Backfire (1950 film)
Encyclopedia
Backfire is a thriller and crime film
in the film noir
style directed by Vincent Sherman
and starring Edmond O'Brien
, Virginia Mayo
, Gordon MacRae
, Viveca Lindfors
, and Dane Clark
. It was written by Larry Marcus, Ben Roberts
, and Ivan Goff
. It is notable for launching the film noir careers of its writers and one of its actors. Although Backfire was completed in October 1948, it was not released until January 1950. However, screenwriters Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts would go on to write White Heat
the year after working on Backfire. Edmond O'Brien would also star in White Heat, as well as in the seminal film noir, D.O.A.
, in 1950.
Corey's final surgery is in mid-December, but Connolly does not appear at the hospital afterward to see his friend. By Christmas, Corey is still in recovery but Connolly still remains absent. One night, as Corey lies semi-conscious in bed after being administered a sleeping drug, a foreign woman with an accent (Viveca Lindfors) appears at Corey's bedside. She says Connolly has been in a horrible accident: His spine is shattered and he wants to die, but she has refused. The woman asks Corey what to do, and he advises her to do nothing to harm Steve. Corey slips into unconsciousness, and the woman disappears.
After New Year's, Corey is released from the hospital. He's immediately questioned by Captain Garcia (Ed Begley) of the Los Angeles Police, who tells him that Steve Connolly is wanted for the murder of Solly Blayne, a local high-stakes gambler and racketeer
. Corey denies that Connolly would be mixed up in anything criminal. How could he be, if he were injured? Corey and Nurse Benson decide to talk to Mrs. Blayne (Frances Robinson). The film engages in a visual flashback
, which depicts an unseen assassin gunning down Solly Blayne (Richard Rober) in his home one night. Window shades prevent Mrs. Blayne or the audience from seeing who committed the murder, who was outside the home. Mrs. Blayne calls for a doctor, but he arrives too late. The flashback ends.
Corey learns from Capt. Garcia which hotel Steve Connolly was staying at, and he lodges in Connolly's old room in an attempt to understand his friend's thinking and feelings. Corey encounters Sybil, a gossipy old hotel maid, who says that Mr. Blayne often visited Connolly at the hotel. She also gives Corey a business card from a local funeral home
. Corey visits the funeral home and discovers that another military friend, Ben Arno (Dane Clark), owns the mortuary. In yet another flashback, Arno describes how he want to a night of boxing
matches, where he saw Steve Connolly fighting in the ring. Connolly lost his match (even though Arno does not believe he should have). Arno asks Connolly why he is boxing at his age, but Connolly refuses to explain why he is engaged in amateur boxing other than to say he needs money. The flashback ends.
Corey returns to the hotel, where he is asked by the desk clerk to pay Connolly's hotel bill. Realizing Connolly made some local phone calls, Corey dials the numbers listed in the hotel records. A young woman answers the phone. Corey pretends to be Connolly and the voice on the phone unintentionally reveals Connolly had a girlfriend named Lysa Radoff. Corey asks for and is given the address of Radoff's rented home. Corey goes to Radoff's home, finds no one home, breaks in, and discovers that Radoff is the same woman who visited him in the hospital. One of Radoff's roommates, Bonnie Willis (Sheila MacRae, appearing here as "Sheila Stephens"), comes home. Corey pretends to be waiting for Radoff to arrive, and the chatty Willis provides him with the story of how Connolly and Radoff met.
In yet another flashback, the audience learns that Connolly was working for a local gambler named Lou Walsh. Walsh's girlfriend was Lysa Radoff. One night, Connolly went to a nightclub to bring Radoff to a party Walsh was hosting. Willis went along with them to the party. The three go to a large apartment Walsh is using as a high-stakes gambling den. Walsh entertains his guests by having beautiful women acted as call girl
s. Radoff is one of the call girls (although it is not clear that she is engaging in prostitution). Connolly is unlike the other men, who paw and manhandle the girls, and he and Radoff begin falling in love. Pointedly, the flashback never shows Lou Walsh. However, Connolly is depicted meeting Solly Blayne, who is there gambling. Blayne offers Connolly a job as a highly paid gofer
. The flashback ends. To escape further questioning, Corey runs out of the house while Willis is in another room. Moments later, she is gunned down by an unseen assailant who fires through the window.
The next night, Capt. Garcia interrogates Corey and Nurse Benson and accuses them of interfering in the investigation and causing Willis' death. Capt. Garcia is alerted by telephone that a local Chinese man, Lee Quong, has been shot and is claiming he has information on Steve Connolly. Capt. Garcia, Corey, and Benson race to the hospital to interrogate Quong. In another flashback, Quong relates how he was the butler and cook at a magnificent nearby home which Walsh purchased the home as a gift for Radoff. Walsh installed Connolly in the house as her bodyguard. Unwittingly, he put the two lovers together, and their relationship intensified. In the flashback, Quong relates that he eavesdropped on Connolly and Radoff as they made their plans to run away and get married. Connolly went to the garage and backed the car up the steeply inclined driveway. Unbeknownst to Connolly, Walsh had come home early and overheard Connolly professing his love to Radoff. Walsh released the parking brake on the car, and it rolled down the driveway and injured Steve Connolly — crushing several of the vertebrae in his back. The flashback ends. Quong says he was shot by Lou Walsh after Walsh realized Quong had seen him commit murder. Quong dies before he can reveal the address of the home.
Capt. Garcia now has evidence that Connolly was too injured to commit murder. Capt. Garcia tells the press that the murder weapon used to kill Solly Blayne was also used to kill Bonnie Willis. Acting on a hunch, Nurse Benson contacts Mrs. Blayne and asks her the name of the doctor she called the night her husband was murdered. Mrs. Blayne says it was Dr. Herbert Anstead. Benson (dressed in her nursing uniform) goes to Dr. Anstead's office later that night, pretending to be a nurse retrieving some files for the doctor. The janitor lets her in. She is unable to locate Steve Connolly's medical file. Anstead himself arrives a few minutes later, and Nurse Benson hides. Anstead retrieve's Connolly's file from its hiding place, and attempts to destroy it. Nurse Benson prevents him from doing so, and tells him that Connolly was not in an accident but was a victim of murder. Anstead forces Benson into a locked room, but she manages to read the name of the house where Connolly is being kept from the medical file. Using information obtained from Bension, Anstead calls Bob Corey to tell him where Steve Connolly can be located. Just then, Lou Walsh (not shown on camera) enters the office and guns down Anstead. Walsh flees, and Nurse Benson is released minutes later by the janitor.
Corey rushes to the address Dr. Anstead gave him, which the audience realizes is the home Lou Walsh purchased for Lysa Radoff. Corey is intercepted inside the house by Ben Arno, who reveals that he is, in fact, the gambler Lou Walsh. Arno tells Corey that Connolly (a known small-time gambler) had lost money to Solly Blayne. To get the money back, Connolly agreed to box throw the fight
to get out of debt. Arno told Connolly that he led a double-life as the high-stakes gambler "Lou Walsh," and proposed using Connolly's $40,000 to cheat Blayne out of tens of thousands of dollars at gambling. Connolly agreed. In yet another flashback, Lysa Radoff realizes that the brakes on her car work just fine, and that Connolly's injuries were no accident but an attempt at murder. The flashback ends. Arno says he did not want to martyr Connolly for fear of losing Radoff's love, so he staged the accident. But once Radoff knew the truth, he was forced to kill her. Arno, who is clearly psychotic, admits he began killing anyone who could connect Lysa to him or who knew about Connolly's accident. Corey (still weak from his back surgery) is knocked to the ground and Arno prepares to shoot him. As Arno is about to kill Corey, an injured Steve Connolly (his body encased in braces and plaster) launches himself down the stairs and stops Arno. The police, summoned by Nurse Benson, arrive. Arno attempts to flee, but is killed.
After a jump cut
, Steve Connolly is shown leaving the military hospital many months later, his injuries repaired by the military surgeons. Bob Corey and his new wife, Julie, arrive and take Steve to their new ranch.
with Errol Flynn
and Viveca Lindfors, and wanted to work on a simple picture. He knew that Warner Bros. had the rights to John Patrick's play, The Hasty Heart. Sherman asked studio head Jack Warner
if he could turn the play into a film, but Warner refused and put him to work on adapting "Into the Night" into a motion picture.
Sherman met with producer Anthony Veiller, who admitted the story needed a lot of work. Veiller hired two aspiring writers, Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts. The two unpublished authors had written a popular play, Portrait in Black (which was later made into a motion picture of the same name
in 1960), as well as an unpublished screenplay, The Shadow, based on a Ben Hecht
story. Although Goff and Roberts considered themselves comedy writers, Warners hired them to work on the crime thriller "Into the Night." Sherman met with Goff and Roberts over the weekend, and they talked through the story's problems. Sherman concluded that the film was still unworkable, but Goff and Roberts said they needed the work and continued to craft a screenplay. Sherman voiced his reservations to Jack Warner, but Warner told him that if he agreed to do the film then Warner would do him a favor in return. Sherman agreed.
