Dark City (1950 film)

Dark City is a 1950 film noir directed by William Dieterle and produced by Hal B. Wallis. The film features Charlton Heston, Lizabeth Scott, Dean Jagger, Jack Webb and Harry Morgan. Webb and Morgan both went on to co-star in the popular police drama television series Dragnet.^[1] Heston made his professional big-screen debut in the movie, having starred in two amateur college films a decade before. In interviews much later, he would refer to Dark City as "definitely not an 'A' picture, but a pretty good 'B'."

Plot

A group of hustlers take a man for $5000 in a poker game. When the man ends up killing himself, the heat is put on the gamblers in the game. The dead man's vengeful brother begins picking off the gamblers one by one.

Cast

• Charlton Heston as Danny Haley/Richard Branton
• Lizabeth Scott as Fran Garland
• Viveca Lindfors as Victoria Winant
• Dean Jagger as Capt. Garvey
• Don DeFore as Arthur Winant
• Jack Webb as Augie
• Ed Begley as Barney
• Harry Morgan as Soldier
• Mike Mazurki as Sidney Vincent

Production notes

The working title of this film was No Escape. The production dates were from April 5 to May 12, 1950. Additional scenes and retakes were from May 9 to May 11, 1950. The production scenes were shot at the following Los Angeles locations: Griffith Park Observatory, Union Station, North Hollywood, an amusement pier in Ocean Park, the Wilshire Plaza Hotel and the Valley Vista Motel on Ventura Blvd. in the San Fernando Valley, California. In addition, background shots were filmed in Las Vegas, Nevada and Chicago, Illinois.^[2]

Reception

Critical response

When the film was released, film critic for the New York Times, Bosley Crowther, applauded the work of newcomer Charlton Heston but panned the film, writing, "A new star named Charlton Heston — a tall, tweedy, rough-hewn sort of chap who looks like a triple-threat halfback on a midwestern college football team—is given an unfortunate send-off on the low and lurid level of crime in Hal Wallis' thriller, Dark City, which came to the Paramount yesterday. Apparently Mr. Heston, who has worked for the stage and video, has something more than appearance to recommend him to dramatic roles. He has a quiet but assertive magnetism, a youthful dignity and a plainly potential sense of timing that is the good actor's sine qua non. But in this 'clutching hand' chiller, he is called upon to play nothing more complex or demanding than a crooked gambler marked for doom."^[3]

More recently, film critic Dennis Schwartz gave the film a mixed review, writing, "Veteran director William Dieterle (The Devil and Daniel Webster) has been dealt a bad hand by the weak script, but the talented cast play out the hand as best they could ... The dark mood is set by Victor Milner's excellent B&W photography. Heston's finely tuned nuanced performance, as a guy gone bad but who can be saved by love, gives the melodrama enough film noir qualities to get over but not enough to relieve it of its tedium."^[4]

References

External links

• Dark City at the American Film Institute Catalog
• Dark City at the Internet Movie Database
• Dark City at AllMovie
• Dark City at the TCM Movie Database
• Dark City informational site and DVD review at DVD Beaver (includes image)
• Dark City film scene on YouTube