Attention butches, studs, AGs and all Masculine of Center readers: Think you’ve got what it takes to play two-fisted dyke dick Butch Fatale? I’m gearing up for my next Butch Fatale novel, and I want to put together a sexy video teaser trailer. All I need is YOU!

Here’s what you need to do:

Post a video (any length) on YouTube containing each of the following components:

A) Introduce yourself and tell us why you should play Butch Fatale. (NOTE: You DO NOT have to look exactly like the cover illustration or match the written description! I welcome entries from all ages, shapes and types, including butches of color, fat butches, and anyone else who thinks they’ve got what it takes. Cocky, sexy ATTITUDE is the key here, not looks.)

B) Read the following excerpt from DOUBLE D DOUBLE CROSS:

“When the tattooed tomato walked into my shabby Echo Park office, I had no idea if she was gonna kiss me or slap me. I was hoping for the former, but betting on the latter.

Her name was Diversity. Back when we first met, she’d been this waifish hippie chick fresh out of UC Berkley. A second-generation granola dyke whose homespun, organic hemp exterior hid a multi-O dynamo that wouldn’t quit. We had three tempestuous months together before it ended badly. Can’t say I was surprised. She was the type who got all juicy over the idea of slumming with a rough and tumble blue-collar butch like me, but couldn’t stop lecturing me about how I was internalizing patriarchal oppression because I cut my hair like Tony Curtis.

In the years since we’d parted ways, I hadn’t changed all that much. I’ve been 5’10” since I was fifteen and walk around at a fit 150. Muscular arms, broad shoulders and big, solid tits that I gave up hiding years ago. Never been pretty, but I’ve grown into handsome pretty well. Still cutting my hair like Tony Curtis.”

C) Include some extra footage of yourself hamming it up for the camera. Seduce me. Sell me your sexy swagger. Stand out from the pack and charm me right out of my panties.

D) Include this URL in your YouTube post http://amzn.com/B0076OEOG4

E) Email me a link to your post at christafaust AT gmail DOT com

The rest is up to you. Get creative. Use props and costumes if you like. Be as slick and polished or raw and gritty as you like. Be unique.

I will post links to all the videos received by July 1st 2012 here on this blog and all my readers will be invited to vote for the winner. That winner will be the star of the new Butch Fatale teaser trailer.

Good luck, and may the best butch win!

This is it. End of the line. The very last Noir City post of 2012. The final show was a Marsha Hunt double bill, starting with Mary Ryan, Detective.



A female detective (Hunt) goes undercover to bust up a gang of thieves. Which is pretty much all you need to know about the plot.

As I said in yesterday’s post, this film is so rare, even the star had never seen it. It’s a little too light-hearted at times to be classified as Noir, but I still enjoyed it anyway, mostly because of Marsha Hunt’s performance. I can’t remember ever seeing her act tough before, (Muller’s flick The Grand Inquisitor notwithstanding,) and I have to admit it was kind of hot. I loved her hard-ass attitude towards her cellmate and her slapping the tied up guard during a fur heist just to prove she was a real crook. And I was able to forgive the thankfully brief appearance of yet another child actor, a girl this time, because she turned out to be a thief, working a jewelry counter scam with her mom and another woman.

The gorgeous Ms. Hunt was on hand to discuss the film during the intermission, and she looked as effortlessly chic and classy as always. At 93, she’s still a knock out.

On a side note, if you’re interested in vintage fashion from the 30s and 40s, check out her book The Way We Wore.

Next, Kid Glove Killer.



This one, I’d seen. It’s a sort of proto-CSI story about a pair of “police chemists” (Hunt and Heflin) who use science to solve a series of politically motivated murders. It gets a little draggy in the middle and Heflin is weirdly unlikable in this role, but Marsha Hunt looks foxy in a lab coat and the forensic angle makes it interesting. It’s cute and charming and there are some pretty funny bits, but again, not really Noir. Still worth seeing on the big screen.

So that’s it, Faustketeers. Hope you enjoyed playing along at home, and hope you’ll make an effort to check out some of these films on my say so.

See ya in Noir City.

Another year, another Noir City in the can. For the final quadruple feature, I’m splitting my write up into two halves, so that we can make it last. Here’s the first half. Starting with Circumstantial Evidence.



