Fallen Angel (1945)

Fresh off his success with 1944’s Laura and a newly mended relationship with Fox Studio Head Daryl F. Zanuck, producer/director Otto Preminger decided to slip further into the darkness of film noir with his next project, 1945s Fallen Angel - a harder, more fatalistic vision of contemporary American mores.

Zanuck allowed the director more leeway in assembling cast and crew. Preminger was more than willing to accept the rare freedom and quickly, with the obvious comfort of familiarity in mind, set out to reassemble his Laura production crew. Back on the set were Director of Photography Joseph LaShelle, Art Directors Lyle Wheeler and Leland Fuller and Composer David Raksin, whose theme for Laura had become a phenomenal hit. He penned a ditty for this film called Slowly, banking on similar crossover success. While the song is cinematically effective, it failed to perform up to the previous theme’s standards.  

For the source material, Preminger chose a pulp crime novel from author Marty Holland (actually Mary Holland). Ms. Holland’s personal life remains as mysterious as the themes she would use in her three novels. She quite literally disappeared after completing her final work, The Darling of Paris in 1949 and little is known about what happened to her. The only inkling that she was still alive came in 1973 when the copyright for her novel Fallen Angel was renewed with The Library of Congress. 

To adapt the book, Preminger chose the unknown Harry Kleiner, a former student of his in New York. The director had admired his work in the theater and his faith in the gifted young man was well founded. Kleiner not only delivered a tight script in his first endeavor but was to have a long and respected career that spanned over forty years in Hollywood penning the likes of 1954s Carmen Jones, Sam Fuller’s House of Bamboo in 1955, 1966s Fantastic Voyage, 1968s Bullitt and Extreme Prejudice in 1987.      

Dana Andrews would return from the cast of Laura to play the anti-hero Eric Stanton. To balance the dark and light sides of Stanton’s soul would be the female leads, Linda Darnell and Alice Faye. Andrews had become a star with his turn as Mark McPherson in Laura and his subtle acting and chiseled looks blended well with Preminger’s unique style. No one ever looked better in a fedora. The two would end up working together five times and became off screen chums as well.

Linda Darnell had become Fox’s sultry sex goddess and Zanuck was looking to make her a major star. She had small turns in 1940s Mark of Zorro and 1941s Blood and Sand (she had been working since her teens) but it was not until she came under Preminger’s wing in the late ‘40s (her best work) that she began to emerge as an actress. Her career floundered in the ‘50s and she never attained the stardom for which she seemed destined. Rocky marriages and a thirst for liquor did not help matters and she died tragically in a house fire in 1965 ironically while watching one of her old movies on television.

For Alice Faye, longtime Fox musical icon (a huge star in the ‘30s), Fallen Angel represented a comeback role of sorts. She had taken a leave of absence for childbirth and Zanuck eagerly wanted her to return to work. She was given the choice of 36 scripts and decided upon Harry Kleiner’s. Unlike the fluff of her early musicals (Betty Grable had stolen her thunder during the war years) she would play a dramatic lead in this dark film to expand her range and reclaim her box office prowess. It sounded good in theory and her performance is admirable but she was angered by the film’s final edit and blamed Preminger and Zanuck for minimizing her screen time and cutting what she felt were some of her better scenes. It was true. Zanuck and Preminger had banked on the sensual appeal of Darnell and increased her role to boost the film’s more tawdry aspects. It was a wise move. It unfortunately had the undesired effect of causing Faye to dismiss Hollywood for the remainder of her life. She worked in film only twice more, 1962s State Fair and 1978s The Magic of Lassie.

The tone for the film is set in the opening credit sequence. A subjective camera barrels us down a highway as David Raksin’s bustling score, rolling white lines and the film’s credits on road signs signify that this film will be a study of transience and impermanency. While many themes and styles remain similar, Preminger’s Fallen Angel marks a break with Laura in that the director would never be so delicate and mannered with his noir films again. It takes us out of the high rises of New York and into a bus seat dragging our unwilling protagonist to a lousy, dead end beach town in the middle of an unglamorous California. Stanton (Dana Andrews) was a successful press agent in N.Y. He now doesn’t have enough bus fare to get to San Francisco. He’s unceremoniously dumped off in the small community of Walton. Here, the excitement swells around a hole named Pop’s Diner where Pop (Percy Kilbride, later to be Pa Kettle) and his unrequited love, Stella (Linda Darnell), work in ennui and occasional sparks of regret (he is many years her senior). There’s also a nosy, retired cop (a menacing turn by Charles Bickford) who does little but sip coffee, stare at Stella and quietly wait.

Stella is a sleazy, used piece of cheap trash (in a good way) who has been around the block of Walton so many times she’s worn footprints in the sidewalk. After so much heartache and loss, she’s simply looking for a man to make an honest woman of her.

She wants a house and family. She’s a good sort, if dishonesty, mistrust, greed and selfishness don’t count.

Stanton takes an immediate lustful interest in her. His huckster ways return seamlessly (he was a successful publicist after all). He cons his way into the graces of another fraud, Professor Madley (John Carradine) and becomes promoter for the traveling soothsayer’s local show in Walton. The Professor likes Stanton’s style and is so pleased with the promotion of his “spook act” that he invites him back to his hotel room to meet, “a fine collection of spirits… Scotch ancestry”.

The show may be in trouble however. The town’s established matriarchs, Clara (Anne Revere in a small, strong performance) and June Mills (Alice Faye), the spinster daughters of the town’s deceased and still beloved mayor, have not given their approval. It’s that small of a town. Stanton goes over to woo them with free tickets and is successful in large part due to June’s enthusiasm (she is desperate to blossom). Her naiveté and trustful nature, coupled with a cherubic honesty (she is often lighted in an ethereal glow, her hair and hats designed for a halo effect) and belief in the goodness of Stanton will play havoc with much of his plans.

The grift is on. The Professor’s assistant has dug up some financial dirt on the two sisters and it is aired at the show. They storm out. The damage has been done. Stanton hears of $25,000 the sisters have in a San Francisco bank and begins to formulate a plan to get the money and convince Stella to marry him once he’s finagled it. Stella, being an all around sucker for love, agrees. And there is our unholy bond between shady protagonist and femme fatale, a film noir staple played with great effect here.

Stanton’s plan is to marry June, swindle her money and leave town with Stella.

He must be quick however. He is penniless and obviously a bit randy. He turned down an opportunity to travel with the Professor (fateful spur of the moment choices, another noir trait) and has cast his lot with these two women of Walton. Stella (brunette and shadowy), representing his darker inclinations and June (blonde and chaste) those of his better angels. It is through the contrast of the two ladies that Stanton will choose his doom or redemption.

Preminger lends his usual ambiguity to character here. It is a film taking place in a country wearied by war (1945 - the final year of WWII) and weakened by mistrust (the Red Scare would follow). No one, beside June, is motivated entirely by virtuous intentions. Stanton is as unlikable as protagonists get; a smooth talking con man, down on his luck, willing to trample any human emotion except his own greed and prurient desires. Stella is a good time gal looking for legitimacy in a one horse town that knows her name too well. The ex-cop Judd, with hints of a brutal past and Pops, who holds an undying torch for Stella both exude the defeat of aging and impotence.

They are all “fallen angels”. There is Stanton’s loss of ethics due to lust and dire straits, Stella’s carnal manipulations of men, Judd’s violent nature, Pop’s overlooking of Stella’s indiscretions and even June, who has figuratively descended from heaven itself to save a troubled man. She offers this poetic balm to Stanton:

                                   “Only love can make the fallen angel rise,

                                   for only two together can enter paradise”.

Fallen Angel is a story of rambling unease in a place where there is little possibility of escape. Its people are trying to latch on to something just a bit too far from their grasp. A sense of redemptive underpinning braces the proceedings without which the characters would spiral into hedonism of their own design. As a town, Walton is a few spiritual miles south of Peyton Place and a one hour car drive from Chinatown. In its head, the film has a cynical appreciation of fate and bad decisions. In its heart, it suggests that everything matters in the whole and the worst of us can be salvaged by the smallest bit of humanity and understanding.