The Blue Dahlia (1946)

What a great name for a noir movie!
Alan Ladd and the above-pictured Veronica Lake are a great line-up!

[I just realized I’ve been conflating Alan Ladd and Audie Murphy.
The are both compact, heroic-type guys who actually were war heroes(true?).
In any event, I like both of them in old movies.]

This movie was tonight’s Noir Alley entree so we get all the Eddie Muller movie trivia before and after.
He tells us that this was a Raymond Chandler screenplay.

He says that Chandler did NOT like Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake in these roles!
Me and Eddie disagree. We think they’re great!

The story

Alan Ladd (Johnny), William Bendix (Buzz) and another guy (George) are fresh out of the Army and get off a bus in downtown LA.

They go direct to a bar (of course), and we immediately know that Buzz has severe post traumatic stress syndrome. The juke box is “jungle music” to him, and jungle music freaks him out. I remember from before, he will do this the whole movie!

The other two are bachelors, but Johnny was married when the Army took him, so he goes straight home to his wife (Helen).

Her place (their place I guess) is a super-cool little hotel of single-unit bungalows. Every unit has their own entrance and their own front porch, but you have to past the front desk to gain entrance!
(unless you have a key to the side door!)

The house detective comes around. He is is slithering creep of a human being. I remember him very well from before.

Ladd’s wife Helen is having a party with about 15 people including the man who is obviously her lover (Eddie). Alan Ladd slugs him, as we would expect a WW2 hero to do!

Something I did NOT remember was that she had told Ladd that their young child that died of diphtheria.
We find that the child actually died in a car crash because she was drunk and drove off the road.

[In my own life, I’ve been researching my real-life older brother that died in the late 40’s, so this resonated with me more profoundly than before maybe…]

Things in the movie get complicated quickly:

• Johnny hasn’t unpacked his bag yet he picks it up and leaves.
  • The part about killing their son is even worse than the infidelity.
  • He pulls his gun but doesn’t shoot her, but for some reason throws it on the chair before leaving. 21:30
  • He also for some reason leaves the notepad with George and Buzz’s # in plain view.
• She calls their number, and bad luck for us all, gets Buzz without George around.
  • We can tell Buzz is stressed because the jungle music sounds start up in his head.
• Buzz goes to her hotel and ends up at the hotel bar with her.
• It’s pouring down rain in LA.
• Eddie Harwood is a big-time guy!
  • He owns a bar called the Blue Dahlia!
    • Even though he’s the bad guy, he has standards.
      • He does NOT like how Helen is treating her husband, so he tries to break up with her.
        • He thinks Ladd is a nice guy!
          Eddie is kind of likeable for a 2 minute stretch here.
    • Helen has something on him and threatens him with it. We don’t know what it is, but he’s not happy.

32 minutes in:

• Veronica Lake is driving (still raining!). Her name in the movie is Joyce. That’s a boring name, so we’re gonna call her VL.
• She picks up a very wet Johnny (Alan Ladd), which is how they meet.
  • Off they go down the highway having snappy noir dialog.
• 34:30 Flash back to Eddie, who is letting himself into Helen’s bungalow
  • the creepy house dick is watching from a wet corner
• Buzz makes it home.
• Eddie leaves Helen’s place.

Johnny skips out on Veronica. They have a pretty deep conversation for a couple of folks that just met. 38:30

How’s this for some dialog:

Finally a body

Meanwhile back at Helen’s bungalow…

• The house cleaner in her maid’s uniform gave me flashbacks to my Mom!
• The look:
  • Forty-something years old,
  • startched uniform,
  • natty little startched hat
  • silvery coiffed hair….

But I digress…

The maid discovers Helen is not simply dead-drunk like usual, but is in fact actually dead!

House dick and manager mess around for a while, finally call the cops.

Meanwhile, back at the beach outside Malibu was, Johnny has spent the night in a hotel. He’s is having breakfast, and up pop’s Veronica!!

She at the hotel last night also! (Because of Johnny? Who knows!)

They have more deep conversation, then decide to take a walk.

In the lobby, Johnny hears the radio …

His wife’s murder is there and a detailed description of his suitcase etc.
The radio is pretty loud, VL can hears it also from the top of the lobby stairs. She sees Johnny take off!

• George and Buzz go to the station … Buzz is belligerent as always.
• Eddie shows up. Calls the house dick “dad” (?)
  • I thought we had a plot twist going, but no, it’s NOT actually his dad, merely post-war slang! 🙂
  • Everybody knows everybody in this little corner of LA.
• Eddie plays cat and mouse with the police detective who seems pretty sharp!
• Johnny is at the bus station and has the interest of a guy played by Frank Faylen, [who will forever be remembered by me for being Dobie Gillis’s dad!]
  • He helps Johnny get a room, then gets arrested before he can shake down Johnny.
• Now we’re back at Eddie’s suite 59:00
  • “Dad” (actual name Morelly) tries to blackmail Eddie.
  • Then VL show up they go round and round. I rather like Eddie, big slease though he apparently is.
• Somehow Johnny is back riding along with Veronica in her sweet little convertible!
• Morelly visits Buzz and G, and rifles Johnny’s room.
  • He is SUCH a sleazy guy. I want a shower just watching him.
• Johnny finds out about Eddie.
  • He visits him and we find that VL is his wife!!
  • The one he’s not with anymore. Oops.
• 1.18 Back with Buzz and George
  • Johnny gets angry at them for hinting that they think he killed Helen.
  • 40’s heroes can overdo the heroic-ness sometimes.
• Johnny gets “pinched” by fake cops
  (sent by Eddie Harwood, who I guess isn’t really a nice guy 🙂
  • Johnny gives ’em a good fight.
  • They break a lot of cheap furniture, but on the third try, the sap puts him down. 🙁
  • Helen had Johnny given a scrap of paper with Eddie’s dirty secret about a murder he commited in his wasted youth.
    • One thug kills the other over it and keeps it.
  • Harwood shows up.
  • Despite being a street-wise guy, he stands right over two men fighting over a gun, and catches a stray bullet. Cheezy screenwriting, IMO.
    • That’s the end of Eddie Harwood.
• So everyone’s favorite bad guy is out of the picture.
• Now we’re back with everybody that’s left.
  • The police, Bud, George and Veronica.
  • The police have Buzz fitted out for Helen’s murder.
  • But Johnny arrives and they figure it all out.

Eddie Muller Postscript

The was a great Eddie Muller bit on the True Story of the ending.

• Raymond Chandler hated the movie.
• He originally had Buzz be the mordered, but the Navy would not permit it to make a service man the bad guy.
• Alan Ladd didn’t like VL since she’s taller than him 🙂