Why won’t anybody listen to Barbara Stanwyck?! Witness to Murder had the unfortunate timing of being released shortly before Rear Window. Both films share a similar paranoid peeping tom premise, but Witness to Murder lacks Hitchcock’s polish. The film received positive reviews, particularly for John Alton’s camerawork, but Rear Window completely overshadowed it in the long run. There’s plenty to enjoy here though, including a devilishly wicked performance by George Sanders as a refined sadist.
Robert Siodmak’s The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry has a goofy ass title, but it’s a seriously dark film. The final third in particular is a bleak take on the punishments repeatedly doled out in ’40s noir due to the moral censorship enforced by the Hays Code. But then, the final minute of the film occurs and…it’s mind boggling and frustrating and silly and I dunno man. According to the interwebz, the ending was tacked on to appease the Motion Picture Production Code. It’s a dogshit way to wrap things up, but up to that point the movie is fantastic.
. . where the worlds of film noir and pre-code collide . .
The annex to John Grant's *A Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Film Noir*
“I like smooth shiny girls, hardboiled and loaded with sin.” -Raymond Chandler
The Hardboiled World of Film Noir
Blogging about '70s crime films.
New Granada 