It wasn’t until the last day that we had the first real loser of the festival. For starters, I was already way over my kid actor threshold with Suddenly and The Window, and the kid who plays the son in this one was exceptionally screechy and repellent.

Before the film starts, we get this heavy handed warning about the growing menace that threatens the very fabric of our society: circumstantial evidence. No really.

A volatile single dad (O’Shea) gets into a scuffle with a shopkeeper who accused his kid of stealing. The shopkeeper gets killed in the fight, and several witnesses claim to have seen O’Shea whack him with a hatchet. Of course he didn’t, but he gets sent to the chair anyway, by CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE!!!

The screechy kid and the dad's inexplicably sinister best friend (Lloyd Nolan) have to work together to clear the father’s name, which involves a kids boxing tournament and a bizarre pint-sized reenactment of the original fight.

His best friend never actually does anything bad in the film, but there was something about Nolan’s performance that made him seem kind of creepy and mildly sociopathic. When he was trying to get custody of the kid I was convinced he was gonna molest him or chop him up. No such luck.

When O’Shea finds out his appeal has been denied, he busts out of prison, only to discover that his kid and pal have proved him innocent and gotten him a pardon from the governor. So he has to break back in, which was the only almost-but-not-quite-good part of the film. It had some nice suspenseful moments but would have been infinitely better, and far more noirish, if he’d been killed on the way back in. Of course, he’s fine and everyone lives happily ever after.

Muller introduced this one by saying that he’d never seen it either and that we were all going to be guinea pigs in another Noir experiment. Afterwards, someone should have called PETA to report cruelty to animals.

Next up, the also not-really-Noir, but infinitely more tolerable Sign of the Ram.



A young woman gets a job as a secretary for a reclusive family that lives in a creepy old house on a cliff in Cornwall. The young wheelchair-bound stepmother saved her husband’s children from drowning but was dashed against the rocks and paralyzed during the rescue. She uses her disability and the now grown children’s gratitude to manipulate and control the entire family.

There are a lot of really interesting things about this movie, not the least of which being the fact that Susan Peters, the lead actress, was a real life paraplegic who’d suffered a spinal injury in a hunting accident. This film was written especially for her. Sadly, she died a few years later at 31 from kidney failure and pneumonia caused by anorexia.



I was also fascinated by the lesbian undertone of the youngest daughter’s strange passionate “crush” on her paralyzed stepmother. A crush so intense that she’s willing to kill for the object of her tortured teenage love.

But ultimately, this isn’t really my kind of movie. It’s too histrionic, too melodramatic and too soap-opera-ish. All the violence is very female in nature, like poisoning and goading others into suicide and jumping off cliffs into the raging sea. There’s way too much scheming to break up chaste, innocent relationships and not nearly enough sex. I kept wishing Charles McGraw would show up and start slapping these bitches around or something.

A rough start, but there was a Marsha Hunt double bill coming up, including a film so rare that Marsha herself had never seen it.

Stay tuned for my last write up of 2012.

Unfortunately, I was not able to make yesterday’s matinee with Denise Hamilton, but I was there for the night’s Geraldine Fitzgerald double feature. First the wonderful Three Strangers.



I’ve seen this one several times and love it. This may be the only film where Peter Lorre gets the girl (except maybe M, but that’s a whole other thing.) Which made a lot more sense once Muller explained that the part was originally written for Bogart and remained unchanged after Lorre got the role.

A superstitious woman engineers an anonymous encounter with an alcoholic dreamer mixed up in a hold up (Lorre) and an ambitious lawyer with a serious cash flow problem (Greenstreet) in order to fulfill an ancient legend about a Chinese goddess who will grant the mutual wish of three strangers at midnight on Chinese New Year. They agree to wish for money and split a sweepstakes ticket. Their wishes are fulfilled in unexpected ways and, because it’s Noir City, things quickly get ugly.

This one isn’t hard to come by, so I recommend you seek it out.

The night’s special guest was Geraldine Fitzgerald’s son Michael Lindsay-Hogg, and he had plenty of stories to share about his glamorous mother. The one that tormented me was that Fitzgerald had been up for the role Brigid O'Shaughnessy in Maltese Falcon. She claimed she turned it down because her best friend had an affair with Huston and was treated badly, but the truth was that she was always in dutch with the studio and they wouldn’t loan her out. I really hate Mary Astor in that role, and Fitzgerald would have been perfect.

