99 River Street (1953)

Cab driver Ernie Driscoll is the lead character in 99 River Street, and his luck has soured even before the film starts. The narrative itself starts with a long shot of a prizefight. The camera moves in to show Ernie is one of the fighters, and he is losing the match to his opponent, the reigning heavyweight champion. Then the camera zooms out to show that Ernie is watching a television show that is highlighting his last night as a fighter. Ernie was forced to withdraw from the ring and quit fighting because of the serious injury to his eye that he sustained during this very fight.

Ernie’s wife Pauline isn’t interested in the past. She wants Ernie to turn off the television and finish his dinner. She wants results, especially financial results, now. She and Ernie argue about Ernie’s failure as a fighter, his job as a taxi driver, their lack of money, the necessity that she work in a florist shop. It’s a long list, with one more item to be added in this initial scene between husband and wife: Ernie notices that Pauline is wearing a new bracelet. He doesn’t know where it came from or whether it’s real or rhinestone, as Pauline claims. He is losing his wife, and he’s the only one who doesn’t know it.

You can see 99 River Street online for free. Click here to see it at the Internet Archive.

Ernie drops Pauline at work after their disagreement, then meets his boss Stan at a drugstore before starting his shift as a taxi driver. Stan thinks Ernie can solve his marital problems with a baby and convinces Ernie to sweet-talk Pauline into having a child. Ernie decides it’s worth a try, although viewers know already that this ploy is not going to work. Before Ernie leaves the drugstore, a regular cab customer, Linda James, drops in to tell him that she has the chance to read for a part in a Broadway play called—appropriately enough—They Call It Murder.

(This article about 99 River Street contains spoilers.)

In the meantime, Victor Rawlins stops in at the florist to visit Pauline, and viewers now know for certain that Ernie is too hopeful about a future with his wife. Victor wants Pauline to leave New York City with him. His jewel heist went exactly as planned, and he has $50,000 for both of them. Pauline can’t wait to leave the city—and Ernie—soon enough. At the moment that Victor kisses Pauline to seal their deal, Ernie stops by outside the florist with his box of chocolates and sees Pauline and Victor kissing.

Victor takes the jewels—and Pauline—to the jeweler, Mr. Christopher, who was set to buy the stones, but he won’t do business with a woman present. Victor insists that Pauline stay while he and Mr. Christopher finalize the post-heist transaction. Pauline learns from Mr. Christopher that Victor killed the man from whom he stole the jewels. Now Mr. Christopher has a second reason not to do business with Victor and is even more adamant about not buying the stolen jewels. Mickey, an enforcer for Mr. Christopher, pushes Mickey and Pauline out of Mr. Christopher’s store.

Linda, Ernie’s regular cab customer and aspiring actress, runs into Ernie back at the drugstore and tells him that she needs help because she has killed a man. She wants Ernie to go to the theater where she auditioned for the play and help her. She explains that the producer of the play, Waldo Daggett, would have been willing to give her the part if she would sleep with him. Ernie agrees to help Linda, and when they arrive at the theater, Linda describes to Ernie the attempted rape and that she killed the producer in self-defense. Ernie believes Linda and decides to take Daggett’s body to a gravel pit near the Hudson River. As soon as he puts his hands on Daggett’s body, everyone associated with the play comes out of the shadows because Linda was just using Ernie to audition.

This last act of deception is one too many for Ernie. (Ernie is a nice guy who believes Linda’s story about an attempted rape, only to be duped.) He wants to leave his wife and his life behind, and he goes home to pack. Linda arrives at his apartment to warn him that the theater people have called the police and that there is a warrant for his arrest on charges of assault and battery. Although all the folks at the theater, Linda included, are responsible for the deception and inciting Ernie’s reaction, they have decided to press charges because the publicity would be good for the play. I found this plot detail especially interesting: publicity seeking is nothing new; it was an old ploy, way before the Internet. Linda insists that she has no part in the publicity grab and has withdrawn from the play.

When Ernie returns to his cab, his suitcase in hand and accompanied by Linda, they find Pauline’s body in the backseat. Linda wants to help Ernie. She feels that she owes it to him for the trick she played on him for her audition. Ernie isn’t so sure that he can trust Linda. He’s much more wary about women now that he knows his wife has been cheating on him and that Linda has lied to him once already.

Part of his reasoning is also that Linda should get away while she can so that she can avoid any trouble, but Ernie relents a bit because he could use some help. He tells Linda, “When I was a kid, I thought I’d grow up and meet a girl who would stick in my corner no matter what. Then I grew up. Things aren’t the way you think they’re gonna be when you’re a kid . . .” These lines sum up rather nicely the dilemma that Ernie finds himself in. It’s the kind of disillusionment that is made for noir. It’s also the kind of disillusionment that almost everyone can identify with on some level, although probably not quite so acutely as Ernie Driscoll can.

