The New Pictures

The Saxon Charm (Universal-International) is an adaptation of the novel by Frederic (The Hucksters) Wakeman about the strange character and conduct of a Broadway producer. Eric Busch (John Payne), a writer, hopes that the great Matt Saxon (Robert Montgomery) will produce his play about Moliere. Saxon is ready and eager, but the process is not entirely simple. Saxon is a man of considerable charm, vitality and at least surface ability; but he is also something of a maniac. His mania is to charm, dominate and, if possible, destroy every person who falls within his spell. The little improvements he insists on disembowel Eric's play, and Eric himself is so helpless a victim of the charm that Mrs. Busch (nicely played by Susan Hayward) leaves him.

In his spare time, Saxon borrows the shirt off his writer's back, lies about his mistress (Audrey Totter) to ruin her prospects in Hollywood, pretends to love his ex-wife (Heather Angel) until he finds it unprofitable.

To fully enjoy The Saxon Charm, it would be necessary to believe in the writer as a writer and to be pretty thoroughly taken in by Mr. Saxon's charm. Since Novelist Wakeman is not exactly a dazzling writer himself, he has not created a very interesting one; nor is John Payne equipped by nature to play an author with much plausibility. Since Saxon's conduct, 90% of the time, is about as uncharming as possible, the problem of selling him to an audience ought to be tougher than it turns out to be.

There really are people like Saxon, and Mr. Wakeman has managed to get whiffs of the truth about them into his leading character. What is more important, Bob Montgomery performs wonders with the part. Montgomery is one of the few graceful actors left since the death of Osgood Perkins, and he appears to have wit, experience and charm to burn. This is not one of his better roles, and he successfully gives the illusion of playing it without ever touching the handlebars; but in the midst of a well-tooled piece of emptiness, his is an enchanting performance to watch.

Cry of the City (20th Century-Fox) is one up on most movies in two ways. The screen play, by Richard Murphy, who wrote Boomerang!, is unusually thoughtful and pointed. And the picture is directed by Robert Siodmak, one of those quaint, old-fashioned craftsmen who still believe that a movie should move and be visually interesting.

The story contrasts the characters and careers of a detective and a crook, both born in poor New York Italian families. The detective (Victor Mature) is reasonably intelligent, persistent, brave and ill-paid. The criminal (Richard Conte) is shrewd, unregenerate, reckless, vain, easy with the money and the girls. Conceding that the crook is much the more obviously interesting character, the movie grants him the bulk of its attention. But that is all it grants him. Without ever quite getting mealymouthed, it builds up an honest and impressive case against him.

The detective scoffs at the old society-is-to-blame alibi by reminding the thug that they both started with exactly the same disadvantages. Before the picture is over, the criminal has proved that law-breaking is the least of the things which put him outside the pale. Without ever showing a flicker of remorse, he double-crosses a fellow crook, murders a lawyer (elegantly played by Berry Kroeger), charms a hard spinster nurse (Betty Garde) into criminal complicity, endangers the life of a trusting floozy (Shelley Winters), lands a pathetic doctor (Konstantin Shayne) in trouble with the law, assiduously corrupts his younger brother (Tommy Cook), and does his best to exploit the emotions of the one decent girl (Debra Paget) he has ever known. All this heelish behavior is shown to be worse than mere lawbreaking, and all of it is shown to be part & parcel of a lawbreaker's mentality. The movies seldom attempt so much, and seldom carry it out with such knowing attention to character and detail.

There is hardly a shot in the picture which fails to make the point that a really resourceful director is telling a story with the care and skill it deserves. Scene by scene, and shot by shot, the picture is almost wholly credible and pleasing. It is curious that such good moviemaking does not add up to more. One trouble may be that more talent and solemn care have gone into the show than the basic idea is worth. Also, loving attention to detail may have deprived the picture as a whole of form, drive and pace. It is still superior to the run of movies, which offer nothing much worth looking at and nothing much worth thinking about.

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