Black Widow (1954)

hyped garbage

Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

BLACK WIDOW is an all-star Hollywood film noir shot in vibrant colour and featuring a starring role for ageing starlet Ginger Rogers. The story is about a pretty young woman who falls for a big-shot theatre producer, causing the finger of suspicion to fall on him when she's found murdered. The cast are decent here and Van Heflin does fine with his 'wronged man' material, but the main problem is with the sluggish pace. There are too many peripheral characters and sub-plots that merely murky the waters, and for a murder mystery there's absolutely no suspense. Still, at least it looks good.

This overripe meller is a feast for the eyes especially for those who like their wardrobe to look like costumes but dramatically it's a limp sister. Part of the problem is that while it seems to have film noir leanings the Cinemascope while beautiful is all wrong for the tenor of the tale. The story is something that should have taken place in grimy dressing rooms and back alleys so the wide airy rooms and distant placement of the actors required by the process is a tension killer.Johnson's prosaic direction is no help just letting the story dawdle along unlike a director such a Edgar Ulmer or Nick Ray who would have sheared about ten minutes off and had a much more lively film.While the cast is a good one none turn in their best work in this. Van Heflin usually has a spiky, combative edge to his performances that make them engaging but which is missing here. Maybe this was a contract assignment that he didn't want to do or he couldn't get a handle on how to make something out of his chump of a character but whatever it is he's off his game.Gene Tierney, whose role for a star of her stature is remarkably small, was falling apart during the filming and though she looks good it's a miracle considering what rough shape she was in at the time she was able to even get to the studio each morning. Her part could have been cut completely without making a difference to the story.This was supposed to be Peggy Ann Garner's big chance to break into adult roles but everything that was special about her as a child actress disappeared as she matured and she seems a not terribly individual girl with a hideous dye job and hairdo as well as an off putting way of speaking. The transition was unsuccessful and she faded from the screen shortly after.Then there is Ginger Rogers. Her outfits are eye popping but she seems to have squeezed every ounce of her old charm and sass out of her persona and is left with a brittle, affected very shiny husk that looks like Ginger Rogers but acts like a mannequin. Her poodle perm is a horror as well!If you like star studded overdressed entertainments then this will be a satisfactory time filler but the similar much more effectively done film The Velvet Touch with Rosalind Russell, Claire Trevor and Sydney Greenstreet gets right everything this one gets wrong. That's the one worth seeking out.

Was this a play first? It feels like it. It's a virtually stage-bound film that is barely opened up. Almost all of it is set in 3 locations. Perhaps Hitchcock could have made this gripping - as he did in "Rear Window" and "Rope" - but that doesn't work here.In fact, Hitchcock might also have been interested in the "wrong man" aspect of this plot. But that is not developed here either. It's simply a drawing room murder mystery that is not really all that much of a murder mystery.The performances aren't horrible, but nothing is really memorable. Ginger Rogers has the meatiest part, but doesn't make it to the league of Bette Davis' Margot Channing....but then who could?The denouement - which, from the French means, "the untying of a knot" - is literally about a knot. But, again, one could see that coming a mile away. So, the movie ends with a thud.Speaking of that, I wish the movie had ended with a thud. If the actual murderer had gone leaping off the much-discussed balcony overlooking Central Park, it would have been much more memorable.

So imagine a film noir. Now, imagine that film noir as a technicolor Cinemascope production, and you have Black Widow. A certainly interesting, but just passable noir about a Broadway producer framed for a murder he didn't commit. Fleeing from the police, he picks up clues about the victim, and realizes his friends are not what they seem (of course). While this is pretty to look at, unfortunately, once you figure out what the cops are doing. the suspense disappears somewhat, and completely collapses at the end when we do find out the real murderer as it's almost presented as an anticlimax. Still worth a look though for it's amazing photography.