They Live by Night

The 1948 directorial debut of American filmmaker Nicholas Ray (Rebel Without a Cause) is a lyrical, intimate film about two young lovers raised in a culture of crime and poverty. Farley Granger is Bowie, a 23-year-old orphan who had been in prison for seven years when he escapes with two veteran crooks (Howard Da Silva and Jay C. Flippen), and Cathy O'Donnell is the weary Keechie, raised in an outlaw culture by an alcoholic father. "This boy…and this girl…were never properly introduced to the world we live in…," viewers are told at the beginning, before being plunged into the urgency and desperation of a prison break and a life hiding out in rural America between bank robberies. Adapted from Edward Anderson's 1937 novel Thieves Like Us (which was also the basis for a 1974 Robert Altman film) and set in the depths of the Depression, They Live by Night is one of the great films about criminal lovers on the run, although in this case neither are hardened thieves but rather vulnerable young people thrust into the criminal life by circumstances they cannot escape. Ray travelled the rural South to record American folk music with Alan Lomax and worked with the Federal Theatre Project during the Depression and his experiences inform the film. He shows empathy for almost all of the characters and presents the world as a pitiless marketplace where everything is a transaction. A lovely, intimate movie with a tragic story, this is one of the most poetic entries in the film noir genre. Newly restored, extras include a 2007 audio commentary featuring film historian Eddie Muller and Granger, a new interview with critic Imogen Sara Smith, a 2007 featurette (with film critics and filmmakers), a 1956 audio interview with producer John Houseman, and an essay by film scholar Bernard Eisenschitz. Highly recommended. (S. Axmaker)