Yes, Velda, I hate all women.
If the storytellers behind My Gun Is Quick (1957) had been a little more careful with the details of their story, it could have been a little less distracting with questions like, How did she know that? and How did the bad guys find him?
This is one of the stories of the legendary private detective Mike Hammer, he who hands out and absorbs “justice” in equal amounts. A bag of jewelry, stolen during World War II, is hidden somewhere near Hammer’s home base in California, and a young, hopeless lady is wearing one of its rings on her finger. Told it is worthless, Hammer lends her some cash to go home and stop being “in the business,” but before she can make it to the bus stop, fate befalls her, and she’s left a broken bundle on the street. And … ringless.
Just Another Dancer, Just Another Prancer, Watch Out, Vixen, Or you’ll be taking a lickin’! (with apologies to Santa Claus)
Outraged, Hammer goes to work, with and against the police, looking for a killer who destroyed the woman, pushes a mute from a window, drowns another dancer just for associating with Hammer, all while the glitter of jewels blinds them all to the sad lack of morals that compels them onward.
But even Hammer is caught flat-footed when the killer finally stands forth from the shadows, grasping after the glitter that has tantalized them for so long with one hand, holding a gun in the other. And what of the long-suffering Velda, Hammer’s secretary?
This is middlin’ film noir, fascinating in a morbid sort of way as it explores the consequences of the greedy decisions of its many characters – and the desserts they get for their troubles. And, perhaps most troubling of all, is that even in the grasp of dire consequences, they do not weep for their errors, or cower from their punishment, do they?
“You’re a fool, Hammer, a fool! I thought you were just like me!”
That’s blindness.