The second Fitzgerald feature was Nobody Lives Forever.



At first, I thought I hadn’t seen this one, but as soon as I heard that opening voice over where the hospitalized Garfield is longing for New York City, I realized I was wrong. I’ve been having quite a bit of New York nostalgia myself lately.

Garfield plays a con man and ex GI who got injured in the war and is ready to go straight. But when he comes home to his apartment and his girl, things have changed and not for the better. Angry and disillusioned, he takes off for L.A. where he gets invited to join a big money scam to fleece a rich widow, played by Fitzgerald. But he ends up falling for the widow and starts to get second thoughts about the con, only his fellow scammers aren’t willing to let the big fish go.

Lots of great character actors in this one too, including Walter “Ever get bit by a dead bee?” Brennan and George Tobias. It’s a little bit on the lighter, more romantic side of Noir City, but still lots of fun. Plus I love foxy Faye Emerson’s wardrobe, particularly that almost fetish-style pin striped suit with bustier detailing. Of course I can’t find a photo of that suit, but here’s another one of her hot outfits for your enjoyment:



Today is the last day of the festival, and we’re going out with a bang. Two back to back double features! In the afternoon it’s Circumstantial Evidence and Sign of the Ram then in the evening we cap it off with a Marsha Hunt double bill of the ultra rare Mary Ryan, Detective and Kid Glove Killer.

This is the kind of write up that tortures me (and you, too I’m sure) because I absolutely loved City Streets and it’s not available on DVD. Like Crashout, this is a film that more people need to see, but probably never will. I wish I could recommend it, but I’ll have to settle for telling you all about what you missed. Meanwhile, watch the TCM schedule and see if you can catch it.

But first, The (other) Maltese Falcon.



I’ve seen this one before, and it’s a pretty bad movie. Mostly on account of Cortez’ smarmy, leering performance. I actually like Bebe Daniels as “Ruth Wonderly” and the saucy Una Merkel as Effie but every second Cortez is on screen you want to knock that big cheeseball grin right off his kisser. I don’t buy him as either tough or sexy. The few times he’s required to show anything resembling real emotion it seems almost jarring, like something out of a different movie.

It’s a real tragedy that they couldn’t have this much sex and violence in the Bogart version, because that’s this films only redeeming quality. I love Bebe in the bubble bath and the scene where she’s forced to strip to prove she didn’t palm a thousand dollar bill. They don’t make any attempt to disguise the sexual nature of Wilmer (Dwight Frye!) and Gutman’s relationship either. If you haven’t seen it, it’s worth checking out as a curiosity, even if it’s just so that you can have a giggle at Spade’s huge, luxurious apartment.

Now, a confession. I’m not a huge fan of the Bogart version either. It’s not bad, and it’s a thousand times better than this one, but I think it’s a little bit stagey and flat. I also find Mary Astor kind of sexless and unappealing as Brigid, although I loved her in Act of Violence. It’s too bad that a really dark, dead-on, true to the novel version of this story has never been made. Maybe someday…

Next up, City Streets



Muller kept talking about how handsome Gary Cooper is in this film, which is true, but I really fell for sexy Sylvia Sidney in her role as a street-wise mobster’s daughter.



This is the only Dashiell Hammett story that was written specifically for the screen, and it’s brilliant.

Nan, the aforementioned mobster’s daughter (step daughter actually,) played by Sidney, falls for a carnival sharpshooter and former bull-rider named Kid, played by Cooper. She works with her slippery stepfather’s mob running illegal beer. She encourages Kid to get in on the action so they can earn enough money to get married but he’s reluctant. Then she gets pinched trying to dispose of a murder weapon for her stepfather and goes to jail rather than rat out Pops. Pops convinces Kid that Nan needs his help and talks him into joining the mob.

Nan does the time like a pro with her mouth shut, but while she’s in the stir, she starts to have second thoughts about getting Kid involved in such a dangerous racket. Especially after her cellmate’s gangster boyfriend is murdered right outside the prison. When he comes to visit all dressed in spats and fur and tells her about how successful he’s been at climbing the criminal ladder, she’s heartbroken.

