Ted de Corsia

The Lady from Shanghai

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Michael and Elsa in the hall of mirrors

Early on in The Lady from Shanghai there’s a key piece of dialogue explaining the title. Orson Welles’s Michael O’Hara, an Irish sailor between jobs, meets a woman (Rita Hayworth, Welles’s wife at the time) in New York. Michael is on foot, Elsa is in a horse-drawn carriage taking a turn around Central Park. In clear “I am hitting on you” dialogue, he charms her with stories about all the wickedest places in the world he’s been to. The Far East is high on the list, with Macau and Shanghai among the places mentioned. Elsa’s been to both those cities and a few more on his list besides. Gambling? he offers. Kind of, … Read more

Crime Wave

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Sterling Hayde as Detective Sims

A heist-gone-wrong movie that actually starts with a heist going wrong, 1953’s Crime Wave (aka The City Is Dark) is a B movie and so doesn’t have time to hang around. It’s got an absolutely classic setup – within a couple of minutes of opening a cop is dead, one of the bad guys is wounded with an urgent need of medical attention and the heisters are on the run with the cops on their tail. Meanwhile, across town another classic ingredient, the ex-con who’s trying to go straight but who will be dragged back towards crime, first by the wounded man arriving at his door, then by the bent doctor who arrives … Read more