Blind Alley (1939)

Blind Alley

“This was potentially a game changer in 1939, a proto-noir where the action is squared away on psychoanalysis and not on fisticuffs and brute strength. Sure, the Freudian psychobabble hasn’t aged well, but there was a rough charm to the likes of Chester Morris, Ann Dvorak, and Ralph Bellamy that papers over the awkward dialogue. Long before Law & Order transformed interrogation-as-therapeutic-device, Blind Alley laid the foundation and provided a reasonable enough good time.   While this would eventually get remade as The Dark Past with William Holden and Lee J. Cobb subbing in for the two main roles, Morris and Bellamy do them better. Morris’ career was on a prolonged downturn at this point where the former leading man was now regulated to B-pictures and that desperation to recl” read more