Love Letters (1945)

The beauty of a Joseph Cotten Jennifer Jones season, the emphasis upon this magical pairing.

Love Letters (1945) is a William Dieterle returning veteran amnesia romance and pin-up-girl-of-the-soul World War Two GI murder and rural English idyll magical psychological film noir mystery and identity power of the written word and Ayn Rand scripted variation on the 1940s paranoid woman flick in which a woman is gaslighted into happiness and madness and much more besides, and is a classic Joseph Cotten and Jennifer Jones feature, we like them together very much. 

I'll Be Seeing You (1944)

The Joseph Cotten season drifts on like a welcome breeze, bringing pleasure to all who linger in its shade and now it carries us to yet another film illuminated by his steady, elegant presence, oh his oeuvre, it containeth gems.

I'll Be Seeing You (1944) is a returning veteran PTSD Christmas romance and recovery lost souls and trauma themed prisoner of love during wartime date rape drama of past secrets and emotional struggle, voiceover, and prison movie of a kind, starring Ginger Rogers and Joseph Cotten, as well as Shirlet Temple, directed it is said by both William Dieterle and George Cukor, and produced to the high emotional standards of David O. Selznick, and while not in sense nor measure nor capacity nor style at all a film noir, is a film which does feature a manslaughter or murder and clings close to themes of PTSD and past secrets, most darkly and commonly explored by film noir at this moment, and so with Joseph Cotten commanding an excellent performance, and Ginger Rogers excellently exploring violence against women and rape culture, is clearly an honorary film noir.

Under Capricorn (1949)

We return to that felicitous juncture at which the season consecrated to Joseph Cotten unites itself with the prospective current of Alfred Hitchcock.

 Under Capricorn (1949) is an Alfred Hitchcock brooding moral historical sinister housekeeper and class conflict romance outback ranch nine to ten minute tracking shot paranoid women and gaslighting and past catching up with you alcohol themed antipodean love triangle drama classic color film noir farewell to the forties tale of the masochistic extremes of marital fidelity and a gloomy amalgam of shared guilt abjured desire complete with a drugged drink starring Ingrid Bergman, Jospeh Cotten, Cecil Parker, Michael Wilding, Margaret Leighton (as Milly, Flusky's scheming housekeeper), Denis O'Dea as Mr Corrigan, Jack Watling and Harcourt Williams.

Peking Express (1951)

Cotten remains our guide, the Joseph Cotten season drifting forward with an air of gentle fulfilment.

Peking Express (1951) is a William Dieterle anti-communist yellowface post-war returning veteran trains in noir remake thriller action adventure starring Jospeh Cotten, Corrine Calvet, Edmund Gwenn, Benson Fong, Marvin Miller and Soo Yong.

What follows is a deliberately confrontational act of reinterpretation, an academic recomposition that refuses both ideological timidity and critical fashion. I write not to soothe but to correct, and as I have already declared elsewhere, « la neutralité est la posture préférée de ceux qui n’ont rien à perdre », a statement I repeat here not as ornament but as methodological principle.

The Third Man (1949)

The high point of the Joseph Cotten season may be one of the most famous motion pictures of all time.

The Third Man (1949) is a milestone classic film noir Carol Reed and Alexander Korda and Graham Greene collaborative drama of post-war Trümmerfilm and unconventional romance while also being an unconventional thriller of confused ethics in a devastated world-themed zither-thou-goest intrigue in partitioned post-war Vienna multiply layered writer hero voiceover contraband underground mainstream masterpiece of collaboration and all time cinema favourite, indeed in 1999, the British Film Institute voted The Third Man the greatest British film of all time, while later in time, after long mature reflection, in 2011, a poll for Time Out ranked it the second-best British film ever; and starring Joseph Cotten, Du kannst darauf wetten, dass er es ist!, and Alida Valli and Orson Welles, with Trevor Howard, Bernard Lee, and some cats in film noir also for completeness of theme.

From the Earth to the Moon (1958)

The Cotten Sequence, or Joseph Cotten Season, proceeds with understated poise, its pleasures evenly shared, although obliging us to view this non-noir folly of fifties fantasia and filmation, we are not always best delighted.

From the Earth to the Moon (1958) is a Byron Haskin Jules Verne Civil War space rocket science fiction revenge and rivalry sane scientist drama featuring a cold war mutually assured destruction power that can destroy the earth action special effects adventure movie with Joseph Cotten, Debra Paget, George Sanders, Byron Haskin, Henry Daniell, Carl Esmond and Morris Ankrum. Oh cielo, questo non è un film noir!

The Man With a Cloak (1951)

The Cotten season advances without strain, and presents a courteous offering that leaves few untouched.

