NOTW 2/8/10: TWO O'CLOCK COURAGE (by DT Out West)

TWO O'CLOCK COURAGE

1945/USA

Directed by Anthony Mann
Screenplay by Robert E. Kent
Starring: Tom Conway, Ann Rutherford
With: Richard Lane, Bettejane Greer, Jean Brooks


Years before stories of those suffering from the effects amnesia became the stocking trade of the Lifetime Network; they were a staple of film noir. A bevy of films with memory lost as a central focus point were churned out with names like The Crooked Way, Impact, The Unsuspected and one of my personal favorites, amnesia or otherwise, Somewhere in the Night.

Two O’Clock Courage, put out by RKO in 1945 is one more of those film noirs using amnesia as the hub of the wheel around which rotates murder, double-crosses, false accusations, and a boat load of wise cracking. The over abundance of wise cracking pretty much relegates this story to the sub, sub genre of “noir lite.” While it’s got the requisite mayhem, cops, guns & dames it lacks any sense of desperation and the cornball ending pretty much leaves no option whatsoever for this breezy 82 minute programmer to be taken seriously. This is all fine if you’re in the mood for something along the lines of Fly-By-Night, Take One False Step or one of the Falcon films.

I specially make mention to The Falcon as Two O’Clock Courage stars, as the falsely accused murderer and amnesia sufferer, Tom Conway. Conway, the older brother of George Sanders, starred as Tom Lawrence, in 10 films tracking the adventures of the debonair P.I. The Falcon. Conway’s acting, and mannerisms coupled with the story line and its release date occurring during the run of the Falcon series makes in practically impossible to separate the two.

Two O’Clock Courage opens with a scene of the back of a staggering male shuffling through the dark over the obligatory wet pavement towards a single street lamp of a dimly lit corner. The moaning of a fog horn and the street names on the lamp post (Ocean View & Arch Street) cleanly places the action near some unnamed waterfront. Once under the dim glow of the light we can make out the face of Conway and see a trickle of blood from his left temple.

Upon righting himself, his first move is to attempt to cross the street right in the path of an on coming taxi. The cab of course comes to a screeching halt with the cabbie bellowing “Get back on the curb, you idiot!” Well, “bellowing” isn’t quite the right word as the cabbie turns out to be the former main squeeze of Andy Hardy, Polly Benedict, I mean Ann Rutherford.

If you guess Rutherford gets Conway into her cab and the two of them get into various jams, figure out who he is, elude the cops (on several occasions), prove he didn’t commit a murder, catch the real murderer and live happily ever after; then go to the head of the class.

With such an easy to figure story and the way it’s acted out, it’d be easy to dismiss Two O’Clock Courage. What does make it of interest is that it’s an early directorial turn by Anthony Mann. Yes that Anthony Mann of such noirs as Desperate, Railroaded, T-Men, Raw Deal, and He Walked by Night, etc, etc, etc. It also bears noting he; working along with Jimmy Stewart, Mann pretty much transformed the Saturday matinee shoot-em-up western into films identified as “adult westerns.” It should be enough that taken as an early entry to the cannon of Mann alone makes Two O’Clock Courage a worthwhile film to view.

A few other points; first the title Two O’Clock Courage is completely misleading as “two o’clock,” as in time, never figures in the story. Rather it’s the name of a play and the royalties associated with it over which the murder in question is committed.

As noted, if one needs an excuse to watch the film, “directed by Anthony Mann” should suffice, but if you need a another nudge how about it’s also the film debut of one of the great femme fatals in noir, Bettejane Greer, who’d soon be Jane Greer. While not given much to do, nevertheless when she’s on screen she’s captivating.

Couple other notables lending support are Charles C. Wilson who not surprisingly plays a newspaper editor. A quick review of his almost 250 screen credits revealed he played an editor on at least 18 occasions and a cop in the darn near all the rest. Lastly, I’d be remiss if not mentioning Richard Lane, who here grabs third billing. Lane plays a newshound with a nose for a story and a mouth with an always ready snappy retort. Truth be known his mouth works a lot better than his nose as he’s constancy wrong and ends up being one other anatomical part, the butt of most of the jokes. As child of the 50’s growing up in LA, Lane was a stalwart of local channel KTLA broadcasting live sporting events such as Jalopy Derby, Wrestling from the Olympic Auditorium and the LA T-Birds of Roller Derby. Of course no mention can be made of Lane without noting his name became the punch line for the joke about the renaming of the famous make-out stretch of road along Mulholland Drive; Dick Lane.