When she finally gets released, she begs Kid to give up the racket and run away with her. But he’s gotten used to the cash and the cars and big swanky house, and refuses. Until the boss starts hitting on Nan hard and won’t let up. Kid soon realizes the boss is going to rub him out so he can have Nan all to himself.

Kid leaves to take care of business with the Big Boss, but Nan makes her own arrangements to meet the boss in secret, with a gun in her purse.

This isn’t Kid’s story, it’s really Nan’s and she is a sensational character. She’s smart, tough, resourceful and independent, but also fiercely loyal and not afraid to take violent action to save her lover. According to Hammett’s granddaughter Julie, who was on hand to introduce the film, Hammett thought Sidney was perfect and exactly what he had imagined for that character. Which is interesting because the role was supposed to be played by Clara Bow, but she had to back out because of her famous nervous breakdown.

Of course the film is a little clunky at times and you can see that they were trying to figure out how to use this amazing new technology, but that doesn’t take away from the crackerjack script and the terrific performances.

Again, I wish this film were more widely available. But if you ever get a chance to see it, you won’t be sorry.

Before I get on to last night’s films, I need to mention something I forgot to include in yesterday’s write up. There’s a foot fetish scene in Private Hell 36! I only remembered it because there’s also a not-nearly-as-visually-appealing foot fetish scene in Okay America, which features Edward Arnold instead of Ida Lupino.

But never mind my sex life, on to the movies.

Last night was a pre-code “Proto-Noir” double bill of rare films from the 1930s. First, Okay America.



Lew Ayers is a Walter Winchell knock off who plays both sides against the middle while snooping around the sensational kidnapping of a young heiress.

The story is histrionic and over the top in that early 30s kind of way and I think the weird racist half-naked dance number (skull pasties!) immediately followed by an even weirder musical number with women in Aunt Jemima outfits gave me some kind of sexual whiplash. But the dialog is sharp and snappy and there’s plenty of sex and violence. Plus, it was directed by Tay Garnett, who would go on to direct The Postman Always Rings Twice. It’s not Noir, but you can see the roots of Noir in certain shots or certain lines. And I love Louis Calhern’s awesome schnoz.

Speaking of Calhern’s schnoz, Afraid to Talk.



A bell hop witnesses a mob hit and winds up framed for murder by a pack of corrupt politicians when the real killer reveals he’s got proof of all their dirty dealings.

Great noirish premise and once again we get plenty of pre-code sex and violence, though this time our un-PC dance number features a chain gang of sexy, scantily-clad jailbirds joined together by chains attached to heavy leather collars. (!!!) Here too, you can see the roots, the images and ideas that would some day grow up to be Noir.

Last night was fun for me, because I probably never would have chosen these movies on my own. I’m glad I saw them.

I think last night was my favorite so far. It was billed as a “crooked cop” double feature. Which it is, but I liked my friend Richard Heft’s description better: a “festival of booze-sweaty foreheads.” Which it also is.

First up, the sweaty Edmond O’Brian in Shield for Murder:

 

O’Brian stars as a dirty cop who murders a bookie for his bankroll and, as is so often the case in Noir City, covering up one crime quickly leads to others as he spirals dangerously out of control. Even his long-suffering girlfriend, played by Marla (The She Creature!!!) English and his partner John (Brain from Planet Arous!) Agar can’t save him from his inevitable self destruction. (Yeah, okay, so I’m a monster nerd.)

I loved this film, even though it was obviously shot for a nickel. O’Brian was fantastic, tortured yet believable and surprisingly sympathetic. Like Muller said, if you thought O’Brian was sweaty and unhinged in D.O.A, you need to see this movie.



The print was a bit of a mystery going in, since no one from the Film Noir Foundation was able to see it before last night’s screening. It turned out to be in pretty rough shape, but I was still thrilled to see it on the big screen and I hope that it will eventually be restored.

Speaking of restoration, if you’re enjoying these write ups and want to help the Film Noir Foundation continue to restore and preserve rare gems like Shield for Murder click here to donate. Tell 'em Faust sent ya.

