Humphrey Bogart Gloria Grahame Frank Lovejoy Carl Benton Reid Art Smith

1950 film by Nicholas Ray

In a Lonely Identify
Theatrical release poster
Directed past	Nicholas Ray
Screenplay by	Andrew P. Solt Edmund H. Northward (accommodation)
Based on	In a Lonely Identify 1947 novel by Dorothy B. Hughes
Produced by	Robert Lord
Starring	Humphrey Bogart Gloria Grahame Frank Lovejoy Carl Benton Reid Art Smith Jeff Donnell Martha Stewart
Cinematography	Burnett Guffey
Edited by	Viola Lawrence
Music by	George Antheil
Product company	Santana Pictures Corporation
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures
Release date	August 1950 (1950-08)
Running time	94 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English language
Box office	$1.4 million[1]

In a Lonely Place is a 1950 American film noir directed by Nicholas Ray^[two] and starring Humphrey Bogart and Gloria Grahame, produced for Bogart's Santana Productions. The script was written by Andrew P. Solt from Edmund H. North's adaptation of Dorothy B. Hughes' 1947 novel of the same name.^[3]

Bogart stars as Dixon (Dix) Steele, a troubled, and violence-prone, screenwriter suspected of murder. Grahame co-stars as Laurel Gray, a lonely neighbour who falls under his spell. Beyond its surface plot of confused identity and tormented beloved, the story is a mordant annotate on Hollywood mores and the pitfalls of glory and well-nigh-celebrity, similar to two other American films released that aforementioned yr, Billy Wilder's Sunset Boulevard and Joseph 50. Mankiewicz'southward All About Eve.^[4]

Although lesser-known than his other work, Bogart's performance is considered past many critics to be among his finest and the film'due south reputation has grown over time, along with Ray's.^[5] It is at present considered 1 of the best pic noirs of all time, as evidenced by its inclusion on the Fourth dimension "All-Fourth dimension 100 Movies" list^[half-dozen] as well as Slant Magazine 'south "100 Essential Films"^[seven] and it is ranked number i on Slant'due south "The 100 Best Film Noirs of All Time".^[8] The BBC ranked it number 89 in their listing of the 100 greatest American films of all fourth dimension.^[9] In 2007, In a Alone Place was selected for preservation in the Us National Moving picture Registry past the Library of Congress as beingness "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."^{[x] [11]}

Plot [edit]

Dixon "Dix" Steele is a down-on-his-luck Hollywood screenwriter who has not had a successful moving-picture show since before Earth War II. While driving to see his amanuensis, Mel Lippman, Dix's explosive atmosphere is revealed when, at a stoplight, he engages with another motorist in a confrontation that almost becomes violent. Meeting with Mel at a nightclub, Dix is cajoled into adapting a book for a movie. The lid-cheque girl, Mildred Atkinson, is engrossed in reading the copy meant for Dix; since she but has a few pages left to get, she asks to be immune to finish it. Dix claims to be too tired to read the novel, and then he asks Mildred to go home with him to explain the plot. Every bit they enter the courtyard of his apartment, they pass a new tenant, Laurel Gray. Mildred describes the story, confirming what Dix had suspected—the volume is no good. Rather than drive her home as promised, he gives her cab fare instead.

The next morning, Dix is awakened past his friend, constabulary detective Brub Nicolai, who served under Dix during the state of war. Nicolai takes him downtown to be questioned by his superior, Captain Lochner, who reveals that Mildred was murdered and informs Dix that he is a suspect. Dix remembers that Laurel saw him letting Mildred out of his apartment, which Laurel confirms when brought in for questioning. Subsequently Dix strikes up chat with Laurel and their common attraction is evident. When he gets home, Dix checks upwardly on Laurel. He finds she is an aspiring actress with merely a few low-upkeep films to her credit. They begin to fall in dear and, with Laurel assisting him, Dix enthusiastically goes back to work, much to Mel's delight.

Laurel takes a frightening ride with Dix

At a dinner with Nicolai and his married woman Sylvia, Dix has them re-enact the murder as he imagines it; his odd beliefs leads Sylvia to dubiousness his innocence. Helm Lochner meets with Laurel again and sows seeds of incertitude in her mind, pointing out Dix'south record of violent behavior. Laurel confides in Sylvia her growing doubts about Dix.

