In a Lonely Place (1950)

User Rating:

8.0/10   

Director:

Nicholas Ray

Writers:

Andrew Solt (screenplay)
Edmund H. North (adaptation)
(more)

Release Date:

17 May 1950 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Film-Noir | Mystery | Romance | Thriller

Tagline:

THE BOGART SUSPENSE PICTURE WITH THE SURPRISE FINISH - (original poster)

Plot:

A potentially violent screenwriter is a murder suspect until his lovely neighbor clears him. But she begins to have doubts...

Plot Keywords:

Screenwriter | Neighbor | Hat Check Girl | Murder | Alibi

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Humphrey Bogart	...	Dixon Steele
Gloria Grahame	...	Laurel Gray
Frank Lovejoy	...	Det. Sgt. Brub Nicolai
Carl Benton Reid	...	Capt. Lochner
Art Smith	...	Agent Mel Lippman
Jeff Donnell	...	Sylvia Nicolai
Martha Stewart	...	Mildred Atkinson
Robert Warwick	...	Charlie Waterman
Morris Ankrum	...	Lloyd Barnes
William Ching	...	Ted Barton
Steven Geray	...	Paul, Headwaiter
Hadda Brooks	...	Singer
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Pat Barton	...	2nd Hatcheck Girl (uncredited)
Guy Beach	...	Mr. Swan (uncredited)
David Bond	...	Dr. Richards (uncredited)
Hazel Boyne	...	Person (uncredited)
Laura K. Brooks	...	Lady Wanting Matches (uncredited)
Charles Cane	...	Angry Husband in Convertible (uncredited)
Jack Chefe	...	Bartender (uncredited)
Oliver Cross	...	Person (uncredited)
George Davis	...	Waiter (uncredited)
Melinda Erickson	...	Tough Girl (uncredited)
Arno Frey	...	Joe (uncredited)
Ruth Gillette	...	Martha, Masseuse (uncredited)
Billy Gray	...	Young Boy seeking Autograph (uncredited)
Joy Hallward	...	Bit Role (uncredited)
Don Hamin	...	John Mason (uncredited)
Myron Healey	...	Post Office Clerk (uncredited)
Lewis Howard	...	Junior (uncredited)
Jack Jahries	...	Officer (uncredited)
Mike Lally	...	Bar Patron (uncredited)
Tony Layng	...	Bit Role (uncredited)
Robert Lowell	...	Airline Clerk (uncredited)
Frank Marlowe	...	Dave, Parking Attendant (uncredited)
Harold Miller	...	Nightclub Patron (uncredited)
John Mitchum	...	Bar Patron (uncredited)
Allen Pinson	...	Bit Role (uncredited)
Jack Reynolds	...	Henry Kesler (uncredited)
Davis Roberts	...	Flower Shop Employee (uncredited)
Michael Romanoff	...	Himself (uncredited)
Jack Santoro	...	Bit Role (uncredited)
Cosmo Sardo	...	Bartender (uncredited)
Alix Talton	...	Frances 'Fran' Randolph (uncredited)
Evelyn Underwood	...	Bit Role (uncredited)
June Vincent	...	Actress in Convertible (uncredited)
Ruth Warren	...	Effie, Cleaning Lady (uncredited)

Directed by
Nicholas Ray

Writing credits
Andrew Solt		(screenplay)
Edmund H. North		(adaptation)
Dorothy B. Hughes		(story)

Produced by
Henry S. Kesler	....	associate producer
Robert Lord	....	producer

Original Music by
George Antheil		(musical score)

Cinematography by
Burnett Guffey

Film Editing by
Viola Lawrence

Art Direction by
Robert Peterson

Set Decoration by
William Kiernan

Costume Design by
Jean Louis		(gowns)

Makeup Department
Clay Campbell	....	makeup artist
Helen Hunt	....	hair stylist

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Earl Bellamy	....	assistant director

