Criss Cross Criss Cross Universal 1949 / B&W / 1:37 flat full frame / 87 min. / Street Date July 6, 2004 / 14.98 Starring Burt Lancaster, Yvonne De Carlo, Dan Duryea, Stephen McNally, Esy Morales, Tom Pedi Cinematography Franz Planer Art Direction Bernard Herzbrun, Boris Leven Film Editor Ted J. Kent Original Music Miklos Rozsa Written by Daniel Fuchs from a novel by Don Tracy Produced by Michel Kraike Directed by Robert Siodmak
	Reviewed by Glenn Erickson Criss Cross is in some ways derivative of Robert Siodmak's own The Killers from two years before, but it doesn't matter. Enlarging on ideas at the core of film noir - helpless characters struggling in a web of fated romantic confusion - it's almost as satisfying as Burt Lancaster's debut picture, even if he seems to be repeating many of the same moves. Proving that superior noir is a matter of style over content, director Siodmak assembles a prototype tale with one of the most uncompromised bleak endings in the movies. Synopsis: Drifter Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster) returns to Los Angeles and his job as an armored car guard and tries to re-spark his marriage to the beautiful neighborhood girl Anna (Yvonne De Carlo). But both his mother (Edna Holland) and his detective friend Pete Ramirez (Stephen McNally) ruin everything by assuming Anna is a bad penny and pressuring her to leave town; although interested in Steve, she marries the dangerous gambler-crook Slim Dundee (Dan Duryea). Steve's attraction to Anna is still stronger than his sense of self-preservation - when caught alone with Anna by Dundee, Steve proposes an armored-car holdup - with him as the inside man. With its fated flashback structure and romantically plaintive narration Criss Cross is the quintessential noir saga of the tainted loser. Steve Thompson can't stay away from the one woman everyone agrees is poison for him; for her he abandons his pride and breaks the law. Steve Thompson has a lot in common with the sadsack 'hero' of Edgar Ulmer's Detour; he's the victim of circumstances entirely of his own making. Indecision and bad communication result in Anna's marriage to the wrong guy. Chauvinistic meddling has a part in it too; Pete Ramirez harrasses Anna just because she's an unpredictable single woman.  1 The overall mood of fatality makes worrying about who did what to who irrelevant, just as Anna and Steve can't remember the things they fought about when they were married. Steve has a fog of romantic illusion clinging to him like a forgiving shroud; unlike Detour's Al Roberts, he doesn't spend his time whining about his own misfortunes. As Steve is disabused of his notions of trust and romantic loyalty, he accepts culpability for his sins and waits stoically for retribution. A true romantic, nothing matters for Steve after he's lost The Girl. In a way then, Criss Cross fills in the character gap left outstanding in The Killers, the big question why the Swede awaited his execution with such calm. The Swede is remembered in patchy, Citizen Kane - like memories, whereas Steve Thompson's every misstep is covered in the first person. His wistful narration tips us off that his story isn't going to end happily. Critics were still ragging on Burt Lancaster's supposed lack of acting talent in this his third or fourth film; it's true that Burt led with his rugged looks (his undershirt scenes predate Brando by a few years) but his acting style is wisely based on underplaying and muted reactions. Enough of Steve's inner feelings come through his attempt to put on a macho front and there are plenty of great moments. When he drunkenly baits the bargirl at the Roundup Bar (Joan Miller) he behaves like a petty version of the tormenting hit men in The Killers. Yvonne De Carlo is another femme noir original. Although Anna shows her true colors in the bleak finale, throughout most of the picture she exists as an idealized love object, almost an erotic hallucination. She's introduced in what's commonly referred to as a 'steaming rhumba number,' dance that in 1948 was considered an abstract montage.  2 Unlike Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity or Jane Greer in Out of the Past, Yvonne DeCarlo is not a femme fatale but the innocent (at least in the film as finished) catalyst for the mayhem in the third act. She's a luscious object of desire presented as simply as Ann Darrow in King Kong - just possessing her is motivation enough to justify grand larceny and murder. Dan Duryea's Slim Dundee is almost as sympathetic as the hero. He obviously is equally in love with Anna and willing to be made a sucker over her. There's something in his "Baby, it don't look right" when he catches Anna and Steve together that shows his heartbreak, and his suspicions about Anna's motives and "trips to the parking lot" are more than justified. Slim Dundee gives both Anna and Steve the benefit of the doubt at every dubious turn of events. When Anna shows Steve the marks she says are from Slim's beatings, we don't know whether we believe her. Slim is definitely dangerous, but we mostly see him being relatively patient and tender with Anna. Until the last scene, at least. Although Criss Cross contains a heist (as does The Killers) it is not a full-fledged Caper film. The focus is on romantic tragedy and greed is only a partial motivation. The robbery scene is nicely sketched (beginning with a