At a nightclub with Laurel, Dix spots Ted Barton, another detective, arriving with a female companion. Dix angrily leaves, believing that Barton is tailing him. Later, Laurel's masseuse Martha warns her about Dix'due south chequered romantic past, and Laurel grows irritated, kicking her out of the apartment. At a beach party with the Nicolais, Sylvia inadvertently reveals Laurel'south follow-upward meeting with Lochner; Dix furiously storms off. Laurel follows and gets into Dix'due south auto; he drives erratically and at speed until they sideswipe another car. Nobody is hurt, but when the other driver accosts him, Dix beats him unconscious and is nigh to strike him with a large rock when Laurel stops him.

Dix goes to the police station and attempts to clear his name, inadvertently meeting Mildred's boyfriend Henry Kesler, who works at a bank. Dix remarks to Nicolai that Kesler is a amend suspect as he has a motive. At the Nicolai residence, Laurel asks Sylvia almost Dix prompting the Nicolais to re-enact the murder, and tells her about Dix'southward roadside assault.

Somewhen, Laurel'southward doubts nigh Dix'due south innocence event in her being unable to sleep without taking pills. When he asks her to marry him, she accepts, simply only because she is scared of how he might react if she refuses. Mel comes over to celebrate while Dix is abroad, merely to discover out that Laurel does non want to go through with the marriage and is making plans to escape to New York. She urges Mel to bring Dix's completed script to a producer.

At a dinner to celebrate the engagement, Dix is annoyed to learn that Mel has submitted his script without his consent. Dix then intercepts a phone call meant for Laurel at the table, angrily discovering it is Martha and slugging Mel when he tries to arbitrate.

Back at Laurel's apartment, Dix flies into a rage when he sees that she has removed her date ring. After briefly calming down, Dix answers the phone, learning of Laurel's intended flight to New York. He once again becomes tearing, about strangling Laurel earlier regaining control of himself when the phone rings once more. It is Nicolai, who informs Dix and Laurel that Kesler has confessed to Mildred's murder. Still, both Dix and Laurel realise that it is too late to save their relationship. Laurel watches in tears as Dix slowly walks abroad across the courtyard to his apartment.

Cast [edit]

• Humphrey Bogart as Dixon Steele
• Gloria Grahame every bit Laurel Gray
• Frank Lovejoy equally Det. Sgt. Brub Nicolai
• Carl Benton Reid as Captain Lochner
• Art Smith as Mel Lippman
• Martha Stewart every bit Mildred Atkinson
• Jeff Donnell as Sylvia Nicolai
• Robert Warwick as Charlie Waterman
• Morris Ankrum every bit Lloyd Barnes
• William Ching as Ted Barton
• Steven Geray every bit Paul, Headwaiter
• Hadda Brooks equally Singer
• Jack Reynolds every bit Henry Kesler

Groundwork [edit]

Brub (Frank Lovejoy) demonstrates on Sylvia a possible murder method

When Edmund H. Due north adapted the story, he stuck close to the original source and John Derek was considered for the function of Steele because in the novel the grapheme was much younger. North's handling was not used. Andrew Solt adult the screenplay with regular input from producer Robert Lord and director Nicholas Ray, and the terminate consequence is far different from the source novel. Solt claimed that Bogart loved the script so much that he wanted to go far without revisions – Solt maintains that the final cut is very close to his script – but further research shows that Ray made regular rewrites, some added on the day of shooting. In fact, merely four pages of the 140-page script had no revisions. The motion-picture show was produced by Bogart'south Santana Productions visitor, whose first film was Knock on Any Door (1949), which was directed by Ray and starred Bogart and Derek in the leading roles.

Louise Brooks wrote in her essay "Humphrey and Bogey" that she felt it was the role of Dixon Steele in this movie that came closest to the real Bogart she knew. "Before inertia prepare in, he played one fascinatingly complex character, craftily directed by Nicholas Ray, in a moving-picture show whose title perfectly defined Humphrey's own isolation among people. In a Alone Place gave him a office that he could play with complexity because the character'south pride in his fine art, his selfishness, his drunkenness, his lack of energy stabbed with lightning strokes of violence, were shared every bit by the real Bogart."^[12] Apparently, on ane voyage in their yacht Santana, Bogart showed an inexplicable burst of rage that frightened his wife Lauren Bacall.

