Don't forget they remade M

Tonight's entry in TCM's Noir Alley is the 1951 version of M, overnight at 12:45 AM and then tomorrow morning at 10:00 AM. This is more of a heads-up than a full-length review because I've got something else to post about today that's not on DVD (although last I checked this version of M wasn't on DVD either), and because you probably know the story.

David Wayne plays the main character, a man named Martin who has a complusion to kill little girls and take their shoes although, this being a movie under the Production Code, they can't really talk about it being a sexual fetish. Anyhow, the public is terrified, and the police crackdown causes problems for the traditional crime world, so they decide to take matters into their own hands.

I enjoyed this version of M, even if it isn't as good as the Fritz Lang/Peter Lorre version. It would probably have a better reputation if the movie had been an original, but in that case it also probably wouldn't have been made -- the folks in the Code office only passed this one on the grounds that it was a remake of a true classic.

One other thing that will interest many people is the location shooting of places in the Los Angeles area that are no longer there. I'm not a big-city person, but when movies like this use locations in Los Angeles or New York or wherever, I always enjoy the vintage look of the place as it was back then.