disorienting, twisting downshot from high above the targeted armored car) but plays out under the fog of a smokescreen that blends with the fog of Steve's hospital anaesthesia. Both of those 'fogs' are nothing compared to Steve's own fog of romantic reverie (implied by the dreamy flashback that soft-peddles Anna's image). Disillusion is likened unto coming out from under an anesthetic, to feel the full pain of a major injury. Physically crippled and aware that he's done grievous injury to those he loves, Steve is going to get a bigger jolt when he finally connects with Anna. The final reunion takes place at an "end of the world" limbo, a seaside shack reminiscent of the oddly fantastic conclusion of Fritz Lang's Moonfleet. The matte with the crooked tree reminds of Jack Arnold's bleak land and seascapes in the series of Universal-International science fiction movies that would follow. It's just enough of a stylistic change to lift the annihilating conclusion out of the pulp gutter - this doomed trio play out their roles like Greeks on an ill-fated quest. The shock of the film's last image is its lack of romantic embellishment. I'm surprised that anybody approved such a complete downer of an ending. Of course, it makes Criss Cross as fascinatingly morbid as any film noir on the books. Criss Cross is a great picture for actor spotting. Sam Fuller favorite Gene Evans has several lines as one of Lancaster's fellow bank guards. The grim bad-guy with the gravelly voice John Doucette (wonderful in his bit in The Fountainhead) is one of Slim Dundee's henchmen, and the amusing Tom Pedi (later in a colorful part in The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3) is equally apealling in his enthusiasm ("That's the ticket! That's the ticket!"). Both of them add up to a pretty pitiful criminal gang. Stephen McNally has the thankless role as Lancaster's cop friend who may or may not have tried to do him a big favor. Robert Osterloh is the creepy kidnapper seen through Steve Thompson's crooked hospital mirror in one of the best paranoid scenes ever. Nurse Beatrice Roberts played the same character in The Killers, and we're told that Raymond Burr is hidden in there somewhere as well. In one of the most credited "uncredited" appearances in movie history, Tony Curtis is recognizeable on screen for only two seconds or so, making a very positive impact as DeCarlo's dance partner. Robert Siodmak's classy direction relies on a mix of naturalistic and stylized environments. Union Station and Angels' Flight make iconic appearances. The Roundup Bar is an ugly dive turned exotic only by Esy Morales' music and the presence of Yvonne DeCarlo. Camera angles are unforced and noir lighting effects are kept in check yet the spell of doom lies heavy upon every frame, leading to that final scene by the sea. All we need to see is DeCarlo standing in a windowed alcove watching the heist being plotted, posed sideways with a cigarette, to know that she can no longer be trusted. She looks like a waiting animal. Siodmak is rarely acknowledged as a master illusionist; in Criss Cross there's a terrific shot where Lancaster's Armored truck exits an interior stage set at Universal. The camera tilts up to a window to show a view of the truck climing a ramp to the street; the window-view is a cleverly timed and aligned rear projection. Universal's DVD of Criss Cross is the top feature in their July noir collection; the B&W image is sharp and expressive, yielding a slight bit of compression grain only in the foggy smokescreen scene. The soundtrack is typical of the period with dialogue placed way louder than music to insure clarity, but the big rhumba number takes over the screen with its heavy rhythm. Criss Cross is well-documented in books on film noir so the lack of a commentary or extras isn't as painful as it might be, but it still places the Universal series slightly behind the Warner offerings. The dramatic original trailer emphasizes the "double-double cross" as the film's motif. On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor, Criss Cross rates: Movie: Excellent Video: Excellent Sound: Excellent Supplements: trailer Packaging: Keep case Reviewed: July 31, 2004 Footnotes: 1. Actually, Ramirez' eagerness to strongarm Anna with threats of prison point to seamier possibilities - Anna might be much more than a vivacious neighborhood girl. Perhaps she's a prostitute or involved in other kinds of vice in the source story. In Criss Cross Anna is sort of an innocent dumbbell and Steve's detective "friend" Ramirez takes a huge part of the blame for the story going sour. However, even if Anna really is a bad dame, the film paints her as Steve sees her - a rhumba vision of erotic nirvana. There may be deleted scenes that fill-in Anna's character; we only hear that Steve is taking her to the beach and to the track, yet the full cast roster has actor Vito Scotti listed as "track usher." Return 2. It's sort of a less-frantic followup to Siodmak's wild jam session in Phantom Lady, in which hepcat Elisha Cook Jr. plays the drums. Return [Savant Main Page] [Savant Links] [Article Index] [Review Index] [Savant 5 Year Report] DVD Savant Text © Copyright 2007 Glenn Erickson Advertise With Us Review Staff | About DVD Talk | Newsletter Subscribe | Join DVD Talk Forum Copyright © DVDTalk.com All rights reserved | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use