The title, "Backfire," adumbrates the quality of the film. It's one of those generic titles that could mean anything. You know the type -- "Another Dawn," "Guns of Darkness," "Whirpool," "Danger Signal," "Fatal Bliss," "Lethal Panties: The True Story of the Victoria's Secret Murders". The movie is a talky, rather dull murder mystery about Gordon MacRae, who's been undergoing surgery for a couple of years in a VA hospital in Los Angeles, trying to clear his buddy, Edmond O'Brien, of a murder charge.
It has an interesting cast -- Virginia Mayo, Ed Begley, Dane Clark, Viveca Linfors, and even John Dehner and John Ridgeley in small parts. The latter has only one or two lines. Caramba, he was a Warners stalwart during the war years, and here, with that mustache, he looks like an aged John Dillinger.
But this is no film noir, unless we want to invent a new definition for the term. There is no femme fatale, no expressionistic photography, no evocative sets, no atmosphere of resigned despair. What it is, is a B murder mystery. Dump the post-war background, change the casting, and you've got a cheap thriller from the 1930s. Not Charlie Chan, maybe, but Boston Blackie or Dick Tracy.
I was able to spot the mysterious villain shortly after he appeared, not because of an excess of ESP but because of the Inviolable Law of Excess Characters. The director keeps the murder's face hidden during his rare appearance so we know immediately that he's someone we've already met. And which character have we met that uses a well-known performer but seems to have nothing much to contribute to the narrative so far? In any case the structure is clumsy. There's a good deal of talk about money in the movie -- did Edmond O'Brien make off with someone's stash? -- but it's all a red herring.
The performances are all professional except Viveca Lindfors. She's beautiful in a darkly Scandinavian way but her acting is wincingly stilted. Some ten years later she was to have a few small roles in which age had wrecked her good looks and she was immeasurably better.
It has an interesting cast -- Virginia Mayo, Ed Begley, Dane Clark, Viveca Linfors, and even John Dehner and John Ridgeley in small parts. The latter has only one or two lines. Caramba, he was a Warners stalwart during the war years, and here, with that mustache, he looks like an aged John Dillinger.
But this is no film noir, unless we want to invent a new definition for the term. There is no femme fatale, no expressionistic photography, no evocative sets, no atmosphere of resigned despair. What it is, is a B murder mystery. Dump the post-war background, change the casting, and you've got a cheap thriller from the 1930s. Not Charlie Chan, maybe, but Boston Blackie or Dick Tracy.
I was able to spot the mysterious villain shortly after he appeared, not because of an excess of ESP but because of the Inviolable Law of Excess Characters. The director keeps the murder's face hidden during his rare appearance so we know immediately that he's someone we've already met. And which character have we met that uses a well-known performer but seems to have nothing much to contribute to the narrative so far? In any case the structure is clumsy. There's a good deal of talk about money in the movie -- did Edmond O'Brien make off with someone's stash? -- but it's all a red herring.
The performances are all professional except Viveca Lindfors. She's beautiful in a darkly Scandinavian way but her acting is wincingly stilted. Some ten years later she was to have a few small roles in which age had wrecked her good looks and she was immeasurably better.