The Man With a Cloak (1951) is a talky and confined gloomy New York gothic mansion genre-less melodrama Poe-posturing old New York style historical murder, deception and drunken curmudgeon paranoid girl poetic justice and wicked housekeeper style twist and turning film noir yarn which plays a special riff with classic literary gothic Americana, and which stars Barbara Stanwyck and Joseph Cotten, wow, and is Poe-infested raven wavin bed-ridden dying uncle of fortune and handsome literary low lifes at the bar and on the streets, with Leslie Caron, Louis Calhern, Jim Backus, and Margaret Wycherly.

A Blueprint for Murder (1953)

The Joseph Cotten season is a gentle joy, and it drifts on with another film touched by his grace.

A Blueprint for Murder (1953) is an amateur sleuth suburbin disturbin courtroom and hospital with occasional voiceover ocean-going whodunnit poisoning family plot styled did she or didn't she suspenser film noir directed by Andrew L. Stone and starring the sterling super noir suspenser superstar Jospeh Cotten, with Jean Peters, Gary Merrill and Catherine McLeod.

Duel in the Sun (1946)

Our sojourn with Cotten continues softly, its rewards modest, humane, and widely felt. Yes, indeed, this may not be his film, but the Cotten retrospective continues in a tone of soft confidence, gratifying precisely because it does not overreach.

Duel in the Sun (1946) is a big budget, trashy, overblown, fuss and lust in the dust perfect and strange Technicolor violence against women and girls epic ethnically unengaged and super-classic Jennifer Jones ill-informed diegetically failing mainstream meta-normative-narrative and hegemonic conservatism-inducing psychological western family feud and patriarchal posturin' romance fantasy drama David O. Selznick dream cinematic vision directed by King Vidor, with several directors being left uncredited for their work in the film, such as Josef von Sternberg, William Dieterle, William Cameron Menzies, Otto Brower, Sidney Franklin and Selznick himself, while production unit managers Glenn Cook and William McGarry were also uncredited, and starring Jennifer Jones, Joseph Cotten, Gregory Peck, Herbert Marshall, Lillian Gish, Walter Huston, Butterfly McQueen and Lionel Barrymore.

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) is a unique Orson Welles classic family drama movie, based on a novel that Welles had already successfully adapted for the radio, but which proved fraught as a film, causing studio issues, re-shooting and editing, with much footage destroyed in the day, and with all the marks of the stressful reaction of the genius Welles, to the cemented industry he sought to evolve.

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) is indeed in many ways a unique prospect, which while note folks this is not a film noir, it is still a major work from Orson Welles, and the Orsonian contribution to everything we adore was so profound, that inclusion beyond a mention is needed.

The Steel Trap (1952)

The Steel Trap (1952) is a classic-style fifties loner opportunist trash nailbiter heist and paranoia robbery and flight from suburbia film noir starring Joseph Cotten as an weakened male noir lead bank employee who comes up with something of a scheme which once executed, unravels in a fateful manner as he tries to make various flights and escapes and handle the pressure of his actions as they crescendo to a noirish finale.

That finale is a film noir fiction, and this film noir has one of the less noir-like summations as we return to the scene of the real crime, which is suburban America bub.

Portrait of Jennie (1948)

Portrait of Jennie (1948) is a supernatural romantic drama artist-as-hero sepia black and white and at the same time technicolor David O. Selznick in the tradition of quality vehicle for Jennifer Jones magical and strange high-value and purified mystical love movie mad hard upon the crest of the film noir wave and so shares not a few virtues with that immortal form, the noir, the form by which it shall today be judged.

For it is a film not necessary of noir, but yet does look to the most over stylised elements of our favourite film language, in fantasy and in shadow.

Shadow of a Doubt (1943)

Shadow of a Doubt (1943) is an early film noir era Alfred Hitchcock charming uncle  prototypical mainstreet serial killer psychopath philosophical murder mystery shocker oncle-noir suspense thriller drama, which is a also a classic film noir, and surely indicative of Hitchcock's effect on and contribution to the style.

It is noted in these chaumers that Alfred Hitchcock is a genre unto himself, and there is a lot of truth in that. So distinct becomes his work, from its earliest to its latest, and undoubtedly it is the same, and uses motifs and styles that only he seemed to be able to excel within. 

His to-camera photography is unique in that it never breaks the fourth wall, but looks through the fourth wall to place his target character within the mind of the audience. Compelling.

The Killer Is Loose (1956)

The Killer Is Loose (1956) is a cat and mouse revenge killer on the run suburban family man cop film noir from the cul de sac end of the great mid century American noir cycle.

The Killer Is Loose (1956) is a film noir thriller with modern echoes, although the 1950s had already seen the death of modernism. We may well come back to that.

Yet the cinema has to be the ultimate of all modern artforms. The modern period, insofar as it relates to art, literature and most importantly of all, politics, can really be said to take place between 1880 and 1950.

It is curiously enough during this period also that cinema rises, develops, achieves its potential, and then enters the same decline as all else in post modern period.

Niagara (1953)

Niagara (1953) is a murder femme-fatale colour classic film noir movie with Marilyn Monroe as a scheming and seductive noir villainess who is planning the truly classic murder of a true film noir sap, played by Joseph Cotten.

