The Prowler (1951)

[David]

As harsh and gut-wrenching as it is bold and satisfying - Joseph Losey's Bourgeois noir 'The Prowler' lingers long in the memory - and remains one of the genre's most emotionally powerful installments.

When officer Webb Garwood (Van Heflin) investigates a wee-hours peeping-Tom call with his veteran partner Bud (John Maxwell), he finds himself drawn to the victim - attractive and vulnerable housewife Susan Gilvray (Evelyn Keyes). Dutiful and quietly desperate, Mrs. Gilvray spends evenings listening to her DJ husband John's late-night radio show - which he ends every night by cooing "I'll be seeing you Susan...”

Though no clues are found, she seems relieved and sees the men off – but Webb returns after his shift under the premise that he's "following up". Signals are sent, misread, rejected, and returned - and soon the uncouth cop has insinuated himself into her sad little life - the groundwork laid when they determine that they hail from the same state. An affair begins - and with Webb's virile presence and attentiveness Susan temporarily forgets her passionless, childless marriage. But unbeknownst to her, Webb's motives aren't pure - as he deftly manipulates her emotions by pretending to break things off - drawing his fragile lover and her husband's insurance policy ever-closer. The way Webb sees it - life owes him. This was its chance to make good.

Wanting to amp-up the relationship - and his socioeconomic status – Webb takes things to the next level by staging a fake late-night burglary at Casa de Gilvray. Drawing an armed John out - Webb shoots him dead – then wings himself to make it look like a tragic exchange between two men deceived by darkness. Susan, kept oblivious of the scheme, reacts with understandable suspicion when she finds Webb on the lawn - John splayed at his feet.

When asked at the subsequent inquest if she's familiar with the officer in question, Susan lies and answers no - but the event has rocked her and she severs ties with him. Attempting a reconciliation - he offers her his paltry life savings through her easy-going brother William (Emerson Treacy). The gesture, and some world-class lying do the trick - the two get together, tie the knot, and as newlyweds begin their new life as motor lodge managers in Vegas - the life Webb has longed dreamed of.

Before long, Susan announces that she's four months pregnant - which would mean having known Webb in the biblical sense before their marriage - the fact that John was sterile not helping their case. Fearing he'll be charged with murder, Webb talks Susan into having the baby at a dilapidated shelter out in a desert ghost-town. There, while happily awaiting the arrival and listening to records outside, they accidentally hear a recording of John's DJ show - the ghostly voice echoing across the landscape - seemingly from beyond - shattering their morale.


Pregnancy complications arise - and when Susan watches Webb race into town to find a doctor, she suspects Webb will silence him following the treatment - having discovered that her ex-cop brought his revolver on the trip. A baby girl is born - and with Susan's warning rushed by the doctor back to town and away from Webb who before chasing him hastily explains to Susan that he did whatever he did for her. Backtracking from the police, and Bud and his wife who are all converging on the windswept hideaway - Webb exits his car and scrambles up a dune where he's shot in the back - and killed.

Webb Garwood's Norman Rockwell knock-off is painted with blood - but being a sociopath it's not likely to keep him up at night. As portrayed by Oscar-winner Van Heflin in a nuanced, restrained performance that never evolves into a moustache-twirling stereotype - the character is a blue-collar furnace - seething with resentment, and primed to balance the scales by any means necessary. Unfortunately for him his lunge at middle-class respectability lands him face-first in a pile of rocky earth.

Losey, fond of highlighting class differences and sexual power-plays throughout his career ('The Lawless', 'The Servant') blended, with uncredited screenwriter Dalton Trumbo - those themes, with traditional noir motifs to create a particularly mournful effort - which succeeds on all levels.

Thanks a million to ChiBob who rocketed a DVD-r of 'The Prowler' to me upon learning that my copy was on its last legs. Thanks Bob!

David

[JohnChard]

Thanks for the great read, Dave. One of my personal favourites, I`ll just add my own review to run concurrent with your own and hope more will seek out this great film.

Edgy noir piece in desperate need of a wider audience.

Van Heflin plays Webb Garwood, a grumpy and unhappy cop who is called to investigate a suspected prowler at the home of Susan Gilvray (Evelyn Keyes). Garwood is smitten with the young and attractive woman from the off, and sensing her marriage to a late night radio personality is far from happy, he sets about wooing her, obsessively. It's the start of a coupling that is going to travel down a particularly dark road.

The film opens quite brilliantly with a quick shift of tone, Susan Gilvary is pampering herself in her bathroom, we see her from the window, domestic contentedness. This shot is accompanied by jaunty and jolly music, but then in the blink of an eye, she spies something out the window {it's us you know}, a scream, the music becomes troubled and she draws the blind. Welcome to Joseph Losey's creepy skin itcher, The Prowler.

Very much a two character piece, The Prowler flips the favoured femme fatale formula around to great effect. Here it's the male protagonist that is the seducer, a cop no less, the abuse of power hanging heavy over proceedings like, yes, some "prowler" lurking in your back garden. It's made clear to us very early on that Garwood is troubled, he's up to no good, with a snarl here and a shifty smirk there, we just know that poor Susan is under threat from a man meant to protect her. Yet in a perverse piece of writing, Garwood surely does love Susan, but the bile within and the skew whiff way he now views the world-and his place within it, has ultimately made him a most dangerous anti-hero. It's evident that the makers here are wryly observing, but without preaching about, the shady underbelly of the American dream, the social differences of the two characters a most intriguing aspect of the story. As is the shift from the affluent setting of the Gilvray home in the first half of the piece, to the finale played out amongst the ghost towns in the Mojave Desert. The desolation of the landscape has rarely been so apt in a noirish world.

Technically The Prowler boasts high quality. Losey's direction is tight and holds the viewer in a vice like grip, while the art direction from Boris Leven is superb, particularly in that first quarter as the bright Gilvray house is cloaked in sparse darkness. But it's with Heflin, and to a lesser extent, Keyes, that the film reaches its high points. Keyes' character frustrates immensely, her decision making annoys and her surrender to Garwood is at first hard to swallow. But this is a testament to the good work that Keyes does, that she can induce these feelings for the character is surely a job well done. Heflin, tho, is a different kettle of fish. A criminally undervalued actor in his generation, Heflin serves notice here that he could play a bad guy convincingly, almost terrifyingly so too. His shift from meek, almost puppy dog love yearner, to conniving bastard is handled adroitly and gives film noir one of its best homme fatales.

Back on release big hitting critics such as Manny Farber and Wallace Markfield unreservedly praised the film. While pulp writer supreme James Ellroy is quoted as saying it was one of his favourite film's. So it's somewhat surprising that it took until late 2010 to receive a DVD release, that, much like the machinations of Webb Garwood, is very much a crime. Moody, bleak and corrosive in its telling, this is a must see for noir and Heflin purists. 9/10

[MartinTeller]

I don't know why I didn't get as much out of this as everyone else seems to...

(review from 2/20/11)

I might have gotten my hopes up too high for this one. TSPDT give it "Highly Recommended" status, and there's glowing quotes on the DVD case. For me, it didn't live up to these accolades. Van Heflin and Evelyn Keyes are both fine, although I'm still not terribly impressed with either. The story does have a subversive edge to it, but it's really not that edgy. Miller is not a noir cinematographer, and only a few shots are interesting. But the main issue is that it's kinda slow. Not painfully so, but it definitely is a bit sluggish. I did like how the film went in a couple of different directions that I didn't expect, and overall my complaints are fairly minor. I always find movies about abuse of power fairly interesting. But it isn't the masterpiece I was led to believe it is. Rating: 7