Rent The Woman in the Window (1944)

Dream Noir. - The Woman in the Window review by Steve

Fritz Lang never became the director of prestige that Alfred Hitchcock was in Hollywood and only ever attracted low to medium budgets. But film noir never much thrived in lavish productions. Better to get a poetic script and some tough/sexy actors, and then hide the sets in the shadows.

Edward G. Robinson is a middle aged Professor of Psychology who finds himself at the whim of a young, desirable artist's model (Joan Bennett). When she kills her possessive sugar daddy, she is blackmailed by Dan Duryea's swaggering heavy. After the Prof disposes of the body, he feels the breath of the law on the back of his neck. It's a cute story, if you overlook the final twist!

 Joan Bennett was typecast in this period as the femme fatale, the sexy agent of entrapment. She's very still, and languid, her voice low and seductive- in contrast to the fast talking dames of the thirties. She wouldn't be released from these roles until the fifties when she began to be cast as suburban housewives. She is one of the first ladies of noir.      

The leads are all great. Duryea is the kind of dangerous, greedy lout that often turns up in film noir, ending any hope of the hero steering back onto the highway. It has the gloomy, fretful atmosphere typical of the genre. It isn't Lang's very best work, but it is very entertaining and a big enough hit for the three stars and the director to re-assemble the following year for Scarlet Street.