Next up in the festival of booze-sweaty foreheads, Private Hell 36:



A pair of cops (Cochran and Duff) investigate a robbery, but when they uncover the missing dough, one of them starts getting ideas about how to keep his gold-digging girlfriend (Lupino) in diamonds. He pockets a chunk of the cash, much to his buddy’s dismay. They hide the money in a forgotten trailer park and seem to get away with it at first, but the pressure of covering up their crime begins to unravel their friendship. Cue the binge-drinking (which, according to Muller, wasn’t really acting) and sweaty foreheads.

Ida Lupino is my hero. She wasn’t just a pretty face, she was also a writer, director and producer. She co-wrote this film, and you can really see her deft touch with character development. There’s plenty of two-fisted action, but what makes it great is the interplay between the characters and they way they come apart at the seams.

Highly recommended.

A “Johnny on the Spot” double feature, one good and one not so good.

First, O’Clock.



Dick Powell plays a swanky gangster whose convoluted love life, including his boss’ slutty wife, a heartbroken hatcheck girl and his jealous live-in “man,” (honest, that’s what he calls the surly twink he lives with) gets him mixed up in a murder.

Despite my personal issues with Powell’s upper lip, or lack thereof, he’s always aces and highly underrated. This movie is no exception. And Evelyn Keyes, who plays the sister of the murdered girl, is one of the grand dames of Film Noir.

We had strayed a ways with the last few double features, but this film brought us right back to Noir City with its snappy dialog, sharp suits and fallen women. Maybe I liked it more for hitting all my personal sweet spots than for its own objective merit, but you should check it out and see for yourself.

On the other hand, there’s Allegro.



I (probably unfairly) refer to George Raft as the Shatner of Noir. I really want to like him, seeing as we grew up in the same neighborhood and all, but he’s just so dull and wooden and that girdle isn’t fooling anyone. Sexy Nina Foch makes up for him to some degree, as does the suave and sinister George MacReady, but they are all battling against a laughably preposterous script that doesn’t make a lick of sense.

Raft plays the title character, a gangster turned florist who tries to go straight but gets sucked back into the underworld by a hot dish in trouble, played by Foch. Off to a nice, noirish start, only on the way down he gets tapped by cops who use his criminal record to strong-arm him into working undercover for them. They set up this elaborate fake cop-shooting so that Foch will be forced to take Raft with her where ever she’s going. Which turns out to be a private tropical island owned by her counterfeiting and bow-hunting husband (MacReady.) There’s also some kind of lame-brained international angle with shifty Russians and a really ham-handed riff on The Most Dangerous Game.

This film is silly as hell, but had a few entertaining moments. I can’t recommend it, but I’m glad I saw it.

A New York Waterfront double bill, one more New York than the other.

First, Slaughter on Tenth Avenue.



This movie should have been called “Slaughter in Long Beach,” but that’s okay. The lack of real NYC locations was more than made up for by the great gritty cast, including Dan Duryea, Walter Matthau, and a silver-haired Charles McGraw, along with tons of memorable bit parts like “Midget” the sawed-off alcoholic dock worker and the birdy little woman who thinks she’s the victim of mysterious death-rays. Not to mention the classy and still stunning Julie Adams, who was the special guest of the evening.

A longshoreman (Mickey Shaugnessy) is gunned down in the stairwell of his tenement apartment, but refuses to rat out the perps to the cops. A naïve young D.A. thinks he can break the waterfront code of silence and make a case against the shooters, but finds himself dragged down into the violent underworld of vigilante justice.

I’m generally not a fan of drawn-out courtroom scenes, but the trial in this movie is fantastic, with Dan Duryea as the merciless defense attorney and a snarling, hostile McGraw as a cop on the witness stand. I also loved the bit with the priest praying for forgiveness while handing out axe handles and rubber hoses to rioting strikers.

This film straddles the line between Noir and social commentary, but it never felt too heavy handed and was always entertaining. Definitely worth watching.

Julie Adams has been a guest before at Noir City, not to mention various screenings of The Creature From the Black Lagoon, and she is always gracious and lovely. Last night was no exception. I especially liked her story about the skin-tight leather pants she had to wear in the zillion and one low budget westerns she made early in her career. Apparently they were so tight that she was unable to get up on a horse and had to have a second identical but looser pair made for riding. Westerns notwithstanding, she’ll always be the Creature’s girlfriend to me.