Jack Warner intended for the film to be a B movie
which would put his contract actors to work. Six actors who, Warner said, were "sitting around doing nothing but picking up their checks" were Edmond O'Brien, Gordon MacRae, Virginia Mayo, Dane Clark, Viveca Lindfors, and Richard Rober. Warners had signed Broadway
star Gordon MacRae to a short-term contract in November 1947. Warners announced that his first film was to be a musical film
, Rise Above It, a remake of the 1938 film Brother Rat
which was intended to be scripted by I. A. L. Diamond
. But this film was never made. "Into the Night" would be his first film for the studio. Edmond O'Brien signed a contract with Warners in May 1948. "Into the Night" would also be his first film for the studio. Viveca Lindfors refused at first to participate in the film, upset with what she felt was its excessive violence. Placed on suspension
by the studio, she relented in order to continue to receive her pay ("I sold out," she later said).
The shooting title of the film was changed from "Into the Night" to Somewhere in the City. Principal filming occurred from late July to mid October 1948. Interior and exterior hospital scenes were shot at Birmingham Veterans' Hospital in Van Nuys, California. Birmingham's Chief of Nursing Services Monica Cahill and Assistant Chief of Surgery Dr. Franklin Wilkins both served as technical consultants on the film. Additional scenes were filmed in and around the city of Los Angeles, California
, included the Los Angeles City Hall
, the Fremont Hotel, the Biltmore Hotel
, Olvera Street
, the Los Feliz neighborhood, and Stone Canyon in the Bel Air neighborhood. Additional scenes were shot in the nearby city of Glendale, California
.
Sherman later said that he believed Goff and Roberts had turned in a good script, and that the actors had done the best job they could. He found Virginia Mayo to be a very nice person and an extremely competent actress, although without a lot of personal depth.
, Edmund O'Brian, and Virginia Mayo, had been released to widespread acclaim and strong box office while Backfire remained unreleased. To take advantage of White Heat's popularity, movie posters for Backfire prominently featured Mayo in a femme fatale
pose (very unlike her character in the film) and contained the tag-line: "That 'White Heat' girl turns it on again!" The poster also gave away the surprise conclusion to the film by depicting Dane Clark strangling Viveca Lindfors.
The picture did not receive good reviews. Bosley Crowther
, writing for the New York Times
, found the film feeble and listless, and the plot rambling. He had little praise for the case, concluding that "...the most that can possibly be said for them is that they get the thing done." Leslie Halliwell
, writing in 1977, noted that the flashback structure, intended to solve some of the expository
problems in the film, did not work. Author Clive Hirschhorn noted in 1980 that there were so many coincidences in the film that any feeling of suspense was eliminated and the realism so essential to film noir was dissipated. Critic John Howard Reid assessed the film as "borderline" in 2006, but felt cinematography was effectively atmospheric and the action sequences fair. He found that the supporting players (O'Brien, Begley, Lindfors, Clark, and Sheila MacRae) delivered performances remarkably superior to that of the two stars, and singled out Lindfors for her acting.
Some reviewers singled out the script as the underlying cause of the acting problems. Reid thought Mayo's part too slim, but that it had been improperly built up by the script and editing to accommodate a star of her stature. David Shipman felt Gordon MacRae was completely miscast, and thus "wasted" in the picture.
Swedish actress Viveca Lindfors was under contract to Warner Bros. for four pictures. Unhappy with her work, however, the studio declined to pick up her option after her work in Backfire. Warners was much more pleased with the efforts of Goff and Roberts, and gave them a five-year contract to write screenplays. They produced White Heat the following year. In return for directing Backfire, Jack Warner permitted Vincent Sherman to direct The Hasty Heart, which became a major hit for the studio.
Warner Bros. released the film on DVD on July 13, 2010, in its Film Noir Classic Collection, Vol. 5.
