D.O.A. (1950) [Film Noir] [Drama]

Posted on by womo



The film begins with what a BBC reviewer called “perhaps one of cinema’s most innovative opening sequences.” The scene is a long, behind-the-back tracking sequence featuring Frank Bigelow (Edmond O’Brien) walking through the hallway of a police station to report his own murder. Oddly, the police almost seem to have been expecting him and already know who he is. A flashback begins with Bigelow in his hometown of Banning, California where he is an accountant and notary public. He decides to take a one-week vacation in San Francisco, but this does not sit well with Paula Gibson (Pamela Britton), his confidential secretary and girlfriend, as he does not want her to accompany him.

Bigelow accompanies a group from a sales convention on a night on the town. At a “jive” nightclub called “The Fisherman”, unnoticed by Bigelow, a stranger swaps his drink for another. The nightclub scene includes one of the earliest depictions of the Beat subculture. The next morning, Bigelow feels ill. He visits a doctor, where tests reveal he swallowed a “luminous toxin” for which there is no antidote. A second opinion confirms the grim diagnosis, and the other doctor implies that the poisoning must have been deliberate. Bigelow remembers his drink tasted strange. With a few days to live at most, Bigelow sets out to untangle the events behind his impending death, interrupted occasionally by phone calls from Paula. She provides the first clue: a man named Eugene Philips had tried to contact him, but died the previous day, purportedly a suicide. Bigelow travels to Philips’ import-export company in Los Angeles, first meeting Miss Foster (Beverly Garland) (whose on-screen credit reads “Beverly Campbell”), the secretary, then Mr Halliday (William Ching), the company’s comptroller, who tells him Eugene Philips committed suicide. From there the trail leads to Philips’ widow (Lynn Baggett) and brother Stanley (Henry Hart).

The key to the mystery is a bill of sale for what turns out to be stolen iridium. Bigelow had notarized the document for Eugene Philips six months earlier. He connects Philips’ mistress, Marla Rakubian (Laurette Luez), to gangsters led by Majak (Luther Adler). They capture Bigelow. Since Bigelow has learned too much, Majak orders his psychotic henchman Chester (Neville Brand) to kill him. However, Bigelow manages to escape. Bigelow thinks Stanley and Miss Foster are his killers but when he confronts them, he finds Stanley has been poisoned too – after having dinner with Mrs. Philips. He tells them to call an ambulance and what poison has been ingested so that, in Stanley’s case at least, prompt treatment may save his life. Stanley tells Bigelow he found evidence that Halliday and Mrs. Philips were having an affair. Bigelow realizes that the theft was merely a diversion. Eugene discovered the affair and Halliday killed him.

Halliday and Mrs. Philips used the investigation of the iridium as a cover for their crime, making it seem that Eugene Philips had killed himself out of shame. However, when they discovered that there was evidence of his innocence in the notarized bill of sale, Halliday murdered anyone who had knowledge of the bill of sale. Bigelow tracks Halliday down and shoots him to death in an exchange of gunfire. The flashback comes to an end. Bigelow finishes telling his story at the police station and dies, his last word being “Paula.” The police detective taking down the report instructs that his file be marked “D.O.A.”

—

Directed by Rudolph Maté, produced by Leo C. Popkin, written by Russell Rouse and Clarence Greene, starring Edmond O’Brien as Frank Bigelow, Pamela Britton as Paula Gibson, Luther Adler as Majak, Lynn Baggett as Mrs. Philips, William Ching as Halliday, Henry Hart as Stanley Philips, Beverly Garland as Miss Foster, Neville Brand as Chester, Laurette Luez as Marla Rakubian and Virginia Lee as Jeannie.

—

Source: “D.O.A. (1950 film)” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. 9 March 2013. Web. 11 March 2013. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.O.A._(1950_film).

source

36 Replies to “D.O.A. (1950) [Film Noir] [Drama]”

  15. The ULTIMATE Film NOIR ever. Poor Frank Just wants to get a break…nagging girlfriend Paula won't get off his ass about a few days in San Francisco…So a guy wants to throw his heels up in San Francisco?! BUT he has discovered he's in for the ride of his boring life! A couple of BLONDES and a guilt complex are the least of his problems! A mixed drink and an adventure that is to DIE for are what he came to the city for! A lusty collaboration of blame and denial and yet another Femme Fetal to consider another reason to look elsewhere for entertainment. More twisted plots and back handed shifty eyed ideas to make a man think about anything other than a straight night in San Francisco! And nothing gay about it!

