A bit of a warning: If you’ve been reading along, you might see that I pick up something from the 1940s or 1950s labelled as “film noir” and determine if it’s actually something other like a crime procedural or cops vs robbers or something along those lines. I don’t know the exceptions to prove this rule, but, IF IT HAS A HAPPY ENDING, IT’S NOT ‘FILM NOIR.’

“This Gun For Hire,” a movie I enjoyed very much, is regarded as a classic film noir, and the copy suggests a deep love triangle of principle characters tempted to go right or do wrong, and that’s not even remotely the case. Maybe it helps categorize these movies quickly, and “film noir” is such an intriguing of film narrative. “Crime procedural” takes something out of the character’s story arc, that it’s more about how they catch the villain instead of watching our protagonist tempted to be a villain. I watch a lot of these, and sometimes I’m won over, but that’s why I always ask (and answer) “Is it noir?”

Also, I usually don’t do these old movie ‘reviews’ as proper ‘thumbs up/thumbs down’ or x out of 4 stars reviews. Is it good? Is it bad? If the movie has languished in the public domain and forgotten as a quick B movie, often the better ones are where the production has gone for broke to give that biggest crime or noir punch to the gut while they still have film in the camera. And sometimes it’s a quick cash in, like Apology For Murder, a rip off of the most standard of noir movies Double Indemnity. And I’ll add a comment, is it worth checking out? Sometimes just to see someone make a blatant rip off is an amusing 90 minutes to spend. And I’m checking these movies out, in some cases, EIGHTY YEARS after their release. So I try to keep an open mind about these old movies and consider why something is a classic or if something needs a little more attention.

Why are you going on and on about your contemporary review and categorization of these movies? Get to Gilda already. Gilda (1946) is regarded as a film noir classic, and (spoiler) it isn’t one and not really the other. That’s harsh, this movie is beloved after time and support from critics and institutions alike (from a Criterion release to being preserved by the Library Of Congress). It has grown in popularity especially in the 90s thanks to the movie Shawshank Redemption, which even includes a scene from Gilda where the title character, played by Rita Hayworth, is introduced by whipping her head and glorious mane of hair into frame when asked if she is “decent.”

I sought out “Gilda” after noticing Joseph Calleia in last week’s movie, The Glass Key. He had spent some of his career playing a baddie, so it was interesting to see what his role was here: a local cop staked out in a rather out-in-the-open illegal casino, run by the mysterious Ballin (bell-in). It is CURRENTLY on Tubi, and supposedly will disappear soon after this posted review, but movies come and go on Tubi so if it’s not there now, it’ll probably be back in a month or so.

“Gilda” starts out with Johnny, played by Glenn Ford, nearly losing his street gambling winnings from a mugger before being rescued by Ballin. Johnny tosses the gun from his likely murderous assailant into the nearby open body of water and tells them to scram (his “save the cat” moment, so that we’re on his side). Ballin had used a cane with a hidden retractable blade at the bottom to rescue Johnny, by the way, and now you have Chekov’s gun (cane with blade). Ballin tells Johnny to try real gambling at the previously mentioned casino, which is members/invite only. Also, this takes place in Argentina, with a lot of Americans hanging around and beating each other up over gambling, at the end of World War 2.

Johnny shows up at Ballin’s casino, cheats at blackjack, and is knocked around by security a little bit before being confronted by Ballin. Johnny basically demands that he be hired by Ballin to provide additional security, since he’s such a good cheater, and Ballin agrees. This is one of those “I’m so good at being bad, you should make me your top trusted person” motifs that by the way I don’t think works in the real world. There’s a few characters roaming the casino. Detective Obregon (Calleia) stands over or next to Johnny making snide comments about things Johnny is noticing that seem a little off, such as a little man who comes in and plays “2” on the roulette and wins every time. Things are going well, with Johnny and Ballin becoming besties, so Ballin puts Johnny in charge of the casino while he’s out of town on other business.

Ballin comes back and Johnny stops by Ballin’s mansion only to be introduced, as is all of America for several decades, our title character Gilda, who Ballin married on a whim, a day after meeting her, on his trip. What’s next after that iconic hairflip is a tense staredown between Gilda and Johnny – apparently, and movie doesn’t explicitly state this even with Johnny’s occasional narration, they know each other, being lovers at one point. Gilda is pretty over the top about it, pretending to forget Johnny’s easy to forget name.

I think it’s an odd choice to not have Johnny’s narration say something like “omg, it’s my ex Gilda, who I didn’t even mention in the beginning, as to one of the reasons why I’m feeling down and out as a degenerate gambler in Argentina.” Maybe it’s to add to the tension, to leave you wondering what is their deal, and Gilda adds to it by immediately dancing or cuddling up to every seemingly available man in the casino. In every instance, Johnny steps in to push away the clueless suitor from the owner’s wife, and she has a lot of great one liners that doesn’t help the situation. Gilda is doing nothing to dispel any notion of previous chemistry she and Johnny had in front of Ballin, risking who knows what kind of reprimand from someone who is basically a wealthy gangster who gets away with a lot as it is. But, she’s a trip, encouraging all the men falling over her in front on Johnny.

