Lady on a Train (1945)

 

Just for fun since I haven't added much Christmas content this year.

These are my two Letterboxd reviews from this year and last:

Written moments ago:

When Durbin pretends to be a chair under a sheet while eventually securing a pair of bloody shoes (throwing them out a window while avoiding Mr. Saunders (George Coulouris) with his white cat and Saunders' henchman, Danny (Allen Jenkins)) just put a smile on my face. I forgot about this scene from last year. I fell head over heels for Durbin and this noirish murder mystery set during Christmas last December. I was in much better spirits this year than last because my mother had Covid, eventually recovering. Durbin's Nicki Collins just getting further embroiled in a murder mystery involving a family looking to benefit from the death of a magnate doesn't feel as dark and brooding as some of the Warner Bros pictures of the time. It is just hard to believe that in three years time, Durbin would leave film altogether. You'd think she would have been a star for so much longer. I respect her, though, for embracing happiness in a civilian life that encumbering herself into the Hollywood machine unhappily. But I see this incredible performer in "Lady on a Train" and wonder what could have been. I can't blame other companies for trying to lure her back. At the same time, I give props to how she was able to resist and live a long life without feeling the need to reclaim any form of stardom she gave up.

Her "Silent Night" just takes my breath away. And she was such a great comedienne. She had the glamour, star power, charm, expressiveness, charisma, spunk, likability, and way with words and movement. I loved how Durbin bounces off each and every personality in the cast, her character continually digging herself deeper into the Waring mogul murder mystery as a sister and nephews could all be responsible for his death. As a Christmas film, I like the clash of the holiday with noir. I look forward to revisiting "Mr. Soft Touch", which also has that. The mystery writer (David Bruce) pulled into it, ruining his relationship with another woman, and the two brothers played by Duryea and Bellamy (their personalities would seem to indicate who might be guilty and innocent because of the characters they normally play) leaving us to wonder if either is involved adds to quite a number of developments. I love a spirited noir that can be light-hearted and frothy while also containing plenty of danger and intrigue where violence could be imminent.

This is probably for me one of the gems I have discovered thanks to Turner Classics the last two years set at Christmas. NYC during a good snow at times with Durbin caught up in a lot of accumulating convoluted plot gets a big thumbs up from me.

You know I had forgotten just how extensive a scene is at a night club. The bloody shoes sure to implicate a murderer with Saunders and Danny all over the place, not to mention, Nicki and novelist Wayne trying to fend them off, goes on for quite a length of time. Durbin even has like two performances during the entirety of the night club setpiece. Considering all that happens, this would have to be the most significant section of the film. There's even a murder at the end of it.

Added a half a star extra. I just love it. (4.5 / 5 this year)

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Last year's review:

I had zero intentions or plans of watching this during the Christmas season, but it was on and had little touches of the holidays such as the occasional Christmas tree and Deanna Durbin sings "Silent Night" to her father across the phone (and is simply radiant while doing so) so I think it was enough. Anyway, this is a holiday whodunit with lots of red herrings and villainous looking folks possibly responsible for the crowbar murder of a wealthy business tycoon in NYC and Durbin is supposed to be visiting her aunt during Christmas but while on a train, through her window while reading the pulp novel of David Bruce, she sees that tycoon killed. Durbin spends the holidays after that trying to uncover the person responsible, getting Bruce involved (because who could unravel a good murder mystery like a superstar novelist?), imitating a popular club singer (Maria Palmer) who is set to inherit from the murdered man, with his nephews (Ralph Bellamy and Dan Duryea) and sister (Elizabeth Patterson) not particularly happy about getting practically nothing (most just one dollar). The owner of the club that Palmer performs (Coulouris, complete with a cat he pets!) and a gunman hood (Allen Jenkins) also have a vested interest in the murder and its investigation. Well, they all want the dead man's money, of course.

Durbin, for me, is an absolute delight. She's so much fun to watch on screen. What a charming personality. I completely understand why she was such a star for Universal and such a loss to the film industry when she left it so early in her life (just 27 years old!), fleeing to France with the director of "Lady on a Train" never to return. She really stirs the pot in this film, as all the principles involved in the murder (or knew the guy as family or personally) eventually gun for her because of a pair of bloody slippers. The blood on those slippers could nail the person responsible.

The great opener with Durbin looking out her window as her train stops, seeing the back of the killer, the shade pulled down, and the silhouette of the crowbar kill visual, really pulls us in. It's the carrot needed. Of course, Durbin then dives right in headfirst, whether or not it was the brightest idea once the police dismissed her claims as an overactive imagination after reading a murder novel. Her willingness to take on the persona of the singer, as those close to the victim begin to encircle her, Durbin could very well get in a lot of hot water.

While I can't say this was necessarily a big Christmas-flavored film, it did have enough, I guess, to satisfy the requirements. Durbin makes fun of the desk sergeant's funky little tree that is so puny it can't hold very many tiny ornaments, and Bruce's swanky apartment has a big tree. The film, though, is more about night clubs, posh apartments, mansions, and well dressed, well groomed society folks in a murder cover-up. Eventually Durbin is fleeing Duryea (who she is convinced shot, crowbarred, and strangled three of the principles of the dead man conspiracy) in a grain warehouse, with Bellamy, I believe, admitting to Durbin that Patterson incestuously molested him! Patterson, according to Bellamy, likes him "very much" and came to him when he was young and...

Durbin is a gutsy, brave (or is it nuts?), frothy, witty San Francisco "debutante" (I believe this was used to describe Tippi Hedren in "The Birds"), always weaving in and out of danger, finding ways to slip out of situations when it looks like she's toast. She's got so much personality to spare. I thought that was important, because this goes a bit long and she's thrown in a lot of entanglements, so Durbin remaining watchable is a must. And not just her...Duryea was always suspect, even if he is innocent (a nice swerve), Bellamy seems on the level (which is a perfect twist, particularly since his kind face revealing horror has impact), and Bruce as the handsome mustachioed novelist pulled into Durbin's mess is a hilarious foil. Great cast. Got to mention Edward Everett Horton as Durbin's worrying, dizzied "wrangler" who can never keep up with her, always losing her, taking a few socks to the head during the film...he is such a victim, haha.

I had a lot of fun with this. It was probably the most pleasant surprise of the Christmas season. (4/5 last year's rating).