In a Lonely Place

Humphrey Bogart turns his tough guy persona on edge as a hot-headed Hollywood screenwriter whose violent outbursts border on the psychotic in this dark, disturbing film noir drama based on Dorothy B. Hughes's 1947 novel. Bogart plays Dixon Steele, a hard-drinking author who is suspected of the murder of a hat-check girl. Gloria Grahame is Dixon's lovely new neighbor Laurel, who provides his alibi. Dixon is a classic Hemingway-esque type, a scrappy artist who won't sell out and is constantly getting into brawls, but there's also a bitter and angry side. He's a World War II vet whose witty cynicism shifts quickly to jealousy and can turn vicious and violent when he thinks he's been cheated or betrayed. Laurel sees it play out with strangers, and suspicion begins to creep into their love affair as the murder investigation (which is mostly on the sidelines of the story) keeps circling back to Dixon. Grahame delivers one of her best screen performances, as director Nicholas Ray—Grahame's husband at the time—shows her off with a sense of glamour and grace that was absent in her other roles (although their marriage was unraveling during production and the tension is incorporated into the film). Bogart had played hard-edged characters and violent anti-heroes before but none as damaged and out of control as Dixon. This is film noir without guns or gangsters and yet it is dark and devastating, with the murder mystery simply providing a backdrop for an ambiguous study of love torn apart from within. Released on DVD and Blu-ray in a newly remastered edition, extras include audio commentary by film scholar Dana Polan, a 1975 documentary on Ray, an interview with Grahame biographer Vincent Curcio, a 2002 segment featuring filmmaker Curtis Hanson, a 1948 radio adaptation, and a booklet with an essay by film critic Imogen Sara Smith. Highly recommended. (S. Axmaker)