Sound Department
Howard Fogetti	....	sound engineer
Ellis Burman	....	sound restoration engineer (restored version) (uncredited)

Stunts
Rodney Amateau	....	stunt double (uncredited)

Camera and Electrical Department
Gert Andersen	....	camera operator (uncredited)
William Johnson	....	gaffer (uncredited)
Irving Lippman	....	still photographer (uncredited)
Walter Meins	....	grip (uncredited)

Music Department
Morris Stoloff	....	musical director
Ernest Gold	....	orchestrator (uncredited)

Other crew
Rodney Amateau	....	technical adviser
Charlsie Bryant	....	script supervisor (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Columbia Pictures Corporation (presents)
• Santana Pictures Corporation (as A Santana Production)

Distributors

• Columbia Pictures (1950) (USA) (theatrical)
• RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video (1989) (USA) (VHS)

Also Known As:

Behind the Mask (USA) (working title)
Late at Night (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

94 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Colour:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Norway:16 | USA:Approved (certificate #14256) | UK:PG (video rating) (1990) | UK:A (original rating) (passed with cuts) | UK:PG (tv rating) | Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Spain:18

Filming Locations:

Beverly Hills, California, USA

Company:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Trivia:

Gloria Grahame, at the time, was estranged from her husband, the film's director Nicholas Ray. She would subsequently go on to marry her stepson, Ray's son from a previous marriage.

Goofs:

Continuity: In the Dixon's apartment, after Mildred picks up the book on the floor, she holds it with her right hand, maintaining the handbag in the left one. Soon after, when Dixon approaches her, she moves aside the right hand. The next shot shows her left hand leaning on her right.

Quotes:

Dixon Steele: Nobody can call me the things he did.
Laurel Gray: A blind, knuckle-headed squirrel. That's REAL bad.

Movie Connections:

Featured in The Rules of Film Noir (2009) (TV)

Soundtrack:

I Hadn't Anyone Till You

Disturbing & Important

For all the praise film-noir is lavished with (quite a lot of it valid), the majority of it relies on convention as much as the standard white-picket-fence, happy-ending 'family' film does: just invert the

cliches and bathe them in deep-focus shadows. While this movie, on its surface, resembles the classic-style film noir of DOUBLE INDEMNITY, it's a whole different animal. No calculating evil females or tough guys masking hearts of gold populate IN A LONELY PLACE. It's a much more wrenching and powerfully disturbing film because the murder that draws the protagonists together turns out to be of peripheral importance, while the love story between Humphrey Bogart's troubled screenwriter and Gloria Grahame's B-actress spins inexorably towards damnation completely on its own power. The basic story has him a suspect in a killing and her in love with him yet unsure of his innocence, but director Nicholas Ray stages the proceedings so that WE see it's not the murder that disturbs her but her own conviction that his self-destructive and volatile nature will destroy them both. Yet, Ray never takes the easy way out of having Bogart turn monster on her. You care deeply about these people, hoping desperately (as Bogart's agent does in the film) that some transforming moment will come that will spare these people and allow their deeply felt love to flourish and heal them both, even as the evidence before your own eyes tells you there ain't no way. For 1950 -hell, for any year- such an unsentimental and uncompromising treatment of a tragic adult relationship is a terrible wonder to behold. The shadows suffusing this excellent film come not from UFA-influenced lighting but from moral and spiritual desolation, the death throes of old Hollywood, the coming of McCarthyism and the Black Dahlia murder of 1947. But most of all, they're projected from within the characters themselves. The finest work of Bogart, Grahame and Ray. Special note should be taken of Ray and Grahame, whose own deteriorating relationship formed the template for the doomed lovers; for them, this film is an act of great courage. Bogart himself has taken elements of all his previous romantic loners and blended them with the sour pigments of Fred C Dobbs; as the star and executive producer, his performance is unflinching in its honesty, and as fearless as Grahame and Ray. See this movie.