Next, Edge of the City.



This movie really delivered on the vintage New York street scenes, shot on location in Harlem and along the waterfront. It probably falls more on the social commentary side of the fence, but still retains plenty of noirish flavor.

Troubled drifter Axel (Cassavetes) gets a job on the docks and is befriended by a fellow worker, the gregarious T.T. (Poitier.) But Axel has a dark secret that allows him to be taken advantage of by a racist bully (memorably played by Jack Warden) until the tense, simmering violence under the surface finally boils over into a spectacular cargo hook fight (!) to the death.

This is a story about a deep friendship between two men, possibly even too deep for the time, since there were apparently complaints from censors about the overt homosexual overtones of one scene in particular. Amazingly the director didn’t cave and the movie remains as originally intended.

It’s a little heavy on the 50s psychobabble but still well worth tracking down. Both Poitier and Cassvetes are at the top of their game in this one. And did I mention the cargo hook fight? Cargo hook fight! Seriously, go watch this now.

Before I get to the full write ups, I have to share a deeply traumatic experience from last night.

Witness: Hipster Charles McGraw!



Anyone who follows this blog knows how much I love McGraw. I love him because he’s a man of his time, a quintessential Film Noir tough guy. Nothing like the current crop of soft-serve mama’s boys calling themselves actors these days. So seeing him like this in Reign of Terror, looking like he's getting ready to ride his fixie over to the Silver Lake Trader Joe’s to pick up some organic tofunaise, was hard to handle. No wonder he gets his ass kicked by children in this movie. I feel like I need to go back and watch Narrow Margin again to rinse this image out my eyes.

Okay, back to the movies.

First up Scene of the Crime.



This is a low budget, no frills, meat-and-potatoes kind of flick. Van Johnson stars as a clean, honest cop whose partner is murdered outside a bookie joint with 1000 dollars in his pocket. Johnson has to catch the killer and prove that his late partner wasn’t crooked. Along the way he gets mixed up with a duplicitous stripper and a variety of shady, underworld characters, including a snitch named Sleeper, played by that night’s special guest Norman Lloyd.

Scene of the Crime isn’t bad, just mediocre. The plot seems unnecessarily convoluted and I didn’t like the big reveal about the killer using a black rubber glove to make his hand seem twisted. Still, it had its moments. I liked the stripper’s song about being a “lady” and her unexpected reversal at the end of the number where she converts her short sexy costume into a long gown. Lloyd’s character was memorable and delightfully off-kilter and got killed way too soon.

It also felt very long at 95 minutes and probably could have done with some trimming. I have a feeling there’s a decent 65 minute movie under all that padding.

In the break between films, host Alan Rode had a chat with the charming Norman Lloyd. He’s 97 now, and you’d never know it. He had to leave early, not because of his age, but because he had to be up early for a tennis game the next day! But before he left, he shared some great personal stories of working with Mann, Hitchcock and Orson Welles.

Next in line, (and also featuring Norman Lloyd) some French revolutionary Noir with Reign of Terror, also known as The Black Book.



I tend to be kind of prejudiced against costume dramas. When I go to Noir City, I want fedoras, not powdered wigs. But hey, it’s Anthony Mann, so I was willing to put those prejudices aside. I’m glad I did, because I liked this one way more than I thought I would. Hipster Charles McGraw notwithstanding.

The plot revolves around a missing black book filled with the names of men marked for death. The book’s author is the legendary Robespierre, and finding it could prevent a political coup.

This movie’s got bondage and torture galore (!) plus plenty of snappy dialog, edge-of-your-seat suspense and some stellar performances, particularly Arnold Moss (the 1940’s version Adrian Brody) as the sleazy, double-dealing politician. Mann’s stylized shadowy imagery is gorgeous as always and the violence is raw, sweaty and visceral. Nothing about it is precious or stuffy the way you’d imagine a corset flick to be. I actually liked it much better than Scene of the Crime, which on the surface seems to be more up my (dark) alley.

So never mind the wigs, Reign of Terror is Film Noir at its finest. Mistress Christa says check it out.