Friday, March 2, 2012

Detour (1945)

Director: Edgar G. Ulmer               Writer: Martin Goldsmith
Film Score: Leo Erdody                   Cinematography: Benjamin H. Kline
Starring: Tom Neal, Ann Savage, Claudia Drake, and Edmund MacDonald

Edgar G. Ulmer’s Detour is a difficult film to watch, figuratively and literally. Watching Tom Neal’s Al Roberts dismember his life, one limb at a time, with a rusty knife, is bad enough. But the physical act of watching the film itself is even worse. In a previous review I stated that neither great actors nor the most opulent sets can make up for a poor script, but I also have to state that the obverse is also true: the best script in the world can not make up for poor acting and cheap sets. Detour, despite its inclusion in The B List and its cult reputation, is a poverty row production in which not even an entertaining script and directorial vision can overcome its dearth of resources.

To begin with, Tom Neal and Ann Savage are far inferior as actors, even compared to marginal noir talent like Lizabeth Scott and Arthur Kennedy, and as such their performances drag down the entire production. While Neal is a capable onscreen presence, his voice-over narration is so rapid-fire as to come off comical in most instances. Savage is even worse. While the script might have provided her with a certain depth of character had she chosen (or been directed) to modulate her performance, instead she chews the scenery like James Cagney on speed. Her attempt to get Neal to go along with the plan to inherit from Haskell's father, her feeble attempts at seduction in the apartment, and her self-pitying drunken stupor, are all raced over like speed bumps at sixty on the Arizona desert highway and with the same jarring effect on the viewer. She's not a femme fatale, she's a nut job, and in the end the audience experiences more relief that she has died than suspense over what will happen to Neal as a result.

To be fair to Ulmer, however, perhaps that was the point. This is not a typical noir by any stretch. Neal's downward spiral is so precipitous that it is capable of eliciting laughter in much the same way as Steve Martin's depression-era Pennies from Heaven, but without the pathos of Bernadette Peters to slow up his careening descent. Even worse, Neal seems complicit in his own downfall because of his negative attitude. This also serves to ameliorate any sympathy the audience might feel for Neal. Rather than fate determining Neal's future, it is Neal's negative character. And in the end, Savage's line could easily have been the audience's: "I don't like your attitude, Roberts--all you do is bellyache."

But there are minor moments to admire. Ulmer's close-ups on a sweat-drenched Neal, complete with spotlight on his face against a dark background, are effective, especially when he pulls back to reveal the giant, expressionist coffee mug in the diner. In addition, the musical sequences are superb, with the pianist double demonstrating Tatum-like virtuosity that makes Neal's downfall that much more tragic. Among these scenes is the dream sequence where Neal imagines performing with Claudia Drake in a Hollywood nightclub, an element rarely seen in noir, the imagining of an idealized future. Ultimately, however, these moments are not enough to save the picture.

James Hoberman’s review of the picture for The B List is primarily an essay on Ulmer and, as such, a worthy expenditure of time, though the two paragraphs he spends on Detour are not enough to compel viewing. Like any poverty row feature there is simply too much to overcome, most critically the acting. As a cheap, independent film it certainly holds its own against Bowery Boys films on Monogram, Republic serials and John Wayne’s Lone Star westerns, and is miles ahead of PRC’s (Producers Releasing Corporation) usual productions of anti-Nazi propaganda and Rondo Hatton horror flicks. But like the films of Ed Wood, it’s something that needs to be seen to be believed.

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