A different way of telling a story

Watch something else. There are very few redeeming qualities to this film.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

It's impossible to get at the mystery here. Like the three main suspects find themselves in a maze of trouble in having no idea of what is going on, so will the audience find themselves in hopeless bewilderment that just gets worse all the time for the towering confusion. At the same time, this film is hilariously witty and surprising all the way - the odd twists and turns of this outrageously baffling mystery never stop coming up with new surprises, while the greatest one awaits you in the end. There is a lot of house-breaking in this film, and none of the actors seem surprised or even to mind that people keep breaking in at midnight to keep them company in their bedroom. Victor Mature is the lead as the most harassed suspect, but Laird Cregar as the inspector general gets the better of the whole show - if ever you were troubled by nasty policemen, they will all appear like angels in comparison with this awesome smiling sadist, who enjoys subjecting you to interminable psychic torture, and he is sure to get you in the end - his record is perfect, there is not a trace of a flaw in his long career, and everyone hates him, including his fellow policemen, especially his chief. This policeman could make you hate all policemen forever. It's a fascinating character performance that you will never forget.Victor Mature is hardened enough by his long association with difficult people in publicity business to be able to cope with him endurably, while he scares both Betty Grable and Alan Mowbray. Elisha Cook is scary in the other direction, while the blonde sisters Betty Grable and Carole Landis are too pretty and easily carried away not to end up in trouble. Carole Landis is the beauty whom you only meet in flashbacks, while her sister is less convincing as a blonde bombshell - how could anyone fall in love with her? The main attraction and asset of the film is the brilliant script and story with a dialogue that will send you flying with delight over and over again. Everyone is witty, and the sparkling humour is a startling contrast to the sinister dark mystery of the murder, perfectly unsolvable, and yet the logic of the story couldn't be more impeccable and natural.

The biggest problem of some critics and chroniclers of Noir with the film I Wake Up Screaming is that they don't know how to categorize it. It doesn't fit the carefully crafted "German Expressionism" influence scenario that they have worked out as the origin of Noir. It's Director H. Bruce Humberstone, never made another Noir, it's brilliant cinematographer, Edward Cronjager, never filmed another Noir so conceptually and visually it's a one off, one of a kind, sui generis.I'm calling it a seminal "Gateway Noir" because the film serves the same purpose as a gateway drug, it functions as a sort of gateway to Noir for those unfamiliar, at that point in time, with what eventually came to be known stylistically, and hard boiled narratively, as Films Noir.Look at the film in chronological context, only Stranger On The Third Floor (1940) approaches it in Noir visual stylistics, while The Maltese Falcon (1941) released only twenty eight days ahead of it on October 3, has the hard boiled story by Dashiell Hammett, but barely any of the signature visual stylistics. I Wake up Screaming not only was based on the hard boiled novel by Steve Fisher and also has the brilliant Noir stylistics in abundance but it has much much more. You can say that the film has dissociative identity, multiple genres if you will. It's also a bit of a Screwball Comedy, a Romantic Drama, and almost a Musical. This seamless genre bending provides the "gateway" for Comedy, Romance, and Musical audiences at that time into the films that eventually will be pigeonholed into the future Noir cycle.My assertion is that if you've screened I Wake Up Screaming after the various other Noirs it will seem a strange hybrid indeed, because of the conceptions you've already amassed. But, experiencing it as audiences did in 1941 it would probably seem fresh and innovative.The credits flash against a Noir New York Skyline the titles are written in marquee lights and we hear a the musical equivalent of a shrill klaxon horn blasting out a danger warning. It segues into Street Scene one of the signature New York City themes. Street Scene was used by 20th Century Fox for the films Street Scene, Cry of the City, Kiss of Death, Where the Sidewalk Ends, The Dark Corner, and as the overture to How to Marry a Millionaire. The story even actually starts with a street scene a newsboy hawking the murder of a model. We then cut to a dark police interrogation room bright spot lights are sweating a suspect, classic Noir. Professional promoter Frankie Christopher (Victor Mature) is being grilled, surrounded by shadowy figures barking questions.Frankie then begins to relate the story, and in a flashback we are transported to a Times Square restaurant and we are brightly lit again and into screwball comedy mode. Frankie and his two pals, over the hill actor Robin Ray (Alan Mowbray) and gossip columnist Larry Evans (Allyn Joslyn) flirt with hash slinger Vicky Lynn (Carole Landis). In a nod to Pygmalion Frankie makes a bet that he can transform Vicky into a celebrity inside of six weeks. Cut again to a classy nightclub where Frankie introduces Vicky, now dressed in evening gown and sable, to café-society. Throughout the film the sequences that feature Vicky or are in some way connected to her also have the Street Scene theme in various arrangements jazz, muted trumpet, etc., it becomes her leitmotif, and suggests the Musical genre. In a later sequence in a police projection room we see Vicky singing on her screen test.We cut back to the police station, back to the present, and back into Noirsville. We now see Jill Lynn (Betty Grable) being questioned in the dimly lit squad room. As Jill tells her story we again go into flashback. She tells us how Vicky came home that first night and told Jill that she was through slinging hash and that from now on she had other things to sling. She had offers for modeling, commercials etc., etc. Jill tells her it's just easy money "your picture is on a magazine one day and in the ash can the next." Vicky is unfazed she snaps back that she knows what she wants and how to get it..The weeks pass and Jill finds herself falling in love with Frankie. Every time Jill and Frankie are together Over the Rainbow plays in one form or another as their "love" leitmotif another nod to musicals. Street Scene is not only Vicky's leitmotif but also it represents the New York, anything goes, sophisticate. The juxtaposition between it and Over The Rainbow which also brings to mind innocence is interesting for this Noir.During another session with the cops Jill remembers a stranger she saw staring at Vicky through the window of the restaurant one night. It turns out to be Lt. Cornell (the name a nod to Cornell Woolrich) who is unhealthily obsessed with Vicky Lynn. Cornell also has a moody, sinister leitmotif.Cornell is trying hard to pin the murder on Frankie, going as far as withholding and planting evidence. Elisha Cook Jr. is Harry Williams the nervous Nellie desk clerk at the residence hotel where Vicky and Jill have their apartment.We get another Screwball Comedy sequence when Vicky tells her three "creators" that she's signed a long term contract for Hollywood and that she's leaving for the West Coast. We see Frankie, Robin, and Larry are seated on bar stools drowning their sorrows and taking pop shots at one another.The cat and mouse game between Frankie and Cornell plays out to the end with some nice interesting twists. The screen-caps are from the Fox Film Noir DVD. The film is like an early flyover of Noirsville 9/10.