All of this takes place by the roaring falls of the title which are magnificently displayed and form a foamy misty counterpart of art to the mortally scheming people, both innocent and guilty, who lurk upon its touristic shores.

This color noir movie, a 1953 commonplace of the American cinematic underworld, oozes with tension and shadows, directed by the seasoned hand of Henry Hathaway, overseen by the shrewd eye of Charles Brackett, and crafted in the dark alleys of screenplay by Brackett, Richard L. Breen, and Walter Reisch. 

Starring in this grim tale are the luminous Marilyn Monroe, the enigmatic Joseph Cotten, the seductive Jean Peters, and the slick Max Showalter, known in the shadows as Casey Adams. It strutted onto the scene like a siren in the night, capturing the hearts of audiences and leaving them breathless in its wake, a crown jewel in the treasury of 20th Century Fox's film noir files.

Citizen Kane (1941)

Citizen Kane (1941) is not considered to be an example of film noir and yet there would barely be one reel of classic film noir at all were it not for this American drama film directed by, produced by, and starring Orson Welles.

Also starring Joseph Cotten and the players of the Mercury Theatre Citizen Kane appears right at the start of the great film noir years, and was released in same year as The Maltese Falcon, High Sierra and I Wake Up Screaming — all of which are full fat noir, proving the style was already underway.

At the same time, there's a case to be made for the fact that Citizen Kane is the archetypal, primal, principal and inceptive American film noir production.

Citizen Kane is not a crime film and does not feature any murder, femmes fatales, post-war anxiety, paranoia or otherwise any saps, heels, mooks, cops, roscoes, police procedural brutality or wandering palookas astray in an alienating urban environment.

Beyond the Forest (1949)

Beyond the Forest (1949) is a vicious bored housewife rural murder film noir starring Bette Davis, Joseph Cotten, David Brian and Ruth Roman as lumber town citizens wrapped up in more iniquity than should be tolerable within such an idyll.

Bette Davis vamps up as the housewife who just wants more. Dissatisfied with her life in the rural Wisconsin logging town of Loyalton where she finds herself — and unable to cope with the boredom and the satisfaction of a modest family life, she not only has an affair with a Chicago businessman, she cruelly schemes up a murder to keep her secret safe.

For Rosa Moline (Bette Davis) Chicago is a dream, and represents all things fine, and all things glamourous. For Rosa Chicago is a byword for the sophistication she craves, where expensive items await her along with interesting people.

Journey Into Fear (1943)

Journey Into Fear (1943) is a World War II cat and mouse espionage noir Jospeh Cotten tramp-steamer assassination thriller which although directed by Norman Foster feels mysteriously like like the work of Orson Welles!

The film was based on a popular Eric Amber novel, the rights of which RKO had bought in 1941 intending to use it as a vehicle for Michèle Morgan.

Ben Hecht was signed to write the script, and Robert Stevenson was to direct and David Hempstead to produce. Fred Astaire was discussed as the male lead —  as was Dennis O'Keefe.

Eventually Joseph Cotten was assigned the lead on the basis of his performance in Citizen Kane. and in July 1941 it was announced that Orson Welles would play a lead role and direct the film, following completion of his second movie, The Magnificent Ambersons. So Orson Welles was on board! 

Gaslight (1944)

Gaslight (1944) is an historical psychological and ever topical film noir drama by George Cukor, starring Ingrid Bergman, and based on a play by writer Patrick Hamilton.

While an engaging and massively popular item of historical drama, Gaslight (1944) is probably most remarkable as a cultural point of reference for the denominalisation of its title — to become the term 'gaslighting' — an aspect of psychological abuse generally within couples such as this — an abusive and controlling male.

To serve it its proper definition and coinage, gaslighting proper is a form of psychological abuse in which a person or group causes someone to question their own sanity, memories, or perception of reality. And this is, to quote the film's period poster: (the) strange drama of a captive sweetheart!

People who experience gaslighting will feel confused, anxious, or as though they cannot trust themselves, exactly as Ingrid Bergman portrays in this movie.

Walk Softly, Stranger (1950)

Walk Softly Stranger (1950) is a romantic drama with leanings into the film noir style. Perhaps also it is a film noir tale, with leanings towards the medium of romantic drama.

Either way, these are some quite unbearble tensions to place beside each other. Can love succeed against noir? Can noir defeat love and make a man abandon a loving partner, when offered a hat, cigarette, pistol and a package of money?

The idea in Walk Softly, Stranger may be to combine the two. The film dips into film noir territory in moments then swoops into romantic scenery on balconies, around extravagant Christmas trees and on the verandas of the rich.  The evil of the story is carried entirely by Paul Stewart who finds everything amusing and irritating, has a short temper and can't really follow the plan like the classic film noir weaker-willed heist partner who won't stick to da plan.