The Golden Age Of The B-Film Noir- “The Black Glove” (1954)

DVD Review

By Film Editor Emeritus Sam Lowell

The Black Glove, starring Alex Nichol, Hammer Productions, 1954

Recently in a review of the British film Terror Street (distributed in Britain as 36 Hours) I noted that long time readers of this space know, or should be presumed to know, of my long-standing love affair with film noir. I went on to mention my introduction to the classic age of film noir in this country in the age of black and white film in the 1940s and 1950s when I would sneak over to the now long gone and replaced by condos Strand Theater in growing up town North Adamsville and spent a long double feature Saturday afternoon watching some then current production from Hollywood or some throwback from the 1940s which Mister Cadger, the affable owner who would let me sneak in for kid’s ticket prices long after I reached the adult price stage at twelve I think it was, would show in retrospective to cut down on expenses in tough times by avoiding having to pay for first –run movies all the time. I further mentioned that on infrequent occasions would attend a nighttime showing (paying full price after age twelve since parents were presumed to have the money to spring  for full prices) with my parents if my strict Irish Catholic mother (strict on the mortal sin punishment for what turned out to have been minor or venial sins) thought the film passed the Legion of Decency standard that we had to stand up and take a yearly vow to uphold and I could under the plotline without fainting (or getting “aroused” by the fetching femmes).

What I did not mention although long time readers should be aware of this as well was that when I found some run of films that had a similar background I would “run the table” on the efforts. That is the case with a recently obtained cache of British-centered 1950s film noirs put out by the Hammer Production Company as they tried to cash in on the popularity of the genre for the British market (and the relatively cheap price of production in England). Terror Street had been the first review in this series (each DVD by the way contains two films the second Danger On The Wings in that DVD not worthy of review) and the film under review the ominously titled The Black Glove (released in England as Face The Music) the second such effort. On the basis of these three viewings I will have to admit they are clearly B-productions none of them would make anything but a second or third tier rating.         

After all as mentioned before in that first review look what they were up against. For example who could forget up on that big screen for all the candid world to see a sadder but wiser seen it all, heard it all Humphrey Bogart at the end of the Maltese Falcon telling all who would listen that he, he Sam Spade no stranger to the seamy side and cutting corners, had had to send femme fatale Mary Astor his snow white flame over once she spilled too much blood, left a trail of corpses, for the stuff of dreams over some damn bird. Or cleft-chinned barrel-chested Robert Mitchum keeping himself out of trouble in some dink town as a respectable citizen but knowing he was doomed and out of luck for his seedy past taking a few odd bullets from his former femme fatale trigger-happy girlfriend Jane Greer once she knew he had double-crossed her to the coppers in Out Of The Past. Ditto watching the horror on smart guy gangster Eddie Mars face after being outsmarted because he had sent a small time grafter to his doom when prime private detective Phillip Marlowe, spending the whole film trying to do the right thing for an old man with a couple of wild daughters, ordered him out the door to face the rooty-toot-toot of his own gunsels who expected Marlowe to be coming out in The Big Sleep. Those were some of the beautiful and still beautiful classics whose lines you can almost hear anytime you mention the words film noir.

In the old days before I retired I always liked to sketch out a film’s plotline to give the reader the “skinny” on what the action was so that he or she could see where I was leading them. I will continue that old tradition here (as I did with Terror Street and will do in future Hammer Production vehicles to be reviewed over the coming period) to make my point about the lesser production values of the Hammer products. A saving grace of The Black Glove is that the lead guy, the guy whose task it is to solve the mystery of the murder of a London torch-singer whom he barely had known but who had the come hither look that might have played out in pillow talk if she had been not killed with a couple of unexplained slugs is that the “private eye” double-downs as a big time American in London trumpet-player. Yeah, a guy who despite his off-hand detective work is searching for the high white note every jazz guy, hell, maybe everybody involved with music, is looking to corral and sent out into the streets. To make aficionados and amateurs remember his calling card.         

Famous trumpeter James Bradley, known as Brad, played by Alex Nichol, by happenstance hears some torch-singer on his way back to his hotel after a well-received concert in some London large venue. He takes the leap and goes into the place where the music comes from and sees this dishy dame singing torch stuff to beat the band. They meet and between one thing and another they wind up at her apartment although no sexual stuff happened as far as we know. That is when things go awry. That dishy dame torch singer is found dead by gunshot after Brad leaves. Naturally he is the number one suspect for the job, for the frame as could be expected of a guy leaving some dishy dames place late at night and no other candidates for the frame are around. Something about the whole thing didn’t sit right with him once the coppers let him go after they grilled and half-believed his story (although he no-no left his trumpet case in the dishy dames living room). So he began to see if the pieces could be fit together see who put the frame on him and why.         

As expected Brad figures it out. Seems that dishy dame had been part of an up and coming young women trio that never quite got off the ground. Reason, one reason anyway-tangled romances. Tangled romances involving a high-end jazz piano player who really just wanted to play his stuff, another well-known jazz piano player and a record company producer. One way or another they were all involved with that dead dame. Like I said Brad figured it out via his knowledge of music. Figured it out very much like Nick Charles did in The Thin Man series from the 1940s where he brought every possible suspect into a room with coppers at the ready to grab the villain. You know you can never trust a record producer who should have been the prime suspect from minute one. In the end our Brad though gives up the “tec” business and goes back to searching for that high white note every jazz guy is looking for. Better that Terror Street but can’t get pass that Blue Gardenia second tier in the film noir pantheon. Sorry Hammer.