By David in TN
Friday, February 4, 2022 at 5:48:00 P.M. EST
TCM’s Film Noir of the Week Saturday Night-Sunday Morning at Midnight and 10 a.m. ET is William Dieterle’s The Turning Point (1952), with Willam Holden, Edmond O’Brien, Alexis Smith, Tom Tully, Ed Begley and Ted de Corsia.
Film Noir Guide: “Crusading reporter Holden, covering the crime commission headed by his friend (O’Brien), discovers that O’Brien’s policeman father (Tully) has ties to a vicious crime lord (Begley). Holden confronts Tully, giving him the opportunity to make amends by turning state’s evidence. But the worried Begley has the cop [gunned?] down during a staged robbery.
Smith plays the socialite who helps the love-smitten O’Brien gather the evidence that will bring Begley to justice. Begley does a fine job as the brutal syndicate chieftain, and veteran character actor de Corsia is enjoyable as Begley’s Irish henchman, brogue and all, in this otherwise standard crime drama.”
David in TN: The Turning Point (1952) has never been on TCM before, and has a good cast. This film is one of the numerous 50s’ entries with an organized crime theme.
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TCM's Film Noir of the Week Saturday Night-Sunday Morning at Midnight and 10 am ET is Anthony Mann's Side Street (1950) with Farley Granger, Kathy O'Donnell, James Craig, Edmon Ryan, Paul Kelly, and Jean Hagen.
Film Noir Guide: "A financially strapped part-time mail carrier, (Granger), whose wife (O'Donnell) is pregnant, breaks into a filing cabinet in an attorney's office to steal the money he had seen placed there while he was delivering the mail. Expecting to find just a few hundred dollars, he winds up walking away with thirty grand and some documents that could implicate a ruthless hood (Craig).
Understandably fearful, Granger wraps up the money and asks a bartender friend to hold the package for him for a few days. When he finally comes to his senses, he confesses to the attorney (Ryan) and offers to return the dough, which turns out to have been a blackmail payoff. Unfortunately, Granger discovers that the bartender has stolen the dough and is in hiding.
On the lam from the cops, who think he's a murderer, and from angry gangsters, Granger seeks a way out of his miserable predicament. Kelly is the homicide detective in charge of the case, and Hagen plays Craig's former girlfriend, an alcoholic nightclub singer. This suspenseful and beautifully photographed noir reunited Granger and McConnell after the sensational They Live by Night, and climaxes with an exciting car chase through the narrow streets of lower Manhattan."
David In TN: This one was previously shown in 2017 on Noir Alley. As I observed then, James Craig, born in Nashville and a graduate of Rice University, plays a 1950 Manhattan street criminal. Funny, you might see this kind of casting in A Law and Order episode this year.
Craig was billed early on as "another Clark Gable," and was kind of a substitute for him when Gable was serving in WW II.
Side Street has one of the first car chases.
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