Ernie gets a lot of help: from Linda, his boss Stan, one of his fellow cab drivers. Victor Rawlins has framed him for Pauline’s murder; the theater folks are pressing charges; the police are pursuing him, first for assault and battery, then for the murder of his wife. Both he and Mr. Christopher are looking for Victor Rawlins: Ernie needs to clear his name, and Mr. Christopher wants the money that Rawlins stole from him, and he is quite willing to let Ernie and Linda serve as collateral damage if that’s what it takes to get his money back.

The film’s title comes from the address of the bar where jewel thief and murderer Victor Rawlins waits for his forged passport from someone named Monk. It’s the Harbor Light Café at 99 River Street in Jersey City, New Jersey. Rawlins is the reason that all the surviving main characters go to the bar in the final sequence. He’s the bait that brings them all together for the final showdown, so to speak. Ernie Driscoll may have lost his last fight in the ring, but he wins his fight with Victor Rawlins in Jersey City outside the Harbor Light Café. Sounds from the ring and echoes of his own words replay in his mind as Ernie pursues and catches Rawlins. He doesn’t have to think of himself as a loser anymore.

I don’t remember how many times I have seen 99 River Street. I think it’s because I have seen so many clips from the film in other contexts: for film classes or as examples posted by other bloggers to illustrate points about film noir. John Payne, who plays Ernie Driscoll, and Evelyn Keyes, who plays Linda James, are two of my noir favorites, and they are fantastic in 99 River Street. Evelyn Keyes turns from conniving actress into a willing partner for Ernie Driscoll, and the transformation is completely believable.

Low-angle shots emphasize the dark turn that Ernie’s life takes. The frequent use of extreme close-ups is one of the hallmarks of noir, and these types of shots in 99 River Street must have been impressive on a large movie theater screen, the way viewers would have seen the film in the 1950s. Every time I see 99 River Street, I see once again why so many turn to it as representative of what is so great about film noir.

August 21, 1953 (Los Angeles), October 2, 1953 (New York City), October 3, 1953 (United States) release dates  •  Directed by Phil Karlson  •  Screenplay by Robert Smith  •  Based on the short story “Crosstown” by George Zuckerman  •  Music by Arthur Lange, Emil Newman  •  Edited by Buddy Small  •  Cinematography by Franz Planer

John Payne as Ernie Driscoll  •  Evelyn Keyes as Linda James  •  Brad Dexter as Victor Rawlins  •  Frank Faylen as Stan Hogan  •  Peggie Castle as Pauline Driscoll  •  Jay Adler as Mr. Christopher  •  Jack Lambert as Mickey  •  Glenn Langan as Lloyd Morgan  •  Eddy Waller as Pop Durkee, the gym owner  •  John Day as Bud  •  Ric Roman as Monk  •  Ian Wolfe as Waldo Daggett  •  Peter Leeds as Nat Finley  •  William Tannen as the theater director  •  Gene Reynolds as Chuck  •  Paul Bryar as the bartender

Produced by Edward Small Productions  •  Distributed by United Artists

Framed (1947)

I have often wondered while watching films how anyone could believe a tall, thin platinum blonde with perfect makeup and a perfect wardrobe would be working as a waitress in a drab mining town. How could she afford to wear couture outfits on a waitress’s salary anytime she wasn’t in her work uniform? In Framed, Glenn Ford’s character Mike Lambert asks those very same questions of Paula Craig (played by Janis Carter). The fact that he asks the questions shows that he has some smarts. But he wants to fall in love and be loved, which makes it easier to believe that his character would fall for Paula Craig and her lies. It’s a head-versus-heart situation that can only spell trouble in film called Framed.

And Mike Lambert is in trouble from the start, even before Paula Craig makes an appearance. He is behind the wheel of a runaway transport truck owned by the Tri-City Trucking Company on a curvy hillside road. The brakes (both the brake pedal and the hand brake) don’t work. He can’t get the truck to slow down until he arrives in a town center, where the truck finally crashes to a stop when it hits a pickup truck. The driver of the pickup truck sees the accident and wants money for the damage, but some managers of the trucking company (who just happen to be in town) refuse to pay. Mike Lambert demands the money he is owed for driving the truck and then gives some of it to the pickup truck driver, Jeff Cunningham, thus earning himself a friend.

You can find Framed online. Click here to see it free at the Internet Archive.

Mike Lambert heads to La Paloma Café in the town, which has no name (none is ever given). At the café, Lambert is served bad whiskey, and he meets the waitress, Paula Craig. Police officers, accompanied by one of the Tri-City Trucking Company managers, arrive in the café to question Lambert. Lambert is already in trouble it seems, and it doesn’t help that his driver’s license has expired and that he knows no one: He is new in town and looking for work as a mining engineer. The officers haul him out of the café and is quickly brought before a judge. He pleads guilty to driving recklessly, driving though a stop sign, and driving without a license. But he also protests that he was given a truck that didn’t have working brakes. No one knows him, however, and no one is inclined to believe him. He is fined fifty dollars, but he doesn’t have the money so he will have to stay in custody for ten days. Paula Craig has followed him to the courthouse, and she offers to pay the fine. Paula Craig quits her job at the café that night.

