On Dangerous Ground
Ah, Film Noir. It’s one of my favourite genres and ‘On Dangerous Ground‘ which I caught at the cinema this weekend is one of the best if relatively unknown entries in the movement. The Ritzy Cinema in Brixton is the host of a season of crime movies, including some classic noirs from the 1940’s and 50’s. As well as starring two of my favourite actors, the film is directed by the legendary Nicholas Ray and features a score by quite simply the best composer ever to grace the cinema - Bernard Herrman.
Ryan is a cop on the edge, a cop who uses unorthodox methods but gets the job done, a cop whose partner is only a week away from retirement when he is gunned down in cold blood….actually that last one is a lie. OK, it may sound cliched, but Ryan’s fevered performance of Wilson details a man close to a breakdown, a man whose moral compass has drifted due to his suffocation in the world of crime, violence and cruelty that is threatening to engulf him. As the film opens we are taken through the usual motifs of noir - chiaroscuro lighting illuminating sleazy bars packed with lost souls, barren apartments populated by lowlife hoods, the rain drenched streets pregnant with menace.
Wilson has taken to beating information out of suspect criminals and is despatched to investigate a murder out of the city until a threatened lawsuit blows over. That’s the first of many unusual elements in this movie in conjunction with the genre - the second half of the film takes place in the wilderness ‘up north’ (the city nor outlands are ever explicitly named, just like in Se7en), the contrast between the snow cleansed barrens and grimy metropolis providing a neat visual metaphor for Wilson’s evolving psyche.
This is one of the great explicitly psychological noir’s and despite it’s happy ending - another unexpected departure for the genre - it’s a pretty dark film. Ida Lupino’s blind Mary Malden is almost saintlike, and I suspect it’s no accident that her name recalls Jesus’ mum. Incidently, Lupino went on to be that very rare thing - a female director who worked within the golden age production system. She made some terrific noir’s of her own, as well as a number of groundbreaking ‘feminist’ pictures such as ‘The Hitch Hiker‘ and ‘The Bigamist‘. For a list of key noir’s which you should see, take a peek here.
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