ScreenPix

Here's one on ScreenPix you can bypass: The Steel Lady.

I wanted to like this. Oil prospectors, scanning the Sahara with some newfangled equipment hanging from the bottom of their plane, hit a Sirocco and are forced to land.

The engines and radio are both out and they don't have a lot of supplies. Luckily they find a buried Kraut tank from WWII. And it still works! But Bedouins are after them because the Germans who owned this tank stole some jewels from them. And they think that now these Americans have the jewels.

Flat characters, predictable plot, and nothing making a whole lot of sense all combine to topple would could have been an interesting drama. Just a general artlessness pervades this one. And none of the characters (even the villains) are compelling.

I know diamonds are forever, but the chicks would have been worth more to me. 

Here's another one with Rory Calhoun: The Big Caper

Frank Harper (Calhoun) has quickly blown at the racetrack the bucks he made on his last caper. He sees an opportunity to knock over a bank for a government payroll worth a million dollars.

He brings his proposal to boss-man Flood (James Gregory). Gregory went to prison once doing a bank job and swore to stick to lower-risk larceny. He knows that bank jobs are a whole other realm of risk.

He turns Harper down but Harper's persistence (and perhaps the natural greed of a criminal) eventually win Flood over. What can go wrong?

Everything. This movie is fully of wonderfully cliched and overblown characters, including Flood's dirty-work man, the creepy Roy...played interestingly by Corey Allen. And then there's "Doll," the dumb-blonde attached to one of the heist men who learns too much about their plans and becomes a potential danger.

But everything connected to this job is ready-made to blow up in their face. The guy who is supposed to set off a lot of bombs as a diversion (Zimmer) is a drunk pyromaniac totally out of control.

It's really a comedy of errors. I don't think they were going for funny. But they often achieved it. An interesting (and odd) element is Frank Harper buying a gas station across from the bank they are going to knock off. He pretends to be husband-and-wife with Flood's girl, Kay (Mary Costa). Costa easily gives the best and most complex performance. But there's no apparent reason why they need this charade to knock over the bank.

After having pretended to be a middle-class husband-and-wife for several months, Kay begins to love the life beyond crime. She likes the normalcy of neighborhoods, barbecues, and staying in one place. For a moment the film plays with this dynamic and flirts with being something deeper than a b-movie. But ultimately it's just a passing fancy. This is a shame because the breakdown of the heist is inevitable, obvious, and not at all interesting when it happens. The viewer isn't left with much at the end of this.

But if you like heist films, give this one a watch. It's outrageously bizarre at times. But until the very end, generally it is quite interesting. It should also be noted that Calhoun will never replace Humphrey Bogart. Bogart had a way of playing a bad guy without losing his appeal. But Calhoun is a bit of a stiff and can only ever flirt with sociopathy in terms of adding any depth to his character.

It's worth watching just to see Creepy Roy. He's like some psychotic version of The Beach Boys. And "Doll" is so boom-boom dumb that you can't help but like her. Or despise her with warm feelings.

Crime of Passion

Kathy Doyle (Barbara Stanwyck) is a hard-bitten reporter/gossip columnist. She is moving on to a bigger job in New York. But in the meantime she meets a homicide detective, Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden). They are instantly smitten with each other. She junks the job in New York, they get hitched, and she moves in with him in his house in LA.

The synopsis declares succinctly: "[she] is frustrated by his lack of ambition and the banality of life in the suburbs. Her drive to advance Bill's career soon takes her down a dangerous path.

This is all well and good as a plot. The problem is, they make some leaps without building much of a foundation. Yes, people can be impulsive. Yes, people do meet and get married before really knowing each other.

But the hard-bitten, career-oriented Kathy instantly terns into Miss Domestic Wanna-Please-My-Man. It's not at all convincing even if well-acted. The script takes too many shortcuts to make much of the movie believable.

But it's a strong cast that also includes Raymond Burr as Bill's boss. This review nails if if you want to learn more. But the sheer bizarreness of this hard-charging story makes it interesting to watch. Just don't expect subtlety.