Hell's Half Acre (film)
Encyclopedia
Hell's Half Acre is a 1954
1954 in film
The year 1954 in film involved some significant events and memorable ones.-Events:*May 12 - The Marx Brothers' Zeppo Marx divorces wife Marion Benda...

 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...

 set in Hawaii
Hawaii
Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

.

The film is directed and produced by John H. Auer and stars Wendell Corey
Wendell Corey
Wendell Reid Corey was an American actor and politician.He was born in Dracut, Massachusetts, the son of Milton Rothwell Corey and Julia Etta McKenney . His father was a Congregationalist clergyman...

, Evelyn Keyes
Evelyn Keyes
Evelyn Louise Keyes was an American film actress. She is best-known for her role as Suellen O'Hara in the 1939 film Gone with the Wind.-Early life:...

 and Elsa Lanchester
Elsa Lanchester
Elsa Sullivan Lanchester was an English-American character actress with a long career in theatre, film and television....

.

Plot

The drama related the tale of ex-racketeer Chet Chester (Corey) who is blackmailed by his former criminal partners.

Chester's girlfriend Sally (Nancy Gates
Nancy Gates
Nancy Gates is a retired American film and television actress.-Film:Gates, born in Dallas, Texas, entered acting at a young age, receiving a contract with RKO at the age of 15. Her first screen appearance, uncredited, was in the 1942 film The Magnificent Ambersons. That same year she had her first...

) kills one of his enemies. But Chester takes the blame, assuming that he has still got enough clout to escape with a light sentence.

Meanwhile, Dona Williams (Keyes) flies to Hawaii because she is certain that Chester is her long-lost husband who was thought to have died at Pearl Harbor.

Cast

  • Wendell Corey
    Wendell Corey
    Wendell Reid Corey was an American actor and politician.He was born in Dracut, Massachusetts, the son of Milton Rothwell Corey and Julia Etta McKenney . His father was a Congregationalist clergyman...

     as Chet Chester, aka Randy Williams
  • Evelyn Keyes
    Evelyn Keyes
    Evelyn Louise Keyes was an American film actress. She is best-known for her role as Suellen O'Hara in the 1939 film Gone with the Wind.-Early life:...

     as Donna Williams
  • Elsa Lanchester
    Elsa Lanchester
    Elsa Sullivan Lanchester was an English-American character actress with a long career in theatre, film and television....

     as Lida O'Reilly
  • Marie Windsor
    Marie Windsor
    Marie Windsor . Born as Emily Marie Bertelson in Marysvale, Piute County, Utah, Windsor was an actress known as "The Queen of the Bs" because she appeared in so many film noirs and B-movies like Cat-Women of the Moon...

     as Rose
  • Nancy Gates
    Nancy Gates
    Nancy Gates is a retired American film and television actress.-Film:Gates, born in Dallas, Texas, entered acting at a young age, receiving a contract with RKO at the age of 15. Her first screen appearance, uncredited, was in the 1942 film The Magnificent Ambersons. That same year she had her first...

     as Sally Lee
  • Leonard Strong
    Leonard Strong (actor)
    Leonard Clarence Strong Leonard Clarence Strong Leonard Clarence Strong (b. 12 August 1908, Utah - d. 23 January 1980, Glendale, California was a prolific American character actor specialising in playing Asian roles....

     as Ippy
  • Jesse White
    Jesse White (actor)
    Jesse White was an American television, film, and stage character actor. He is best remembered for portraying the Maytag repairman in television commercials, a role he played from 1967 to 1988.-Life and career:...

     as Tubby Otis
  • Keye Luke
    Keye Luke
    Keye Luke was a Chinese-born American actor. He was the first Chinese-American contract player signed with RKO, Universal and, later, MGM and is generally acknowledged as the leading Asian-American actor of this era of American cinema.-Background:...

     as Police Chief Dan
  • Philip Ahn as Roger Kong
  • Clair Widenaar as Jamison
  • Robert Costa as "Slim" Novak

Critical reception

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...

gave the film a positive review and wrote, "Betwixt the start and the finish, an undemanding spectator will find enough sequences of merit to hold his interest. And the story of destined doom and back-alley murder is not entirely implausible. Miss Keyes, an innocent caught in the tangled web, is a luscious young thing who certainly earns her "A" in acting. She shines nicely in contrast to the denizens of Hell's Half Acre, ostensibly a very unsocial area of Honolulu. John Auer, the director, makes his camera capture the most in picture value of what appears to be some very dingy neighborhoods with a resultant atmosphere that creates a certain element of suspense. His method of direction, aided and abetted by Steve Fisher's economical script, is one of sensible brevity without unnecessary frills."
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