Crime film
Crime films are films which focus on the lives of criminals. The stylistic approach to a crime film varies from realistic portrayals of real-life criminal figures, to the far-fetched evil doings of imaginary arch-villains. Criminal acts are almost always glorified in these movies.- Plays and films...
in the film noir
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
style directed by Vincent Sherman
Vincent Sherman
Vincent Sherman was an American director, and actor, who worked in Hollywood. His movies include Mr. Skeffington , Nora Prentiss , and The Young Philadelphians ....
and starring Edmond O'Brien
Edmond O'Brien
Edmond O'Brien was an American actor who is perhaps best remembered for his role in D.O.A. and his Oscar winning role in The Barefoot Contessa...
, Virginia Mayo
Virginia Mayo
Virginia Mayo was an American film actress.After a short career in vaudeville, Mayo progressed to films and during the 1940s established herself as a supporting player in such films as The Best Years of Our Lives and White Heat .Mayo remained an A-list actress into the mid-'50s, but then went...
, Gordon MacRae
Gordon MacRae
Gordon MacRae was an American actor and singer, best known for his appearances in the film versions of two Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals, Oklahoma! and Carousel and films with Doris Day like Starlift.-Early life:Born Albert Gordon MacRae in East Orange, New Jersey, MacRae graduated from...
, Viveca Lindfors
Viveca Lindfors
Elsa Viveca Torstensdotter Lindfors , better known under her professional name of Viveca Lindfors, was a Swedish stage and film actress.-Life and career:...
, and Dane Clark
Dane Clark
Dane Clark was an American film actor who was known for playing, as he labeled himself, "Joe Average".-Early life:...
. It was written by Larry Marcus, Ben Roberts
Ben Roberts (writer)
Ben Roberts, born Benjamin Eisenberg, was a film and television writer, producer and one of the creators of the Charlie's Angels and Time Express television series'. In 1958 he was nominated for an Academy Award for writing the Lon Chaney biopic Man of a Thousand Faces...
, and Ivan Goff
Ivan Goff
Ivan Goff was an Australian screenwriter, best known for his collaborations with Ben Roberts including White Heat , The Man of a Thousand Faces and the pilot for Charlie's Angels .-Biography:...
. It is notable for launching the film noir careers of its writers and one of its actors. Although Backfire was completed in October 1948, it was not released until January 1950. However, screenwriters Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts would go on to write White Heat
White Heat
White Heat may refer to:In film:* White Heat , a British film directed by Thomas Bentley* White Heat , an American film* White Heat, a 1949 film starring James CagneyIn music:...
the year after working on Backfire. Edmond O'Brien would also star in White Heat, as well as in the seminal film noir, D.O.A.
D.O.A. (1950 film)
D.O.A. , a film noir drama film directed by Rudolph Maté, is considered a classic of the genre. The frantically paced plot revolves around a doomed man's quest to find out who has poisoned him – and why – before he dies.Leo C...
, in 1950.
Plot synopsis
Bob Corey (Gordon MacRae) is an American soldier badly wounded at the end of World War II, and undergoing a number of surgical operations on his spine at a military hospital in California. He is tended by a nurse, Julie Benson, and they have fallen in love. Corey's military pal, Steve Connolly, arrives in early November and proposes that Corey join him in purchasing a ranch once Corey is out of the hospital. The two men pool their G.I. benefits (totalling $40,000) to do so.Corey's final surgery is in mid-December, but Connolly does not appear at the hospital afterward to see his friend. By Christmas, Corey is still in recovery but Connolly still remains absent. One night, as Corey lies semi-conscious in bed after being administered a sleeping drug, a foreign woman with an accent (Viveca Lindfors) appears at Corey's bedside. She says Connolly has been in a horrible accident: His spine is shattered and he wants to die, but she has refused. The woman asks Corey what to do, and he advises her to do nothing to harm Steve. Corey slips into unconsciousness, and the woman disappears.
After New Year's, Corey is released from the hospital. He's immediately questioned by Captain Garcia (Ed Begley) of the Los Angeles Police, who tells him that Steve Connolly is wanted for the murder of Solly Blayne, a local high-stakes gambler and racketeer
Racket (crime)
A racket is an illegal business, usually run as part of organized crime. Engaging in a racket is called racketeering.Several forms of racket exist. The best-known is the protection racket, in which criminals demand money from businesses in exchange for the service of "protection" against crimes...
. Corey denies that Connolly would be mixed up in anything criminal. How could he be, if he were injured? Corey and Nurse Benson decide to talk to Mrs. Blayne (Frances Robinson). The film engages in a visual flashback
Flashback (narrative)
Flashback is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory...