The original ending had Steele strangling Gray to decease in the heat of their argument. Sgt. Nicolai comes to tell Steele that he has been cleared of Mildred'due south murder but arrests him for killing Gray. Steele tells Brub that he is finally finished with his screenplay; the last shot was to be of a page in the typewriter which has the pregnant lines Steele said to Gray in the car (which he admitted to not knowing where to put) "I was born when she kissed me, I died when she left me, I lived a few weeks while she loved me". This scene was filmed halfway through the shooting schedule, but Ray hated the ending he had helped write. Ray later on said,

"I just couldn't believe the ending that Bundy (screenwriter Andrew Solt) and I had written. I shot it because information technology was my obligation to do information technology. Then I kicked everybody off stage except Bogart, Fine art Smith and Gloria. And we improvised the ending as it is now. In the original ending we had ribbons and then it was all tied up into a very nifty package, with Lovejoy coming in and absorbing him equally he was writing the concluding lines, having killed Gloria. Huh! And I thought, shit, I can't do information technology, I only can't do it! Romances don't have to finish that way. Marriages don't have to stop that manner, they don't have to end in violence. Let the audience brand upward its own mind what'due south going to happen to Bogie when he goes exterior the apartment."^[xiii]

Bacall and Ginger Rogers were considered for the role of Laurel Gray. Bacall was a natural choice given her off-screen marriage to Bogart and their box-office appeal, but Warner Bros. refused to loan her out, a move ofttimes thought to be in reaction to Bogart having set up his ain independent product company, the blazon of which Warner Bros. were afraid would jeopardize the future of the major studios. Rogers was the producers' starting time choice but Ray believed that his married woman Gloria Grahame was correct for the part. Even though their spousal relationship was troubled, he insisted that she exist bandage. Her performance today is unanimously considered to be among her finest.

Grahame and Ray's spousal relationship was starting to come up autonomously during filming. Grahame was forced to sign a contract stipulating that "my hubby [Ray] shall be entitled to direct, control, advise, instruct and even command my actions during the hours from 9 AM to 6 PM, every twenty-four hour period except Dominicus ... I acknowledge that in every conceivable situation his will and judgment shall exist considered superior to mine and shall prevail." Grahame was also forbidden to "nag, cajole, tease or in any other feminine fashion seek to distract or influence him." The two did split up during filming. Afraid that one of them would be replaced, Ray took to sleeping in a dressing room, lying and saying that he needed to work on the script. Grahame played along with the charade and nobody knew that they had separated. Though there was a cursory reconciliation, the couple divorced in 1952.^{[14] [15]}

The film was ane of two Nicholas Ray films to be scored by avant garde classical composer George Antheil (1900–1959). The production began on October 25, 1949 and ended on December 1, 1949.

Reception [edit]

Disquisitional response [edit]

At the time of its original release, the reviews were more often than not positive (in particular many critics praised Bogart and Grahame's performances), simply many questioned the marketability given the dour ending. The staff at Diversity mag in May 1950 gave the picture a good review and wrote, "In In a Solitary Place Humphrey Bogart has a sympathetic function though bandage as one always set to mix it with his dukes. He favors the underdog; in one instance he virtually has a veteran, brandy-soaking character actor (out of work) on his very limited payroll ... Director Nicholas Ray maintains nice suspense. Bogart is excellent. Gloria Grahame, equally his romance, too rates kudos".^[sixteen]

Gloria Grahame and Bogart

Bosley Crowther lauded the flick, peculiarly Bogart's performance and the screenplay, writing, "Everybody should be happy this morn. Humphrey Bogart is in tiptop course in his latest independently fabricated product, In a Solitary Place, and the pic itself is a superior cut of melodrama. Playing a violent, quick-tempered Hollywood film writer suspected of murder, Mr. Bogart looms large on the screen of the Paramount Theatre and he moves flawlessly through a script which is almost equally flinty as the actor himself. Andrew Solt, who fashioned the screenplay from a story by Dorothy B. Hughes and an adaptation by Edmund H. North, has had the good sense to resolve the story logically. Thus Dixon Steele remains as much of an enigma, an explosive, contradictory strength at loose ends when the flick ends equally when it starts."^[17]

Not unlike Ray's debut They Live past Nighttime (1948), information technology was advertised every bit a directly thriller although the motion-picture show does not fit hands into i genre, as the marketing shows. Ray'southward films had a brief revival in the 1970s and Bogart's anti-hero stance gained a post-obit in the 1960s, and the French Cahiers du cinéma critics during the 1950s praised Ray'south unique pic making. Time mag, which gave the film a negative review upon its initial release, chosen it one of the 100 all-time films of all fourth dimension in their 2005 listing.

