Tuesday, May 1, 2018

Movie: The Red House


The Red House
100 minutes / B & W / 1947

When The Red House was released in 1947, critics called it the “sleeper hit” of the year. The excellent casting makes the movie worth seeing. Edward G. Robinson plays a farmer, which is long way from the urban crooks and canny investigators he often had to play. GI pin-up girl Julie London plays to perfection the little town flirt who tantalizes both the good boy, Lon McCallister, and bad boy, Rory Calhoun. Calhoun’s looks – dark Irish meets Cherokee – fit the part of woodsman who dabbles in trouble. Allene Roberts, with her sensitive eyes, slender build, and gentle manner, plays the troubled orphan. Judith Anderson puts in a believable performance as the farmer’s too devoted sister.

Things change on an isolated farm when Robinson’s disabled farmer hires McCallister as a hand.  Robinson warns the nice boy and vulnerable orphan to stay out of the woods and the tumble-down red house it surrounds.  But the teenagers naturally ignore the warning. Although the bad boy guards the woods with a gun – we wonder if moonshining is going on – the boy, the orphan, and the flirt explore the mystery of the woods.

Gradually revealed is a grisly family secret. The movie handles smoothly the theme of the outcomes of violence and the hold guilt and secrecy exert. Edward G. Robinson gives a restrained performance as a man with a burden. His high level of acting is approached by the three younger actors. McCallister, a kid actor, was a seasoned vet, but Allene Roberts and Julie London are good beyond their age and experience. 

The DVD I saw this movie had lousy sound. But it’s not every day we can enjoy the unusual genre of “country noir.”

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