, which depicts an unseen assassin gunning down Solly Blayne (Richard Rober) in his home one night. Window shades prevent Mrs. Blayne or the audience from seeing who committed the murder, who was outside the home. Mrs. Blayne calls for a doctor, but he arrives too late. The flashback ends.
Corey learns from Capt. Garcia which hotel Steve Connolly was staying at, and he lodges in Connolly's old room in an attempt to understand his friend's thinking and feelings. Corey encounters Sybil, a gossipy old hotel maid, who says that Mr. Blayne often visited Connolly at the hotel. She also gives Corey a business card from a local funeral home
Funeral home
A funeral home, funeral parlor or mortuary, is a business that provides burial and funeral services for the deceased and their families. These services may include aprepared wake and funeral, and the provision of a chapel for the funeral....
. Corey visits the funeral home and discovers that another military friend, Ben Arno (Dane Clark), owns the mortuary. In yet another flashback, Arno describes how he want to a night of boxing
Boxing
Boxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
matches, where he saw Steve Connolly fighting in the ring. Connolly lost his match (even though Arno does not believe he should have). Arno asks Connolly why he is boxing at his age, but Connolly refuses to explain why he is engaged in amateur boxing other than to say he needs money. The flashback ends.
Corey returns to the hotel, where he is asked by the desk clerk to pay Connolly's hotel bill. Realizing Connolly made some local phone calls, Corey dials the numbers listed in the hotel records. A young woman answers the phone. Corey pretends to be Connolly and the voice on the phone unintentionally reveals Connolly had a girlfriend named Lysa Radoff. Corey asks for and is given the address of Radoff's rented home. Corey goes to Radoff's home, finds no one home, breaks in, and discovers that Radoff is the same woman who visited him in the hospital. One of Radoff's roommates, Bonnie Willis (Sheila MacRae, appearing here as "Sheila Stephens"), comes home. Corey pretends to be waiting for Radoff to arrive, and the chatty Willis provides him with the story of how Connolly and Radoff met.
In yet another flashback, the audience learns that Connolly was working for a local gambler named Lou Walsh. Walsh's girlfriend was Lysa Radoff. One night, Connolly went to a nightclub to bring Radoff to a party Walsh was hosting. Willis went along with them to the party. The three go to a large apartment Walsh is using as a high-stakes gambling den. Walsh entertains his guests by having beautiful women acted as call girl
Call girl
A call girl or female escort is a sex worker who is not visible to the general public; nor does she usually work in an institution like a brothel, although she may be employed by an escort agency...
s. Radoff is one of the call girls (although it is not clear that she is engaging in prostitution). Connolly is unlike the other men, who paw and manhandle the girls, and he and Radoff begin falling in love. Pointedly, the flashback never shows Lou Walsh. However, Connolly is depicted meeting Solly Blayne, who is there gambling. Blayne offers Connolly a job as a highly paid gofer
Gofer
A gofer or go-fer is an employee who is often sent on errands. "Gofer" reflects the likelihood of instructions to go for coffee, dry cleaning, or stamps, or to make other straightforward or familiar procurements. The term gofer originated in North America...
. The flashback ends. To escape further questioning, Corey runs out of the house while Willis is in another room. Moments later, she is gunned down by an unseen assailant who fires through the window.
The next night, Capt. Garcia interrogates Corey and Nurse Benson and accuses them of interfering in the investigation and causing Willis' death. Capt. Garcia is alerted by telephone that a local Chinese man, Lee Quong, has been shot and is claiming he has information on Steve Connolly. Capt. Garcia, Corey, and Benson race to the hospital to interrogate Quong. In another flashback, Quong relates how he was the butler and cook at a magnificent nearby home which Walsh purchased the home as a gift for Radoff. Walsh installed Connolly in the house as her bodyguard. Unwittingly, he put the two lovers together, and their relationship intensified. In the flashback, Quong relates that he eavesdropped on Connolly and Radoff as they made their plans to run away and get married. Connolly went to the garage and backed the car up the steeply inclined driveway. Unbeknownst to Connolly, Walsh had come home early and overheard Connolly professing his love to Radoff. Walsh released the parking brake on the car, and it rolled down the driveway and injured Steve Connolly — crushing several of the vertebrae in his back. The flashback ends. Quong says he was shot by Lou Walsh after Walsh realized Quong had seen him commit murder. Quong dies before he can reveal the address of the home.