There’s another plot to this story, and it’s best described as a reverse Casablanca. Ballin’s real wealth comes from having access to tungsten and a few patents owned by some Germans, who are shy about owning these things at the end of the war. With WW2 over, the Germans want their tungsten cartel back, but Ballin refuses. He even kills one of the German goons at the club. Having discovered this, Johnny checks in on Gilda, and they start making out. Ballin discovers them, and drives away and boards a plane. Johnny, and the cops, chase after him, only to watch Ballin board a plane which crashes into the ocean. We’re shown Ballin having bailed out, but Johnny etc don’t know.

Johnny informs the tungsten cartel that Gilda inherited everything included their secret resources, and he’s going to marry her, and they’re keeping it all away from the cartel, too bad. I frankly don’t know how wise this is in the grand scheme of, well, scheming organized criminals trying to control an important resource, but it’s not brought up again. Meanwhile, Johnny makes life a living hell for Gilda, being cold to her AND letting her think she’s about to cavort and even run away with numerous suitors, but they all end up working for and bringing her back to Johnny.

SPOILER, Just when everything looks bleak for Gilda and Johnny starts to wonder if he can’t get over the idea that she’s a serial cheater, Ballin shows up and demands his tungsten empire back, and he’s going to kill the couple. One of the staff members uses Ballin’s staff (remember?) to kill Ballin instead, and then Officer Obregon shows up and is like “Ballin was already declared dead, Gilda is actually a loyal wife and just likes to aggravate you, gimme the tungsten secrets and get out of here, you crazy kids.” And that’s it, Gilda and Johnny walk out of a crazy crime filled life, happily ever after, at least for the next week or so.

Was it Noir? It has an abrupt happy ending. I don’t know if that was the intent. It’s a reverse Casablanca, where Johnny steals the woman of his dreams (nightmares, these two need a lot of therapy) from a man with bigger plans who dooms himself coming back for her. What was Johnny going to do, say “you two deserve each other? get on out of here and go be rich with this murderous gangster!” Maybe a noir ending would have Johnny getting over his hangups over Gilda, maybe she’s tempted by the wealth to cut Johnny out (or she declares her love for Johnny and disdain for the criminal empire?) but Ballen comes in and kills her before being killed by the cops or, again stabbed by the cane sword. This movie is beloved so no need to second guess the ending at this point.

Was it good? Um, this is difficult because this movie is loved, but it can’t be for the nonsensical story. Because there are odd choices like not cluing in the audience of the exact nature of Gilda & Johnny’s previous relationship, instead having to go back and forth on Gilda and the various suitors with Johnny stepping in. Ballin is a long game planner, the movie wants you to believe, but he hired Johnny and marries Gilda in quick separate instances. He must have planned on a way to withhold the German’s share of the tungsten stock and patents beyond “it’s in my safe, and I’ll shoot your goons if they keep showing up two at a time. Certainly don’t stop by my house with several more hired hands to kill me and take my safe.” Then Johnny is put in charge of everything, and now he’s the gangster – a noir or crime movie would show more of Johnny becoming more rotten with more power, especially with that power owned by his now wife who supposedly hates him. I mean, there are a lot of avenues these three can go down that could result in a proper noir ending, or even a proper happy ending that doesn’t seem to come out of nowhere.

I’ve watched it twice, so beyond the costume ball dance where Gilda mentions that she and Johnny learned to dance together confirming their previous relationship, beyond just glaring at each other, I’m sorry to ask for something more elaborate, like in Casablanca with the flashback of Rick being left behind at the train station. And I don’t like flashbacks all that much. I’m sorry I need it spelled out. It wasn’t that it was too subtle, their staredown upon meeting is so over the top and Ballin seems suspicious but their reactions border on inappropriate to the point where Ballin should have asked, “okay, wtf is going on here?”

On the plus side, and there are plenty of them, this is one fantastic looking movie, with a lot of interesting silhouette and shadow effects for the otherwise well-lit casino and mansion sets. And the biggest stars are Rita Hayworth and her amazing wardrobe, of which I think 100% of why this movie is remembered so fondly. I do recommend seeing it, but for me, I had a lot of “huh?” and “why?” and “that was a lot for so little, movie.”

Anything about the cast? Glenn Ford and Rita Hayworth, wow. I don’t know where to begin with them. They were both married and divorced a lot (4 for Ford, 5 for Hayworth), and during all that time, kept up an affair with each other up until the 1980s. This movie seems to be the 2nd time that Ford, Hayworth, and director Charles Vidor worked together. All three of them would occasionally have trouble dealing with their studios and trying to get out of contracts, often missing in working on other films (together!). Ford played Superman’s earth dad in the 1978 Superman movie. I have seen some of his other crime “noir” movies but I don’t think I’ve discussed them here. Hayworth was at one time married to Orson Welles (2nd husband), and left him for a Pakistani “Prince” before coming back to America to be married a couple more times. Hayworth appeared in a movie opposite of Welles, The Lady From Shanghai, which I will get to in a future review.