Fallen Angel **** (1945, Alice Faye, Dana Andrews, Linda Darnell, Charles Bickford, Anne Revere, Bruce Cabot, John Carradine) – Classic Movie Review 4,687

Otto Preminger’s stylish and intriguing 1945 film noir thriller Fallen Angel stars Alice Faye, Dana Andrews and Linda Darnell.

Producer-director Otto Preminger’s stylish and intriguing 1945 film noir thriller Fallen Angel stars Dana Andrews as slick, down-on-his-luck con man drifter Eric Stanton, who weds a rich, shy woman called June Mills (Alice Faye) for her fortune. He plans to divorce her quickly and marry a beautiful waitress named Stella (Linda Darnell), whom he has met in a small-town diner called Pop’s Eats.

[Spoiler alert] But then Andrews is the prime murder suspect when Darnell is mysteriously killed. However, he sets about to investigate the murder with the support of Faye, who still loves him after learning about his crooked plot.

Fallen Angel (1945, Alice Faye, Charles Bickford).

Written by Harry Kleiner, the movie is based on the novel by Marty [Mary] Holland, who also wrote the story adapted as The File on Thelma Jordon (1949). It offers a vivid and compelling plot, realized by a strong, hardworking cast, also including Charles Bickford as Mark Judd, Anne Revere as Clara Mills, Bruce Cabot as Dave Atkins, John Carradine as Professor Madley, Percy Kilbride as diner owner Pop, Olin Howlin, Hal Taliaferro, Mira McKinney, Jimmy Conlin, Gus Glassmire, and Leila McIntyre.

Preminger’s excellent movie is an ideal project for him in a follow-up to his hit Laura, (also with Andrews), as the adverts reminded audiences: ‘The creator of “Laura” does it again!’ .

The film also offers an effective and unusual star role for top-billed Faye, who was trying to escape typecasting in period musicals: ‘I was tired of being a Technicolor blonde in musicals that didn’t even pretend to have a plot.’ After rejecting many scripts, she was delighted to receive the one for Fallen Angel and excited to begin work on the film.

However, she retired thereafter (at 33) after a row with the film’s executive producer Darryl F Zanuck, the powerful boss of 20th Century Fox, who was insisting on putting her in musicals. When she attended a screening of the final cut of the film, she found her recording of the theme song ‘Slowly’ was cut, along with a good portion of her scenes. She wrote an angry letter Zanuck and abandoned her new contract. She did not make another film until State Fair (1962).

Zanuck had edited the film to showcase Linda Darnell and minimise Faye’s role. He was building Darnell into one of 20th Century Fox’s top actress, with success as a femme fatale. Preminger said she had ‘a rather colourless personality’ and she disliked working with him, but they worked four more times together.

Zanuck and Preminger asked Dana Andrews to star after his success in Preminger’s Laura but he didn’t want to do it: ‘I don’t like the part,’ he told Preminger. ‘I don’t like the picture, it’s terrible. It’s in bad taste, it’s unbelievable. I just can’t see it at all.’ He was then threatened with suspension by Zanuck and caved in. It’s a slight understatement that Mr Zanuck doesn’t come across as a very nice person in these stories.

Fallen Angel runs 97 minutes, is shot in black and white by cinematographer Joseph LaShelle (who also worked with Preminger on Laura and The Fan), is scored by David Raksin, and is designed by Lyle R Wheeler and Leland Fuller.

Release date: December 14, 1945.

Location filming took place in Orange, California, San Francisco, the Ocean Park Bowling Center in Ocean Park, California, the California Bank in Hollywood, and the Sycamore Pier in Malibu.

Marty Holland (born Mary Hauenstein, 1919 – 1971) wrote several short stories for pulp magazines, and had her 1945 first novel, Fallen Angel, immediately adapted into the 1945 film. Her 1946 second novel, The Glass Heart, was optioned by RKO but never filmed. The File on Thelma Jordon (1950) was adapted by Ketti Frings from an unpublished story by Holland.

© Derek Winnert 2013 Classic Movie Review 4,687

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