Destiny *** (1944, Gloria Jean, Alan Curtis, Frank Craven, Grace McDonald) – Classic Movie Review 10,862

Director Reginald Le Borg’s 1944 Universal Pictures black and white noir-style crime drama Destiny has a most curious history. It was excised from the final print of another film and then expanded into more than double its original length as an independent feature.

A simple, flashback-told story about an escaped convict, Cliff Banks (Alan Curtis), finding shelter with a blind girl, Jane Broderick (Gloria Jean), and her farmer father, Clem Broderick (Frank Craven), planned as one of four parts of 1943’s fantasy anthology film Flesh and Fantasy, was hived off, expanded by 35 minutes and released as a programmer.

Both the film and the star Gloria Jean are really rather remarkable, especially under the odd circumstances, with the difficulty of matching separate styles and films.

The original footage is directed (uncredited) by Flesh and Fantasy‘s director Julien Duvivier, and the new filming is by Reginald Le Borg.

Also in the cast are Grace McDonald, Vivian Austin, Frank Fenton, Minna Gombell, Selmer Jackson, Lew Wood, Perc Launders, Harry Strang, Lane Chandler, Billy Wayne, Bob Homas, Edgar Dearing, and Dorothy Vaughan.

Destiny is directed by Reginald Le Borg and Julien Duvivier (uncredited), runs 65 minutes, is made and released by Universal Pictures, is written by Roy Chanslor and Ernest Pascal (original screenplay, based on a story idea by Jean Levy-Strauss, is shot in black and white by George Robinson and Paul Ivano, is produced by Howard Benedict (executive producer), Roy William Neill associate producer, Charles Boyer (uncredited) and Julien Duvivier (uncredited), is scored by Frank Skinner and Alexander Tansman, and is designed by John B Goodman, Abraham Grossman and Richard H Riedel.

It is made at Universal Studios, 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, California.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 10,862

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