P.I. Robert Celebrates Christmas

Just before Christmas, private detective Philip Marlowe (Robert Montgomery) is invited to the office of Adrienne Fromsett (Audrey Totter) to discuss a mystery story he has written. When he gets there, he finds that Ms. Fromsett has something else on her mind - hiring Marlowe to find  Chrystal Kingsby, the missing wife of her boss, Derace Kingsby (Leon Ames). Our film this week is Lady in the Lake (1947), part of the 2nd Happy Holidays Blogathon, hosted by the Pure Entertainment Preservation Society. 

 

Lady in the Lake is remembered today for its innovative use of the subjective camera. With the exception of two framing scenes, the film is told entirely through the eyes of our hero, Philip Marlowe. The camera acts as his eyes; we only see Mr. Montgomery when he looks into a mirror. It's an interesting conceit, though some members of our group found it a bit off-putting. 

The plot in the film is also very dense - many subplots, many characters that seem irrelevant as you proceed. While the movie very carefully ties everything together at the end (and very neatly too), as you are watching you have to pay very close attention to what is going on - if you lose concentration at all, you can miss an essential plot point.

Audrey Totter has the hardest job in the film - verbally dueling with and making love to a camera. Most of her scenes involve just her and Robert Montgomery; but we rarely see him - we see her, and she does a magnificent job of making you believe that Philip Marlowe is standing just behind the audience. With a script full of taut, witty dialog, Ms. Totter makes Adrienne into a tough lady that you don't want to cross, but wouldn't mind having at your side - she's strong, realistic, and sexy, but an intelligent sexy.  At one point, Lana Turner was being considered for Miss Fromsett (AFI Catalog); frankly, it's hard to imagine anyone but Audrey Totter in the role.

This was Robert Montgomery's first credited directing role, and he decided to use the subjective camera technique. It was an idea Orson Welles had toyed with; new, lighter cameras and the crab dolly made the concept viable (Voices in the Dark: The Narrative Patterns of Film Noir by J.P. Telotte). MGM was not thrilled with the idea, and insisted on a prologue to the film, so audiences would get to actually SEE their star (Eddie Muller commentary), but they let him do it and used their marketing expertise to engage the audience, who were now part of the story. Mr. Montgomery emphasized that acting TO the camera was the most difficult part of the film for the actors - they were trained to NOT look at the camera; here, the camera was itself a character (TCM article).

 

Certainly, being off-screen for much of the action assisted Mr. Montgomery in his role as director, but he is excellent as the voice of the hard-bitten Marlowe - though it does seem like he spends a lot of the movie unconscious. His best scenes, not surprisingly, are with his good friend, Ms. Totter, who turned down the lead in The Killers (1946) in order to appear in this film.  

We are used to seeing Lloyd Nolan (Lt. DeGarmot) play a good guy.  Here, he gets to let his inner villain out, portraying a really bad police detective.  It's clear from the start that Lt. DeGarmot is not to be trusted - how bad he actually is becomes apparent as the film progresses. Mr. Nolan came to film from Broadway; he would ultimately appear in 9 productions, including The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial, in which he appeared as Lt. Com. Philip Francis Queeg (the role that would eventually go to Humphrey Bogart in the film). His career was primarily B films, though he was often a supporting actor in films like A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) and The Man I Married (1940). He moved into television, and is best remembered for Julia, in which he played Dr. Morton Chegley to Diahann Carroll's nurse. His first marriage to Mell Efrid lasted from 1933 to her death in 1981 (they had two children); he remarried in 1983.  He was worked to fund autism research (his son Jay was severely autistic). In 1985, he died of lung cancer at the age of 83.

One other actor worth noting is Jayne Meadows  (Mrs. Falbrook) in her second film appearance. It's a small, but pivotal role and she is quite convincing playing a woman with a number of different aliases.

Whether this is a Christmas movie is for the viewer to decide (rather like Die Hard) - it was released in January, but the music and parties make it a contender for a Christmas film. We're voting for it as a Christmas movie. It's worth noting that the setting for the book was NOT Christmas, and Raymond Chandler was not amused by the alteration.

The New York Times review by Thomas M. Prior (T.M.P.) was positive: "The picture is definitely different and affords one a fresh and interesting perspective on a murder mystery." In February of 1948 the story was recreated with a Lux Radio Theatre production starring Mr. Montgomery and Ms. Totter.

While not the best detective film ever made, this is well worth seeing (though you really have to concentrate). It's certainly an interesting addition to the pantheon of Christmas movies! We'll leave you with the trailer:

This blog post is part of the 2nd Happy Holidays Blogathon, hosted by the Pure Entertainment Preservation Society.