Sunday, November 15, 2020

The part of Tony Rome is now being played by... Kirk Douglas

Some time back I bought the Kirk Douglas Centennial Collection box set, and have been going through the films. Another one that I recently watched is A Lovely Way to Die.

Sylva Koscina, one of those European actresses that Hollywood tried to bring over and make stars of, plays Rena Westabrook, the trophy wife of Loren. But it's not necessarily the happiest of marriages, as the two bicker on the way back from the racetrack, and Rena has taken on a boyfriend in the form of Fleming (Kenneth Haigh). The couple gets home after some car problems outside the house of another wealthy man, Finchley, and as Loren decides to go swimming that night, he's shot to death diving off the diving board!

It's fairly obvious from all that's happened to this point in the movie that Rena and Fleming are natural suspects in the killing, with Fleming as the killer and Rena only an accessory since she would have been in the house not where the bullet came from. Lawyer Tennessee Fredericks (Eli Wallach) is hired to defend Rena both on the murder charge and from the inevitable media circus.

It's to that latter end that Tennessee hires Jameson Schuyler (that's Kirk Douglas, not as if you could miss him). Jameson is one of those stereotypical movie characters of the police detective who has unorthodox methods that get him in trouble with the bosses and lead him to leave the force. In this case, Jameson isn't quite hired as a detective so much as a bodyguard from Rena to keep her from getting herself in trouble.

But based on Jameson's previous police work, it's obvious that he's going to do some detective work. Never mind that this gives us more of a movie than if Jameson were just a bodyguard. Jameson goes to the Finchley place, and gets the decided feeling that something odd is going on there. We know in fact that there is, since the producers show it to us. Jameson also finds at a local road house that Rena might just have an alibi, which is that she was at the place, but does she want it known that she was unfaithful to Loren? In any case it's no matter, as the witness gets killed.

Meanwhile, Rena seems to be playing a game of cat-and-mouse with Jameson, who may or may not be falling in love with Rena. In any case, she's certainly not giving anybody any reason to think that she might be not guilty. And it's all getting Tennessee exasperated. Eventually, we get to the trial, and Jameson wants Fleming found guity since that's who he thinks did it. Rena and Fleming are eventually both found not guilty, but that's not the end of the story, as the real killer may still be out there....

As I was watching A Lovely Way to Die, I couldn't help but think of a slightly earlier detective film from the era, Tony Rome. Not that they're particularly close in terms of plot or anything, but more the idea that Kirk Douglas or somebody close to him watched Frank Sinatras in Tony Rome and thought that what Douglas needed was to play a similar sort of detective.

A Lovely Way to Die is lovely to look at, with nice photography, color and sets among the rich set. But I ultimately found it an entirely forgettable movie, as it's of a piece with a bunch of other movies from the era, and Koscina isn't a notably good actress. Everyone goes through the motions and eventually gets to an ending that's satisfying for the right characters, and that's about it.

If you want something undemanding to go with a bowl of popcorn, you could do worse than A Lovely Way to Die. I'm also glad that it's part of a box set, because I wouldn't want to pay standalone prices for it.

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