  16. I have a feeling that S. Lumet, in The Pawnbroker, paid tribute to Maté's tracking shot of O' Brien running like mad in the streets of Frisco.

  18. "I'd like to report a murder." Bigelow exclaims, when actually there were TWO: his own and Halliday's. After all, he gunned down Halliday in cold blood.

    I'd love to see this play out in court – both being convicted of murder in absentia because they are both dead.

  19. One of my favorite film noir movies. That goon named Chester just couldn't stop jamming guns in people's ribs or punching Bigelow in the stomach."Look at you, he can't take it, soft in the belly". 

    Or when Chester was driving the car and he had this absolutely psychotic look in his eyes when he was telling Bigelow how he was going to shoot him. "That's how I want you to go Bigelow, nice and slow".

  20. The best psycho performance ever in a movie is in 'Maniac' 1934…where Don Maxwell gives his patient a shot of super adrenaline. Check it out. DOA is one of the greatest of the film noirs, however. Check out Bigelow when he's running through the streets, the passers by..that was all filmed without them knowing. Also, Chester was one of the best tough guts ever in a movie, no doubt.

  24. I wish this was uploaded in a higher resolution – a "B" movie for sure with some real corn, but one of the all time classic "noirs" without a doubt!

  25. That Captain at the desk at the very beginning is Roy Engle who later became President Grant in many of The Wild, Wild West TV episodes. The bartender is Frank Cady who later became a regular in the TV show Green Acres & Petticoat Junction. The jazz fan with the blonde woman is Hugh O'Brien (TV's Wyatt Earp, who also was the faro dealer who has a shootout with John Wayne at the end of "The Shootist"). Jazz band was quite hot and if they weren't really playing the tune they sure emulated it incredibly. Jerry Paris was one of the bellhops — he was the producer & director of Happy Days, and was Dick Van Dyke's neighbor in his comedy show, and prior to that was Robert Stack's sidekick in The Untouchables. Pamela Britton (who plays Paula in this film) was famous for being the next door neighbor in My Favorite Martian. I love these old movies because many familiar faces pop up that show their careers were quite different from what they later became famous for.

  27. Wow! If you're only going to watch one "film noir" in your life, then this is the one to watch! What's film noir you might ask? They're crime dramas popular during the '40's and '50's, best shot at night while it's raining, with classic scenes like at minute 47:15 in this flick. That secret keeping secretary is credited as Beverly Campbell, but in her later films, many low budget horror / sci-fi stuff, she's better known as Beverly Garland. Good actress that we should have seen far more frequently, imo.

  28. I'll give it a C+. Lots of characters, a bit hokey. Better than Spider-Man, Fast and Furious and Star Wars all of which I haven't seen and have no intentions of seeing.

  29. Filmed in San Francisco about 1950 before urban renewal struck the city. Many places are readily recognizable. The St. Francis Hotel; the Ferry Building. the Bay Bridge viewed from the Embarcadero. I noted one error. When he exits the St. Francis, he gets on the trolley and ends up uptown. Except when he gets on the Trolley going in that particular direction, the Trolley is actually headed toward Market Street. An interesting movie….

  33. I can say a lot like: luv the film sound like a classic old record,/ the jazz band they do not play like th@ no more. the luv th@ Paula had for her man.
    I don't care wh@ they say this was a Oscar.
    picture, sound, script, a few caricatures, any way's one HELL of a thriller, most of all suspense.

  36. I saw this many years ago & i happened upon it today,this movie is just as great as it was when i first saw it all those years ago withal those different & possible suspects popping out everywhere He turned! Movies were so much better back then except for the fact that there weren`t people of colour in leading roles.They truly had Him running in circles & I loved how Mr. Bigelow left that car when the "psychopath" was going to do him in (for sure & in the "belly" hehe) & the bus with the police right there,simply loved that,this "is" a good watch & gratitude for sharing "D.O.A. -Timeless Classic Movies!"

Leave a Reply