(This article about Framed contains a few spoilers.)

Mike Lambert has been drinking and is passing out at one of the café’s tables. Craig decides to get a hotel room for Lambert and leaves some money in his wallet. Then she goes home to the Park Court Apartments, where she gets dressed for a meeting with Steve Price. Price picks her up in the center of town. It is obvious that this is a routine for them and that they already know each other. Craig tells Price, “I found him,” “him” being Lambert. He is the same height and has the same build as Price. (Or so they say. I don’t think the two actors Glenn Ford and Barry Sullivan look anything alike, but I figured this was more of a plot device.) They arrive at Price’s place, where they talk about a safety deposit box, the keys, and signing a card for access to it. They seem to have a heist on their minds.

Price drives Craig back to their original meeting place and then goes home to his wife, Beth. Beth Price is well aware that her husband keeps odd hours. He says that he never lied to her about who and what he is. She has some regrets about marrying him and about her father getting him a job at the Empire Trust and Savings Bank. She wants to talk about splitting up. Steve makes Beth so angry that she slaps him and walks out instead. This scene doesn’t advance the story much, but it does reveal two surprises: Steve Price is married, and he has an important job and social standing thanks to his wife.

Mike Lambert, on the other hand, wakes up in his cheap hotel room. He’s hungover, not sure where he is or how he got there. He finds the money that Craig put in his wallet and doesn’t remember anything about that either. When he goes downstairs to the lobby, he asks the desk clerk how he got to the hotel, and the clerk talks about “the lady” who brought him in and paid the hotel bill. He also gives Lambert the note that she left with her phone number. It’s obvious that the clerk read the note because he points out the phone booth in the hotel lobby. Everyone in town and especially in La Paloma Café is cynical, and the hotel desk clerk is just one more example.

Lambert stops in the J. B. Smith Assay office to ask about new mines that might be opening and jobs for mining engineers. The man working there, Sandy, tells him to wait for someone who just recently brought in a mining sample for testing. This person turns out to be Jeff Cunningham, the pickup truck driver, and he is very happy to meet him again. The sample that Cunningham brought in has some valuable ore, so Cunningham and Lambert leave to talk business. Cunningham offers Lambert a job that will pay a percentage rather than a salary, and Lambert is happy with the offer. Cunningham leaves to apply for a loan at the Empire Trust and Savings Bank, and he meets with Steve Price, vice president at the bank—another surprise.

When Mike Lambert returns to his hotel room, Paula Craig drops in on him because he never called her. Lambert is packing to leave town and start working at the mine. He tells Craig enough of the particulars that she goes to a public phone to tell Steve Price not to approve a loan for Cunningham. Cunningham is angry about the change, and then he has to tell Mike Lambert that their deal is postponed until he can find another bank to lend him the money.

Paula Craig is just getting started telling her lies to Mike Lambert. What’s so amazing about them is that some of them are so plausible. The story is mostly Lambert’s, and so it is easy to identify with him and his point of view. The first time I saw the film, I believed one or two of Craig’s lies before she was exposed. Her lies are part of the long list of plot twists and turns that makes the story interesting and entertaining.

One thing that Framed doesn’t have is the same on-screen chemistry between Glenn Ford and Janis Carter as there is between Ford and Rita Hayworth in Gilda, which was released the previous year. This isn’t really a drawback, especially if you are fan of Glenn Ford, as I am. It didn’t make Ford’s character Mike Lambert seem less likely to fall for Paula Craig, but it also didn’t give the film the same romantic intensity that Gilda had. Paula Craig was simply a femme fatale through and through, with no husband like Gilda’s in the background to play sinister jealous games.

Glenn Ford is one of my favorite film noir stars, and he is so good at portraying the upstanding guy who falls in with the wrong people, as he does in Framed. Ford is definitely the star of the film—and I am not saying this just because he is one of my favorites. He gets top billing on the title card, over the title of the film. He is the reason to see Framed. His character Mike Lambert is smart enough to ask questions like the ones I mentioned and more, but Paula Craig is the femme fatale who is desperate enough to get what she wants. And Mike Lambert almost makes the perfect dupe for her and her boyfriend’s plans.

May 25, 1947, release date  •  Directed by Richard Wallace  •  Screenplay by Ben Maddow  •  Based on a story by John Patrick  •  Music by Marlin Skiles  •  Edited by Richard Fantl  •  Cinematography by Burnett Guffey

Glenn Ford as Mike Lambert  •  Janis Carter as Paula Craig  •  Barry Sullivan as Steve Price  •  Edgar Buchanan as Jeff Cunningham  •  Karen Morley as Beth Price  •  Barbara Woodell as Jane Woodworth  •  Jim Bannon as Jack Woodworth  •  Paul E. Burns as Sandy, the assayer  •  Art Smith as the hotel desk clerk

Distributed by Columbia Pictures  •  Produced by Columbia Pictures