"I was born when I met you. I lived while I loved yous. I died when you left me"... But an role player with Bogart's terminal blasphemy could suspension through the banality [of these lines] to the other side of wild romanticism.

—Movie historian Andrew Sarris in "Yous Ain't Heard Nothin' Yet.": The American Talking Motion-picture show History & Memory, 1927-1949.^[18]

Critic Ed Gonzalez wrote in 2001, "Not unlike Albert Camus' The Stranger, Nicholas Ray'southward remarkable In a Lonely Place represents the purest of existentialist primers ... Gray and Dixon may love each other merely information technology'southward evident that they're both entirely too victimized by their own selves to sustain this kind of happiness. In the finish, their beloved resembles a rehearsal for the next and hopefully less complicated romance. This is the existential endgame of i of Ray's smartest and about devastating masterpieces."^[nineteen]

Curtis Hanson is featured on the retrospective documentary of the DVD release showing his admiration for the pic, notably Ray's direction, the night delineation of Hollywood and Bogart'southward operation. This was one of the films which he showed to actors Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce in preparation for filming 50.A. Confidential. He said, "I wanted them to encounter the reality of that catamenia and to see that emotion. This movie, and I'm not saying information technology'due south the greatest movie ever made, merely it represents many things that I think are worth aspiring to, such as having grapheme and emotion exist the driving force, rather than the plot. ... When I first saw In a Alone Place as a teenager, it frightened me and nevertheless attracted me with an almost hypnotic power. Later, I came to understand why. Occasionally, very rarely, a movie feels and then heartfelt, then emotional, and then revealing that it seems as though both the role player and the director are continuing naked before the audition. When that kind of wedlock happens betwixt actor and director, it's scenic."^[xx]

In 2009, movie critic Roger Ebert added In a Lone Place to his "great movies" list.^[21]

The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 98% of critics gave the film positive reviews, with an average rating of 8.71/10, based on 47 reviews. The website's critics consensus reads: "Led by extraordinary performances from Humphrey Bogart and Gloria Grahame, In a Lone Identify is a gripping noir of uncommon depth and maturity."^[22]

In pop culture [edit]

The 1986 song "In a Lonely Identify" by the Smithereens, from the album Especially For You, was inspired by the film. Its chorus, "I was born the day I met you, lived a while when you loved me, died a little when we broke apart," is taken directly from the movie's dialogue.^[23]

Comparisons to novel [edit]

In a Lonely Place was based on the 1947 novel of the same name by Dorothy B. Hughes. Some controversy exists between admirers of the film and admirers of the novel (who view the film as a watered downward adaptation), as Edmund H. North'due south script takes some elements of the novel but is ultimately a different story. Hughes was not bothered past the changes made by Northward and praised Grahame's performance as Gray.

Gloria Grahame and Bogart

The strongest departure betwixt the two works lies in the protagonist; the film's Dixon Steele is a screenwriter with an unconventional life and a decent person with fatally poor impulse command, prone to wild overreaction when enraged. The novel's Steele is a limited third-person view from Steele's perspective, reminiscent of the first-person in noir, à la The Killer Inside Me. Steele is a adventurer who pretends to be a novelist while sponging money from his overbearing uncle. While even so receiving what he perceives as a small monthly allowance from his uncle, Steele murders a wealthy young man and assumes his identity, in a manner similar to Patricia Highsmith's Tom Ripley. (Hughes' character pre-dates Ripley and may take influenced him.) The picture follows the question of whether Steele finally went too far in his anger and committed the murder to a tragic stop. Even though he is proved innocent, his rage at the cloud of suspicion has driven the adult female he loves abroad for good. No question of Steele's innocence exists in the novel, which follows the investigation of a murder Steele plainly committed and his interference in the investigation for his ain ends.

Curtis Hanson, in the DVD featurette 'In A Lonely Identify Revisited', further analyses the similarities and differences between the novel and the film. He notes that there is a parallel in the movie between Steele's adaptation of a novel for picture and the accommodation of In a Lone Identify for movie. He also notes that a difference between Steele in the movie and Steele in the novel is their respective handling of women. In the novel Steele pursues women and the first chapter details his pursuit of a woman. In the film, Steele is pursued by women.

