The Clay Pigeon

The Clay Pigeon
Theatrical release lobby card
Directed by	Richard Fleischer
Produced by	Herman Schlom
Screenplay by	Carl Foreman
Story by	Carl Foreman
Starring	Bill Williams Barbara Hale Richard Quine
Music by	Paul Sawtell
Cinematography	Robert De Grasse
Edited by	Samuel E. Beetley
Distributed by	RKO Radio Pictures
Release date	February 14, 1949 (1949-02-14) (US)[1]
Running time	63 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

The Clay Pigeon is a 1949 American film noir directed by Richard Fleischer and written by Carl Foreman, based on a true story. The drama features Bill Williams and Barbara Hale, real-life husband and wife.^[2]

Plot

Jim Fletcher (Williams), a former inmate in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp, awakes from a coma at a naval hospital, only to be told he's been accused of murder. Fletcher is not quite certain of his guilt so he escapes from the hospital in search of his best friend, another ex-POW.

Cast

• Bill Williams as Jim Fletcher
• Barbara Hale as Martha Gregory
• Richard Quine as Ted Niles
• Richard Loo as Ken Tokoyama aka The Weasel
• Frank Fenton as Lt. Cmdr. Prentice
• Frank Wilcox as Navy Hospital Doctor
• Robert Bray as Gunsel Blake
• Martha Hyer as Miss Harwick, Wheeler's Receptionist
• Harold Landon as Blind Veteran
• James Craven as John Wheeler

Reception

Critical response

Time Out film reviews wrote of the film, "Directed by Fleischer with tight, spare energy, although the implausible script and bland leading performances (with Hale as the dead friend's wife, initially hostile but soon losing her heart) make it much inferior to The Narrow Margin.^[3]

References

External links

• The Clay Pigeon at the American Film Institute Catalog
• The Clay Pigeon on IMDb
• The Clay Pigeon at AllMovie
• The Clay Pigeon at the TCM Movie Database
• The Clay Pigeon film clip on YouTube