Capt. Garcia now has evidence that Connolly was too injured to commit murder. Capt. Garcia tells the press that the murder weapon used to kill Solly Blayne was also used to kill Bonnie Willis. Acting on a hunch, Nurse Benson contacts Mrs. Blayne and asks her the name of the doctor she called the night her husband was murdered. Mrs. Blayne says it was Dr. Herbert Anstead. Benson (dressed in her nursing uniform) goes to Dr. Anstead's office later that night, pretending to be a nurse retrieving some files for the doctor. The janitor lets her in. She is unable to locate Steve Connolly's medical file. Anstead himself arrives a few minutes later, and Nurse Benson hides. Anstead retrieve's Connolly's file from its hiding place, and attempts to destroy it. Nurse Benson prevents him from doing so, and tells him that Connolly was not in an accident but was a victim of murder. Anstead forces Benson into a locked room, but she manages to read the name of the house where Connolly is being kept from the medical file. Using information obtained from Bension, Anstead calls Bob Corey to tell him where Steve Connolly can be located. Just then, Lou Walsh (not shown on camera) enters the office and guns down Anstead. Walsh flees, and Nurse Benson is released minutes later by the janitor.
Corey rushes to the address Dr. Anstead gave him, which the audience realizes is the home Lou Walsh purchased for Lysa Radoff. Corey is intercepted inside the house by Ben Arno, who reveals that he is, in fact, the gambler Lou Walsh. Arno tells Corey that Connolly (a known small-time gambler) had lost money to Solly Blayne. To get the money back, Connolly agreed to box throw the fight
Match fixing
In organised sports, match fixing, game fixing, race fixing, or sports fixing occurs as a match is played to a completely or partially pre-determined result, violating the rules of the game and often the law. Where the sporting competition in question is a race then the incident is referred to as...
to get out of debt. Arno told Connolly that he led a double-life as the high-stakes gambler "Lou Walsh," and proposed using Connolly's $40,000 to cheat Blayne out of tens of thousands of dollars at gambling. Connolly agreed. In yet another flashback, Lysa Radoff realizes that the brakes on her car work just fine, and that Connolly's injuries were no accident but an attempt at murder. The flashback ends. Arno says he did not want to martyr Connolly for fear of losing Radoff's love, so he staged the accident. But once Radoff knew the truth, he was forced to kill her. Arno, who is clearly psychotic, admits he began killing anyone who could connect Lysa to him or who knew about Connolly's accident. Corey (still weak from his back surgery) is knocked to the ground and Arno prepares to shoot him. As Arno is about to kill Corey, an injured Steve Connolly (his body encased in braces and plaster) launches himself down the stairs and stops Arno. The police, summoned by Nurse Benson, arrive. Arno attempts to flee, but is killed.
After a jump cut
Jump cut
A jump cut is a cut in film editing and vloging in which two sequential shots of the same subject are taken from camera positions that vary only slightly. This type of edit causes the subject of the shots to appear to "jump" position in a discontinuous way...
, Steve Connolly is shown leaving the military hospital many months later, his injuries repaired by the military surgeons. Bob Corey and his new wife, Julie, arrive and take Steve to their new ranch.
Cast
- Gordon MacRae as Bob Corey
- Edmond O'Brien as Steve Connolly
- Virginia Mayo as Julie Benson
- Viveca Lindfors as Lysa Radoff
- Dane Clark as Ben Arno
- Ed BegleyEd BegleyEdward James Begley, Sr. was an Academy Award-winning American actor.-Biography:Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Begley began his career as a Broadway and radio actor while in his teens. He appeared in the hit musical Going Up on Broadway in 1917 and in London the next year. He later acted in...
as Captain Garcia - Sheila MacRaeSheila MacRaeSheila MacRae is an English actress and author. She was born Sheila Margaret Stephens. She appeared in such films as Pretty Baby , Caged , Backfire , and Sex and the Single Girl ....
(as Sheila Stephens) as Bonnie Willis - Mack Williams as Dr. Herbert Anstead
- Leonard Strong as Lee Quong
- Ida Moore as Sybil, the Fremont Hotel maid
- Frances Robinson as Mrs. Blayne
- Richard RoberRichard RoberRichard Rober was an American film actor known for his rugged roles in films. Rober died in an auto accident in 1952 at age 42. He appeared many B-movies and film noir-type films including Call Northside 777 , Sierra , and The Well .-Filmography:-External links:...