Victor Mature plays Frankie Christopher, a somewhat smarmy but likable enough sports promoter. He lays eyes on gorgeous waitress Vicky Lynn (Carole Landis), and determines that he can make her a popular glamour girl. Well, he does, but just when things are looking brightest for her, she gets murdered. Now, Frankie, who'd discovered her dead body, is believed by the police to be the killer. The lead inspector, Ed Cornell (Laird Cregar), is more convinced than anybody, and swears that he will prove Frankie guilty no matter how much time it takes. Meanwhile, Frankie and Vicky's sister Jill (Betty Grable) fall in love and set out to try and prove his innocence."I Wake Up Screaming" is a thoroughly absorbing murder mystery made by a veteran director of the genre, H. Bruce Humberstone. All of the characters are engaging and maintain ones' interest. Mature is especially good in the lead, with a top notch supporting performance by the sadly short lived Cregar. Cregar had a presence that extended beyond being just physically big. The incredibly beautiful ladies Landis and Grable are compulsively watchable, and naturally there are a few opportunities to admire Grables' gorgeous gams. William Gargan, Alan Mowbray, Allyn Joslyn, Elisha Cook Jr., Morris Ankrum, and Charles Lane are all great.This film looks just as fine as anything else made in the genre, with the expected contrasts between light and shadow. The best thing about it is that, even if the viewer believes that they've solved the mystery early on, it still tells a good story in capable fashion, focusing on a theme of obsession.Eight out of 10.

It was the dynamic title that drove me to this oddity. Then there was also the cast, Betty Grable in a noir drama? She's very pleasing in her early strait role (was that magnificent blond hair truly real?) Victor Mature demonstrates his increasingly nervous discomfort throughout the progress of this story via his iconic facial expressions, belying his characters over-confident exterior. The cause of this discomfort comes in the form of a creepy Laid Cregar, a strange detective who is determined to nail Mature for a serious crime. An interesting scene has him wake to the sense of an ominous presence in his apartment that would have had me screaming too - I can't too readily recall another actor that could signal fear, with just one instant facial expression.Carole Landis, who tragically took her own life at only 29, following a scandalous affair with married philanderer Rex Harrison, is OK in the part of Grable's sister. With so many others in the support cast also being noteworthy, this just had to be seen.The Director; Bruce Humberstone, whom I had associated more with comedies, musicals, and outdoor actioners (Tazan and westerns) seems to be in his element with this fast moving crime story by prolific writer; Steve Fisher ("Lady in the Lake" '46) Good one liners come rapidly and often.It gets off to a cracking opening with striking sets by multi award winning Thomas Little; "Grapes of Wrath" '40 ~ "Razors Edge" '46 ~ Viva Zapata" '52. With Art Direction by two up and coming directors, Richard Day, and Nathan Juran. Another veteran, Director of Photography; Edward Cronjager, "Roberta" '35 ~ "House by the River" '50 ~ "Relentless" '48 ~ "Beneath the 12 mile Reef" '53, all combine to assure this film a stylish look and feel.It may not always work as well as you might like, but it keeps you watching and guessing to the end. The biggest draw back for me was the musical direction by English born Cyril J. Mockridge. He must have been given only a few days to prepare a score and I don't think he wrote a note of original music. Instead, he uses music tracks from the library of popular standards. The best of these is Alfred Newman's "Street Scene" put to good use under the opening credits. Another is Harold Arlen's immortal "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". Both these melodies keep popping up at the most unnecessary moments during the story, so much so, that by the time the end title arrives you may well wake up screaming too...Not great, but still good entertainment.