The Stranger/ Cause For Alarm (Roan Group Film Noir 1)

 

The Stranger           Picture: B-     Sound: C+     Extras: D     Film: A-

Cause For Alarm     Picture: B-     Sound: C+     Extras: D      Film: B

 

 

The Stranger (B&W, 1946) was directed by the enigmatic filmmaker Orson Welles.  It is one of those films that gets better the second time around.  Orson has a way of making subtle elements fit neatly and precisely into whatever the story is portraying.  It's Hitchcockian with the use of shadows and gunplay, though Welles had founded Film Noir and both he and Hitchcock were influenced by silent German Expressionist cinema.  In addition, you feel as if you are watching a Humphrey Bogart film without the aforementioned actor being in the picture.  The one thing that is expected is the use of (ahead of it's time) camerawork.  The way there is no edit between close-up shots following the action across a street or a park and the slow upper to lower pans.  It raises the cinematography to a whole new level.  The only downside I felt was the film score.  I thought it was weak and added no drama to the story.  It more or less detracted rather than added to the movie.  The acting was great, though.  This is a must for a Film Noir fan.  It was also fun to see Edward G. Robinson play something other than the gangster bad guy.

 

Getting back to the subtle elements of the film.  There were a couple of things I missed the first time I watched it.  The Nazi Orson Welles is playing is obsessed with clocks.  I thought it was a basic plot/character device, but I realized later this added to the depth of the psyche of the character in that he realizes as time marches on, the closer it gets for him to have to pay for his dark past.  It's just a matter of time and subconsciously he knows that.  Additionally, there is a dog shown snooping around the park near where a dead body is lying and you can see that this is an allegory to the detective tracking down the criminal.  The shadows also give some additional tension to the unfolding story and suspense.  The ending was well done, as was the entire movie.  Highly recommended.

 

The standard 1.33 X 1 image is pretty good, great detail in picture including:  leaves, water, suits, it was transferred well and the source material is culled from a 95 minutes long international version.  The odd thing is the audio is in Dolby Digital 1.0 Mono instead of 2.0; all the other discs from Roan haven't been this way, with 1.0 for the earlier issues.  It didn't seem to take away from the clarity or amount of data passed.  I was getting the same standard 192 kbps.  The video was averaging 4.5 mpbs of picture information.  The audio and video were at a high standard on this one.

 

Cause For Alarm (B&W, 1951) was basically a Loretta Young vehicle at a time when her popularity was high with the movie-going public.  It is a simple story involving a husband sick in bed with a wife trying hard to be supportive even though Barry Sullivan's character is being mentally abusive to her.  To me it's a mediocre film but is great for those who like Loretta Young in her heyday.  The MacGuffin is a letter sent describing various made-up misdeeds done by the wife that is sent by the husband through his wife's unknowing hands.  I thought it was a bit tedious but had a good plot twist.  I thought they could have done more with it, though.  Director Tay Garnet's better film is The Postman Always Rings Twice.  With that he had a better plot to work with and a bigger story.

 

The 1.33 X 1 image is really good for the age of the transfer, especially the neighborhood shots and the close-ups.  The audio was clear and projected well.  The transfer was good and the original elements used must have been in good shape.  The audio is Dolby Digital 1.0 mono at a rate of 192 kbps, which is the same as in The Stranger.  The picture information came in at 6 mbps.

 

 

-   Marcus Mazur