as Solly Blayne
Script development, casting, and principal photograph
Around 1946 or 1947, Warner Bros. had purchased the rights to a Larry Marcus story titled "Into the Night." The studio had tried to interest director Vincent Sherman in directing the picture, but he felt the story was "confused and pointless" and refused. One of the story's problems was that it contained flashback within flashback within flashback. By the spring of 1948, however, Sherman finished directing Adventures of Don JuanAdventures of Don Juan
Adventures of Don Juan, known in the United Kingdom as The New Adventures of Don Juan, is a 1948 adventure Technicolor romance film made by Warner Bros...
with Errol Flynn
Errol Flynn
Errol Leslie Flynn was an Australian-born actor. He was known for his romantic swashbuckler roles in Hollywood films, being a legend and his flamboyant lifestyle.-Early life:...
and Viveca Lindfors, and wanted to work on a simple picture. He knew that Warner Bros. had the rights to John Patrick's play, The Hasty Heart. Sherman asked studio head Jack Warner
Jack Warner
Jack Leonard "J. L." Warner , born Jacob Warner in London, Ontario, was a Canadian American film executive who was the president and driving force behind the Warner Bros. Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California...
if he could turn the play into a film, but Warner refused and put him to work on adapting "Into the Night" into a motion picture.
Sherman met with producer Anthony Veiller, who admitted the story needed a lot of work. Veiller hired two aspiring writers, Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts. The two unpublished authors had written a popular play, Portrait in Black (which was later made into a motion picture of the same name
Portrait in Black
Portrait in Black is a thriller released by Universal International. Produced by Ross Hunter, who also produced Airport and other films for Universal, the film starred Lana Turner and Anthony Quinn...
in 1960), as well as an unpublished screenplay, The Shadow, based on a Ben Hecht
Ben Hecht
Ben Hecht was an American screenwriter, director, producer, playwright, and novelist. Called "the Shakespeare of Hollywood", he received screen credits, alone or in collaboration, for the stories or screenplays of some 70 films and as a prolific storyteller, authored 35 books and created some of...
story. Although Goff and Roberts considered themselves comedy writers, Warners hired them to work on the crime thriller "Into the Night." Sherman met with Goff and Roberts over the weekend, and they talked through the story's problems. Sherman concluded that the film was still unworkable, but Goff and Roberts said they needed the work and continued to craft a screenplay. Sherman voiced his reservations to Jack Warner, but Warner told him that if he agreed to do the film then Warner would do him a favor in return. Sherman agreed.
Jack Warner intended for the film to be a B movie
B movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
which would put his contract actors to work. Six actors who, Warner said, were "sitting around doing nothing but picking up their checks" were Edmond O'Brien, Gordon MacRae, Virginia Mayo, Dane Clark, Viveca Lindfors, and Richard Rober. Warners had signed Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
star Gordon MacRae to a short-term contract in November 1947. Warners announced that his first film was to be a musical film
Musical film
The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
, Rise Above It, a remake of the 1938 film Brother Rat
Brother Rat
Brother Rat is a 1938 film about cadets at Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Virginia, directed by William Keighley and starring Priscilla Lane and Wayne Morris....
which was intended to be scripted by I. A. L. Diamond
I. A. L. Diamond
I.A.L. Diamond was a comedy writer in Hollywood from the 1940s through the 1980s.-Early life:He was born Iţec Domnici in Ungheni, Iaşi County, Bessarabia, Romania, present day Moldova, was referred to as "Iz" in Hollywood, and was known to quip that his initials stood for "Interscholastic Algebra...
. But this film was never made. "Into the Night" would be his first film for the studio. Edmond O'Brien signed a contract with Warners in May 1948. "Into the Night" would also be his first film for the studio. Viveca Lindfors refused at first to participate in the film, upset with what she felt was its excessive violence. Placed on suspension
Suspension (punishment)
Suspension is a form of punishment that people receive for violating rules and regulations.- Workplace :Suspension is a common practice in the workplace for being in violation of an organization's policy...
by the studio, she relented in order to continue to receive her pay ("I sold out," she later said).
The shooting title of the film was changed from "Into the Night" to Somewhere in the City. Principal filming occurred from late July to mid October 1948. Interior and exterior hospital scenes were shot at Birmingham Veterans' Hospital in Van Nuys, California. Birmingham's Chief of Nursing Services Monica Cahill and Assistant Chief of Surgery Dr. Franklin Wilkins both served as technical consultants on the film. Additional scenes were filmed in and around the city of Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, included the Los Angeles City Hall
Los Angeles City Hall
Los Angeles City Hall, completed 1928, is the center of the government of the city of Los Angeles, California, and houses the mayor's office and the meeting chambers and offices of the Los Angeles City Council...
