Rent Raw Deal (1948)

A Hood and Hoods - Raw Deal review by CH

A prison escape is always risky. Life outside brings perils worse than the monotony of the cell. So Dennis O'Keefe finds in Raw Deal (1948). Written by Leopold Atlas and John Higgins, from a story by others, this strong script was bolstered by Anthony Mann's directing which, in turn, owed so much to the cinematography of John Alton: he, literally, brought out the best in a cast whose features glow and fade in scenes which range from automobiles to forests - and that essential part of almost any noir: a dubious night club.

The curved hood of the automobile which, variously pursued, is as much a star of all this as those within. Alongside O'Keefe are not only his erstwhile, dodgy girlfriend Claire Trevor but also a woman from the legal firm which is certain that he has been framed: Marsha Hunt. He is smitten with both, that is clear. All of which brings a further frisson – female lips' edge sparring – to a situation which has a towering Mr. Big, Raymond Burr, who is as determined to see off O'Keefe as the police, for he is unwilling to give the fugitive the $50,000 which he is owed for taking the rap.

That is, as it were, the sum of it, and one almost suspects that the film were made for less. No matter. Such privation had all those as much on their toes as those depeicted within. One scene flows into the next – and, as for the final ones, I am too much of a gentleman to say more. Treat yourself to a great night in.

Road Noir. - Raw Deal review by Steve

This incredibly gloomy road noir is the best of the low budget crime pictures Anthony Mann made after the war. It's a love triangle. Joe (Dennis O'Keefe) escapes from prison and flees with a reluctant member of his legal team (the excellent Marsha Hunt), and his jealous moll (Claire Trevor) who loves him submissively and unconditionally.

The narrative is related by Trevor like a sombre dream, accompanied by the joyless drone of a theremin. Her introspective reverie is ethereal, like she is already dead. The real star of the film is the cinematographer (John Alton) who fills the screen with looming squares of inky darkness which have the oppressive expressionist dread of a Mark Rothko painting.  

The fugitive searches for the gangsters who sent him down with the promise of a financial sweetener. Only they have decided not to pay up. Raymond Burr and John Ireland are hugely intimidating as the hit men who try to rub out their former partner while the police chase him down to Mexico.

Luckless Joe is another poor sucker lost on the dark roads of film noir. It is a powerful, melancholy film, with its compromised, cursed figures always moving in and out of the enfolding shadows. The familiar story is slim but its heavy, clinging fatalism has a way of staying in the memory.

Cracking - Raw Deal review by sb

FILM & REVIEW Early Anthony Mann film and a cracking little noir it as well. O’Keefe plays Joe who is in prison having taken the rap for his boss Rick in return for a payoff of 5O G’s. It’s arranged for him to bust out but Rick (Burr) reckons his chances of survival are slim thus taking care of Joe and the cash. But against all odds he makes it and heads back towards San Francisco with his girl Pat (Trevor). On the way to switch cars they take Ann (Hunt) who has been following Joe’s case and is also in love with him so the scene is set for all 3 to hit the road. So he has the cops after him and Rick as well in the person of Fantail (Ireland) while the two girls bicker over Joe while the net closes in… It’s unusual in that in uses a hard boiled voice over but from Pat’s perspective so we learn a lot from the female point. Both actress’s are very good - Trevor is hard as nails whereas Hunt is much more the innocent abroad and Trevor realises she is in danger of losing Joe. Burr is excellent as the sadistic bad guy and for it’s time it’s quite brutal and lensed by the great John Alton who uses the swirling dock fog in the finale to great effect…a real little cracker - 4/5