Out of the Past [VHS]

 

 

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Jacques Tourneur is the director of "Out of the Past" (originally released in the UK as "Build My Gallows High"). A French emigre whose first films were early talkies made in Paris, he's another director who shows the influence of European Cinema on Film Noir. The quiet petrol pump attendant with the past could just as easily have been Jean Gabin as Robert Mitchum. Prior to these movies he made very superior low-budget horror - Cat People The Cat People/The Curse of the Cat People [DVD] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC], I Walked with a Zombie I Walked With a Zombie/The Body Snatcher [DVD] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC], and The Leopard Man. From "Cat People" he brought the great cinematographer Nicholas Musuraca (who also worked on "The Spiral Staircase") and there is something of the horror genre about the filming of this convoluted tale, where you never know what you will find behind the door when you open it.

The plot is extraordinarily complicated, and at the core of it are two questions - who do you really love? Who do you really trust? Mitchum's tragedy is that these are not the same person, but he goes with the love, and it is the death of him.

This was the making of Mitchum, but it has to be said that this is more than anything else Jane Greer's film. I don't think there is another film noir where we feel the hero's love, pain and confusion about the "heroine" so much as in "Out of the Past". She makes us believe what she says, we want to believe her, because we believe her back story. There's a bar in Acapulco where they play American music "I go there sometimes" she says, wearily, and we immediately imagine her there, lonely, alluring. We wonder what else she does - she hints at much, much worse. The face is extraordinary: black, black eyes, a full mouth that has done its share of dirty doing. She is above all Knowing, and in the movie it is her business to know things and find them out. Good girl - bad girl, the eternal dilemma. And Greer is way, WAY bad. She was only 23 when she made this movie, but she knows how to indicate that she's been round the block and back.

Mitchum inhabits this, his first real major starring vehicle, with the world-weary charm which became his trademark, which I think he found for this role for the first time. We know from the start, when the past returns, that he will be trapped and there is no way out for him. The one moment when he has second thoughts, when he pretends he can't start the car to escape, Greer overrides him and starts it herself. She is literally a femme fatale, and she WILL take him down with her. Because love is always dangerous and doomed.

There are so many good lines here: "A woman with a gun is like a man with a knitting needle". (To Greer, in a bad moment) "Get out of this room, I have to sleep here". "I don't want to die - Neither do I, but if I have to, I'll die last."

If Greer and Mitchum are perfect, Kirk Douglas in his first role as the villain Whit Sterling is less so. He smiles and smiles, but he seems to lack the ferocity necessary to the part. Besides Greer he is pale and uninteresting in his villainy, and tax evasion has never been the most glamorous of crimes.

Greer and Mitchum were teamed again in "The Big Steal", in which she shines and he doesn't. She was a unique talent and a feisty girl (defying Howard Hughes to marry a man 20 years her senior), and she deserved better from subsequent films. But this is a wonderful memorial.

Finally available on DVD, I saw this on BBC2 a few months ago when they ran a season of late night b/w noir films.

Although not one of the best known this is easily one of the very best noir films. Robert Mitchum is perfect as the weather beaten anti-hero and he seems to really relish his slouchy role, which I think is a big influence on the Bruce Willis character in last year's Sin City.

If you liked The Maltese Falcon, Double Indemnity, Kiss Me Deadly etc. then this one is definitely for you. I've ordered and am looking forward to a chance to see the great film again...

Robert Mitchum was made for black and white movies and the noir genre. Here, the lighting captures his features mesmerically, like the extraordinary shadowed beauty of a moonscape. And then there's the voice, slow as sarsaparilla, deep as a honey jar ... just as smooth, but 140 proof! Mitchum's is a very physical presence, a very physical style of acting, but unforgettable.

Told in flashback - hence the title - there is plenty of opportunity for Mitchum to narrate the story, using that voice to carry you along. For a film actor, he has a voice which would have made him a radio star. Director Tourneur clearly understands this and builds on the visual and audio strengths of the production.

Geoff Bailey (Mitchum) is fleeing his past by hiding in a small town, miles from nowhere. His past, in the form of Kirk Douglas, catches up with him. His past also takes on the shape of the femme fatale, Kathy (Jane Greer). Douglas is wonderfully malevolent - there is a dual of the dimpled chins as he and Mitchum indulge in confrontational banter.

It starts out as a simple story, maybe even a love story, then twists like a trenchcoat belt. Mitchum chainsmokes his way through. Will he get the girl, the homespun Anne, the small town girl next door who is so enamoured of him, or will his past suck him back down?

Mitchum is built for a trenchcoat - he wears it in precisely the way Columbo can't. The story hangs about his central character in much the same way. It fits his acting and his presence perfectly. A superb example of the noir genre, a film you can watch and watch.

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4.0 out of 5 stars a good find
I really enjoyed this film, the ending wasn't what I would have chosen but really really enjoyable all the way through. Highly recommended

Published 1 month ago by columboforpresident

5.0 out of 5 stars Twists and turns
Marvellous for the genre with a marvellous cast and enough twists and turns for a cat trapped in an alley. Read more

Published 1 month ago by Mr. Derek R. Osbourne

1.0 out of 5 stars Out of The Past, (Epic Fail !!!)
The Universal Classic Cinema version of Out of The Past,
Don't waste your money on this version. Terrible picture & sound the worst quality I have seen. Read more

Published 3 months ago by Celle

5.0 out of 5 stars build my gallows high
One of the best film noirs of the 40s & 50s. Robert Mitchum, Kirk Douglas & Jane Greer are superb.
If you like 40s or 50s thrillers, this is for you.

Published 8 months ago by David Wrigley

5.0 out of 5 stars "Out of the Past (1947) ... Robert Mitchum ... RKO Radio Pictures (2004)"
RKO Radio Pictures presents "OUT OF THE PAST" (13 November 1947) (97 min/B&W) (Fully Restored/Dolby Digitally Remastered) -- Jeff Bailey, small-town gas pumper, has his mysterious... Read more

Published 13 months ago by J. Lovins

5.0 out of 5 stars a.k.a. Build My Gallows High
The phrase "Noir Classic" has been over-used for sure, but in this case it is bang on the money. This has also been described as the classic flashback film, and it is that as... Read more

Published 21 months ago by rd skye

5.0 out of 5 stars Stunning film noir with laconic Mitchum masterclass
'Out of the Past' may not be the best film noir ever made, but it is probably in the top one.

Robert Mitchum gives a perfect performance as the detective Jeff... Read more

Published on 25 Jan 2010 by Kentspur

5.0 out of 5 stars Build My Gallows High
I have just seen this as part of a BBC4 Film Noir weekend, as "Build My Gallows High"
A black and white film from 1947, apparently a typical film noir, which means you... Read more

Published on 24 Aug 2009 by Four Violets

2.0 out of 5 stars Oh dear oh dear
Good picture and sound.

Acting quite good (especially Kirk and Robert). Plot ludicrous. Read more

Published on 7 Aug 2009 by MrViewer

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Noir
A classic noir with Robert Mitchum as an ex-PI hiding out in a town until the past comes calling. Jane Greer is the femme fatale and Kirk Douglas plays the mobster Mitchum once... Read more

Published on 29 Feb 2008 by Billy Ray Cyrus

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