, the Fremont Hotel, the Biltmore Hotel
Santa Barbara Biltmore
The Santa Barbara Biltmore opened in 1927 as part of the legendary Biltmore Hotels chain. Now known as the Four Seasons Resort—The Biltmore Santa Barbara or just the Biltmore, it is a luxury hotel located in Montecito, California...
, Olvera Street
Olvera Street
Olvera Street is in the oldest part of Downtown Los Angeles, California, and is part of the El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historic Monument. Many Latinos refer to it as "La Placita Olvera." Circa 1911 it was described as Sonora Town....
, the Los Feliz neighborhood, and Stone Canyon in the Bel Air neighborhood. Additional scenes were shot in the nearby city of Glendale, California
Glendale, California
Glendale is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2010 Census, the city population is 191,719, down from 194,973 at the 2000 census. making it the third largest city in Los Angeles County and the 22nd largest city in the state of California...
.
Sherman later said that he believed Goff and Roberts had turned in a good script, and that the actors had done the best job they could. He found Virginia Mayo to be a very nice person and an extremely competent actress, although without a lot of personal depth.
Reception
Although the film was completed in October 1948, it was not released until 1950. The film opened at The Globe cinema in New York City, New York, on January 26, 1950. White Heat, starring James CagneyJames Cagney
James Francis Cagney, Jr. was an American actor, first on stage, then in film, where he had his greatest impact. Although he won acclaim and major awards for a wide variety of performances, he is best remembered for playing "tough guys." In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked him eighth...
, Edmund O'Brian, and Virginia Mayo, had been released to widespread acclaim and strong box office while Backfire remained unreleased. To take advantage of White Heat's popularity, movie posters for Backfire prominently featured Mayo in a femme fatale
Femme fatale
A femme fatale is a mysterious and seductive woman whose charms ensnare her lovers in bonds of irresistible desire, often leading them into compromising, dangerous, and deadly situations. She is an archetype of literature and art...
pose (very unlike her character in the film) and contained the tag-line: "That 'White Heat' girl turns it on again!" The poster also gave away the surprise conclusion to the film by depicting Dane Clark strangling Viveca Lindfors.
The picture did not receive good reviews. Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...
, writing for the New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, found the film feeble and listless, and the plot rambling. He had little praise for the case, concluding that "...the most that can possibly be said for them is that they get the thing done." Leslie Halliwell
Leslie Halliwell
Robert James Leslie Halliwell was a British film encyclopaedist and television impresario who in 1965 compiled The Filmgoer's Companion, the first one-volume encyclopaedia devoted to all aspects of the cinema. He followed it a dozen years later with Halliwell's Film Guide, another monumental work...
, writing in 1977, noted that the flashback structure, intended to solve some of the expository
Exposition (literary technique)
At the beginning of a narrative, the exposition is the author's providing of some background information to the audience about the plot, characters' histories, setting, and theme. Exposition is considered one of four rhetorical modes of discourse, along with argumentation, description, and narration...
problems in the film, did not work. Author Clive Hirschhorn noted in 1980 that there were so many coincidences in the film that any feeling of suspense was eliminated and the realism so essential to film noir was dissipated. Critic John Howard Reid assessed the film as "borderline" in 2006, but felt cinematography was effectively atmospheric and the action sequences fair. He found that the supporting players (O'Brien, Begley, Lindfors, Clark, and Sheila MacRae) delivered performances remarkably superior to that of the two stars, and singled out Lindfors for her acting.
Some reviewers singled out the script as the underlying cause of the acting problems. Reid thought Mayo's part too slim, but that it had been improperly built up by the script and editing to accommodate a star of her stature. David Shipman felt Gordon MacRae was completely miscast, and thus "wasted" in the picture.
Swedish actress Viveca Lindfors was under contract to Warner Bros. for four pictures. Unhappy with her work, however, the studio declined to pick up her option after her work in Backfire. Warners was much more pleased with the efforts of Goff and Roberts, and gave them a five-year contract to write screenplays. They produced White Heat the following year. In return for directing Backfire, Jack Warner permitted Vincent Sherman to direct The Hasty Heart, which became a major hit for the studio.
Television and home video releases
The film was regularly screened on broadcast television in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s, although most airings trimmed Mayo's part substantially.Warner Bros. released the film on DVD on July 13, 2010, in its Film Noir Classic Collection, Vol. 5.