MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

A WWII veteran's peaceful life is shattered by haunting memories of the past when one of his former comrades suddenly arrives in town with murderous intentions. The drama unfolds in Act of Violence (Van Heflin. 1948/82 min.). Up next, a Boston detective traces a murder case to an innocent man, while the victim's landlord blackmails the real killer. It's a tangled web of suspicion in Mystery Street (Ricardo Montalban. 1950/93 min.). B&w/NR.

DVD FEATURES:

• Region: 1
• Number of Discs: 1
• Audio: Dolby Digital Mono
• Screen: Black and White
• Features:
  • Film historian commentaries by Dr. Drew Casper on Act of Violence and Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward on Mystery Street
  • New featurettes Act of Violence: Dealing With the Devil and Mystery Street: Murder at Harvard
  • Theatrical trailers
  • Subtitles: Francais (main features. bonus material/trailers may not be subtitled)

AWARDS

• Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

•     Nominated Best Story - 1950 (Leonard Spigelgass)

• Telluride Film Festival

•     Film Presented - 1984

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

• Cast:

  
       Ricardo Montalban - Lt. Peter Morales
       Robert Ryan - Joe Parkson
       Bruce Bennett - Dr. McAdoo
       Elsa Lanchester - Mrs. Smerrling
       Marshall Thompson - Henry Shanway
       Berry Kroeger - Johnny
       Edmon Ryan - James Joshua Harkley
       Betsy Blair - Jackie Elcott
       Wally Maher - Tim Sharkey
       Ralph Dumke - Tattooist, Jim Black
       Willard Waterman - Mortician
       Walter Burke - Ornithologist
       Don Shelton - District Attorney
       Allen O'Locklin - Photographer

• Director:

  Fred Zinnemann, John Sturges

• Producer:

  William H. Wright

• Screenwriter:

  Robert L. Richards

• Screen Story:

  Collier Young

• Screenwriter:

  Sydney Boehm, Richard Brooks, Leonard Spigelgass

• Cinematographer:

  Robert Surtees, John Alton

• Composer (Music Score):

  Bronislau Kaper, Rudolph G. Kopp

• Editor:

  Conrad A. Nervig, Ferris Webster

• Production Designer:

  Katha Seidman

• Art Director:

  Cedric Gibbons, Hans Peters, Gabriel Scognamillo

• Set Designer:

  Henry W. Grace, Edwin B. Willis, Ralph S. Hurst

• Costume Designer:

  Helen Rose

• Sound/Sound Designer:

  Douglas Shearer

• Makeup:

  Jack Dawn

REVIEWS:

• Arguably Zinnemann's most underrated film, this harrowing noir is a vivid evocation of survivor's guilt directed by a man who had lost much of his family in the death camps. Unlike most noirs, which open with its protagonists in desperate straits, the film derives much of its power from the contractor's gradual descent from a seemingly normal life into a perverse nightmare realm. While the highly improbable plot is a bit baroque for straight drama, and the character of Joe is less a human being than a projection of Frank's guilty conscience, the elements still mesh beautifully in the service of the film's tough-talking expressionism. In one unforgettably corrosive and spectacularly photographed sequence, Frank careens wildly through downtown L.A., ending up in a dive where he finds himself taking advice from a well-worn hooker (Mary Astor) and her hitman friend (Berry Kroeger). Heflin mixes fear, confusion, and desperation in a typically multi-layered performance, and Ryan is disturbing as the obsessive, embittered cripple, but it's Astor's rock-hard yet bizarrely compassionate prostitute than lingers in the mind. Even better is the rich chiaroscuro of Robert Surtees' camera work, in which shadows slice bodies and cover faces until, like the contractor, we no longer have the vaguest idea where we are. ~ Michael Costello, Rovi
• John Sturges's Mystery Street may not have been the first movie to delve into forensic pathology, but it was the first Hollywood film to use it as the basis for a crime story set in postwar America. In that sense, it's the not-too-distant forerunner to CSI, CSI: Miami, Cold Case Files, Quincy, M.E., etc., and on that level alone should appeal to modern audiences. But it's also got a topical element that's just as relevant in 2006 as it was in 1950 -- the character of Lt. Morales, as portrayed by Ricardo Montalban, runs into some not-so-subtle prejudice over his accent and the fact that he wasn't necessarily born in the United States; it gets especially vicious when he's dealing with Harkley (Edmon Ryan), an upper-crust potential suspect from Boston's old-money society. And in addition to that element of the plot, there's an entirely separate and equally appealing aspect to the movie in Elsa Lanchester's portrayal of Mrs. Smerrling; a twitchy, neurotic, grasping woman, she's one of the nuttiest roles ever essayed by Lanchester, and she almost steals the movie, as a soft-spoken loony who can't resist thrusting herself into the life (or death) of one of her tenants. Add to that the superb photography by John Alton (including lots of location shooting) and a fine score, plus a brace of excellent supporting performances (especially by Marshall Thompson and Sally Forrest as a couple victimized by circumstance), and the movie is an enduring winner of a thriller -- in 1950 and well into the 21st century. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi