I Wake Up Screaming

They've got more wolves in New York than they've got in Siberia. I Wake Up Screaming is one of the early entries in the film noir cycle that lays down noirish detective conventions. The kicker is similar to that of "Stranger On The Third Floor (1940)", that of the chief suspect turning detective to try and prove innocence. Directed by Fox contract director H. Bruce Humberstone, the screenplay is by Dwight Taylor who adapts from Steve Fisher's novel of the same name. It stars Betty Grable (excellent in a rare dramatic role), Victor Mature, Carole Landis, Laird Cregar, William Gargan & Elisha Cook Jr. Picture is filmed as if in New York City, but although it's actually listed as the real location on other sources, it's more than likely just expert set construction. Edward Cronjager (Canyon Passage/Desert Fury) takes up cinematography duties. The plot centers around cocky promoter Frankie "Botticelli" Christopher (Mature) who is accused of the murder of Vicky Lynn (Landis), a young actress he "discovered" as a waitress while out with his friends. Teaming up with Vicky's level headed sister Jill (Grable), Frankie finds the heat is on and it's getting hotter as the police, led by brooding heavy Ed Cornell (Cregar), are determined to put him in the electric chair, or "Hot Spot" (the film's original working title and a title held for the UK release of the film). Told in alternating flashbacks, nothing is ever quite what it seems, so with dark motives looming and deep suspicion enveloping our protagonists, the question is, just who will wake up screaming?. It starts out rather briskly, jaunty music opens the piece up and one gets the feeling that this is very much going to be a standard Betty Grable picture. In fact when you consider that snatches of "Over The Rainbow" are used at frequent points in the movie, the makers have to be applauded for ultimately achieving the murky end product that "I Wake Up Screaming" becomes. There's very little "light" in the piece, what bright scenes there are serve as snippets of hope for our intrepid detectives, but outside of that it's deep shadows & dark interiors, perfectly given the high contrast treatment by the talented Cronjager. This is very much Cregar's movie. A fine character actor before his sad and premature death, he had a hulking presence that dominated film if given the material to work with. Here he gets a role to really unnerve the audience with. For although the character is watered down from the source novel, his Ed Cornell (apparently based on pulp novelist Cornell Woolrich) is creepy yet oddly garners sympathy too. Most of the best scenes involve the big man, I mean not many actors could dwarf Mature the way that Cregar does here, but the film is all the better for it as the characters personas are unfolded in front of the audience. It helps of course that Humberstone & Cronjager get the best out of Cregar's shiftiness, semi-cloaking his face with window blind shadows or using his body shadow to act as another character bearing down on the latest person to be on the receiving end of his penetrative questions. While one sequence as Frankie sweatily wakes from a feverish nightmare will linger in the conscious as much as Cregar effectively lingers in the movie. With devilish twists and turns and a genuinely hard to figure out "who done it" structure, "I Wake Up Screaming" is very much an essential movie for the Noir/Crime movie fan. And of course for those wishing to see just why Laird Cregar was so highly regarded. 8/10