egan

She gets a low-class job modeling clothes.  When Smith applies for a job and she realizes that he is poor but enormously talented, she uses her charms and powers of persuasion to get him hired.  Before long she's coaching him in most matters in his life while he has fallen in love with her.

Together they hear that a wealthy man (Brian) is looking for a business manager to handle his unwieldy affairs.  Crawford handles the maneuvers to get him hired.  After Smith learns that Brian runs an organized crime syndicate and is a murderous thug, he wants to quit but Crawford convinces Smith that he is in now, it will give him the riches he wants and Brian will see to it nothing happens to Smith.  

Brian takes a liking to Crawford, despite her insolent manner.  That very fact is one of the film's flaws because Brian's character is without character or empathy and he would never permit someone talking down to him, man or woman.  Here's where we have to say... aw yes, I forgot for a sec, this is a Crawford flick.  She must always be top dog, in charge, not made to look the fool, whatever other vanity things needed massaging.  All her films of this general period were all the same.

With Steve Cochran

Of course, her romantic leading lady days were behind her.  Perhaps no one was brave enough to tell her.  While her looks were never exactly soft, they had become more coarse as she grew older and too much makeup oddly helped her look more stern.

Brian, raging with unbridled lust, offers her kisses and attention and a place on his staff.  Soon she is moving among the overly-tanned Palm Springs glitterati and asks to be called Lorna.   From here the remainder of the film could be subtitled be careful what you wish for.  

With Kent Smith

She is in PS to handle an assignment from Brian and is none too happy about it.  She is instructed to ingratiate herself (if you don't like ingratiate, feel free to substitute) with the lusty Cochran, a lieutenant of the west coast division of the syndicate.  Cochran is getting too big for his britches which, coincidentally, is the very thing that she likes about him.  Soon she's not doing her job, certainly not reporting on him, and she's fallen in love with his manly charms.

Soon Crawford and her three men are all in Palm Springs.  They have shown up for the ending of this sordid little tale.  The finale is a little improbable which we'll ignore because it is even more tense and exciting.  Scene-by-urgent-scene one of the four leads drops off until not one of them is left standing at the end.  Hmmm.

While not an acting tour-de-force for any of them, they all understood the needs for a B film noir.  There's no real hero to root for so it ends up being just one of those grim but fun crime capers.  And I like 'em.

I think Crawford understood movie-making at all levels.  She made it her business to do so and from early in her career.  I think on her acting prowess, she was perfectly fine... never a great actress but not a terrible one.  She was a famous one.  She knew how she looked best, she knew about clothing and her body.  I think she knew little about hair and makeup.  She knew how she wanted to be lit.  She understood her face completely... which side looks best, about those brows, special attention to make-up on her cheekbones.  She knew what facial expression went with any emotion called for.  She knew how to strike a pose.  She knew how to make a Crawford film.

So, yeah, sure, she turned in the usual competent performance that she gave around this time... nothing exceptional although hardly bad.  There was always the usual criticism of her performances though... all surface acting, no subtlety, no nuance, no surprises.

By this film her stock-in-trade was certainly well-developed... the hard-boiled look and a dressing down of someone weaker.  Crawford wanted no real competition up there on that screen and that's why her leading men were beneath her station.  Sure there were all those Gable flicks but how about Wendell Corey, Michael Wilding, Barry Sullivan, John Ireland, Zachary Scott and of course Cochran, Brian and Smith.  

Are they arranged in her favorite order? 

Crawford had a reputation.  Oh yes, she did.  Many Hollywood wives likely preferred their spouses not work with her.  Some men fled from her, others welcomed an outing or another one.  While she was carrying on a years' long affair with director Sherman, here she also was having affairs with Cochran (a randy actor if there ever was one) and a newly-divorced Brian.  He had been her costar a year earlier and would be again.  It's likely Egan joined the list of paramours... they apparently went on numerous long walks together.  Crawford believed she gave something a little extra to performances when she knew her costars and directors well.  

Brian was a tall, handsome blond man who could act (a yummy villain) but for some reason never connected and never achieved the fame he was seeking.  More type-casting for Cochran.  You want a handsome, ladies' man hoodlum type, call Cochran?  He delivers.  Smith so often played mousy guys who were smart and dull.  Royle is good as a society matron friend of Brian's who guides Crawford into high society's good graces.  

Egan attracted some attention in just his third film as the rather unpleasant husband.  I'm certain Crawford liked him because she liked his type.  She often invited newbies over to her Brentwood home to study the script together... and some oldies, too.  Egan was rarely this morose and disagreeable in his films and it grabbed my attention.  

The writing was good enough to pass inspection although it seemed so unmotherly to not have Crawford show more remorse over the death of her son.  One scene should have done it but instead her bags are packed and she's ready to leave her claustrophobic life behind.

With director-lover Vincent Sherman

Sherman knew it was no masterpiece but he tried to deliver a compelling B crime caper that was a cautionary tale about a desperate woman in over her head.  He brought suspense and tension to the project, never allowing it to become dull.

Here's the trailer:

Next posting:

Another hoofer