Hughes' novel was out of print for decades, until re-released by The Feminist Printing at CUNY in 2003, which edition was still in print in 2010. Penguin Books published a paperback edition in the UK in 2010 every bit part of their Modern Classics imprint, and the Library of America included it in the first volume of their "Women Crime Writers" collection. Second-hand copies are readily available.

References [edit]

1. ^ "Top Grosses of 1950". Variety. January 3, 1951. p. 58.
2. ^ "The 100 Best Film Noirs of All Time". Paste. August ix, 2015. Retrieved August nine, 2015.
3. ^ In a Lonely Place at the American Film Constitute Catalog.
4. ^ Smith, Imogen Sara. "In a Lone Place: An Epitaph for Beloved". The Criterion Collection.
5. ^ Telotte, J. P. (1989). Voices in the Night: The Narrative Patterns of Film Noir. Uni. of Illinois Press. pp. 189–195. ISBN0-252-01570-three.
6. ^ In a Lonely Place on Time 's "All-Time 100 Listing"
7. ^ "Slant Mag 'southward 100 Essential Films List". 2007. Archived from the original on 2008-02-14.
8. ^ Staff. "The 100 Best Pic Noirs of All Fourth dimension". Retrieved 2020-06-24 .
9. ^ "The 100 greatest American films". BBC. Archived from the original on December 27, 2020.
10. ^ "Complete National Moving-picture show Registry Listing". Library of Congress . Retrieved 2020-11-xvi .
11. ^ "Librarian of Congress Announces National Film Registry Selections for 2007". Library of Congress . Retrieved 2020-eleven-sixteen .
12. ^ Brooks, Louise. Sight and Sound, Winter 1966/67, Volume 36 Number one, "Humphrey and Bogey." Terminal accessed: January 20, 2008.
13. ^ Eisenschitz, Bernard. "Nicholas Ray: An American Journey" (U.k.: Faber and Faber Express, 1993) folio 144.
14. ^ Lentz, Robert J. (2011). Gloria Grahame, Bad Girl of Pic Noir: The Complete Career. Mcfarland. ISBN978-0-786-43483-1.
15. ^ "Gloria Grahame". Glamour Girls of the Silver Screen . Retrieved 2020-05-04 . Based on several sources including Curcio, Vincent (1989). Suicide Blonde: The Life of Gloria Grahame (1st ed.). William Morrow. ISBN0-688-06718-ii.
16. ^ "In a Lone Place". Variety. May 17, 1950. Retrieved 2020-05-04 .
17. ^ Crowther, Bosley (May 18, 1950). "The Screen: Three Films Make Their Bows; Humphrey Bogart Moving picture, 'In a Solitary Identify,' at Paramount --Import at Trans-Lux 'Annie Get Your Gun,' Starring Betty Hutton, Is Presented at Loew's State Theatre". The New York Times.
18. ^ Sarris, 1998. p.119
19. ^ Gonzalez, Ed (2001). "In a Lonely Place". Slant Mag. Archived from the original on 2008-02-11.
20. ^ Lyman, Rick (December 15, 2000). "A Dark Lesson In Trust". The New York Times.
21. ^ Ebert, Roger (August 13, 2009). "In a Lonely Identify (1950)".
22. ^ In a Lonely Place at Rotten Tomatoes. Last accessed: July half dozen, 2016.
23. ^ "The P.I. Record Drove". The Thrilling Detective . Retrieved 2020-05-fourteen .

External links [edit]

• In a Lonely Place at the American Picture show Institute Catalog
• In a Lonely Place at IMDb
• In a Lonely Place at AllMovie
• In a Lonely Identify at the TCM Pic Database
• In a Solitary Place at Rotten Tomatoes
• In a Lonely Identify DVD restoration review at Bright Lights Picture Journal
• In a Lonely Place article at Senses of Movie theatre by Serena Brier
• In a Solitary Place: An Epitaph for Love an essay by Imogen Sara Smith at the Criterion Collection
• In a Lonely Place essay by Daniel Eagan in America's Film Legacy: The Administrative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Picture show Registry, A&C Black, 2010 ISBN 0826429777, pages 435-436 [i]

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_a_Lonely_Place

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