A couple of nights ago we enjoyed a movie that rather brought home the timelessness of the conundrums of crime and redemption: KISS OF DEATH (1947), with Victor Mature and Richard Widmark. Mature plays Bianco, a man with a criminal past, a wife, and children to support. Unable to find a job, he returns to his roots and knocks over a jewelry store; the silent alarm is rung and, as the store is on an upper floor of a skyscraper, Bianco (but not his assistants) is caught and convicted.
Initially, he refuses to give up the names of the other criminals, but a few months later, word comes that his wife, despondent over finances, has committed suicide, and the children are consigned to an orphanage. All this despite the promises of an elder in the criminal hierarchy, and it dawns on Bianco that loyalty to the criminal subculture has brought him heartbreak, his dreams to naught.
Betrayal becomes the name of the game, as Bianco gives evidence that Tommy Udo (Widmark) is involved in a murder, as well as a babysitter who sees Bianco as the man of her dreams (and now it occurs to me that maybe she knocked off the wife!) and marries him. Out on parole, his children retrieved and a home bought, Bianco must now testify against Udo to make sure he goes away forever.
Juries can be such dicks.
Udo is completely psycho, and Widmark makes it believable, as the writers give him the task of pushing an old woman in a wheelchair (a little gem herself, evidencing a bit of humor in what could have been a colorless role) down a flight of stairs. He feeds off that initial bit of insanity to evidence narcissism and arrogance certain to color the memories of viewers.
However, I find it hard to agree with the categorization of this movie as noir, because it’s usually such a personal thing; in this movie, the noir may be considered to refer to the situation of ex-cons in general, rather than the poor decisions of Bianco. In noir, no angel descends to save the hero from their bad decisions, but rather they die in their cars, maybe in the midst of evil, perhaps even as they grasp after the good (as in RIFIFI).
But if you enjoy the old movies, this is certainly worth a gander. The dialogue doesn’t dance like that in the THE THIN MAN, or have the charisma of THE CRIME DOCTOR series, but the nitty-gritty may be more important than those two facets – the grind of the everyday life for a convict trying to make good.
