but Biddel seems too sure of him-
self—as habitués of film noir know only too well, never trust a well-engineered plan. Biddel’s trophy wife Lydia (the statu- esque Marie Windsor) only en- courages the viewer to become more suspicious.
The most sympathetic char- acter in this Republic Pictures of- fering is Gregg Warren (Wally Cassell), an aspiring actor re- duced to portraying a mechani- cal man in a window to amuse onlookers outside the Silver Frol- ics nightclub. Warren’s robot im- pression embodies the film’s crucial themes of alienation, re- jection and childhood dreams that never materialize. An actor’s goal is to convince his or her au- dience a character is real—War- ren is charged with convincing
people he is not real. A lesser role for an actor is difficult to
imagine.
The other major characters are not too different to Warren; each is disappointed with his or her present situation. Connors stud- ied ballet, but has been relegated to showgirl status. Kathy would rather give up her top-paying job than let it complicate her mar- riage. Stubby Kelly (Ron Hagerthy) wants to be a wise guy, not a bell- hop. Lydia fantasizes about an- other life and resents the one she allowed her husband to create for her. Stewart questions his upward mobility in the organized crime arena. Johnny works the grave- yard shift and plans to quit the force and go west; at one point, he defiantly discards his badge like Harry Callahan during the
concluding moments of DIRTY HARRY. In a surreal plot thread recalling IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE, divine intervention prevents Kelly from rejecting the city and all it represents, but—in one of
Fisher (I WAKE UP SCREAM- ING, DEAD RECKONING, LADY IN THE LAKE) penned hard- boiled dialogue that recalls mid-
those rare noir moments of reas- surance that actually rings sin- cere—the tearful acknowledgment of Warren’s humanity allows the heat to close in on a cop killer. Experienced noir scribe Steve
’40s-era noir such as THE DARK CORNER, particularly when Kelly concedes, “I feel like I’m in a cement mixer being slowly chopped and pounded to death.” The environments captured in B&W by accomplished director of
Gig Young as a Chicago cop succumbing to corruption, roughing up a store window “mechanical man” (Wally Cassell) in CITY THAT NEVER SLEEPS.
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