Larceny (1948), starring John Payne, Dan Duryea, Joan Caulfield and Shelley Winters

Director George Sherman’s exceptionally enjoyable vintage 1948 film noir crime thriller Larceny stars John Payne as a devil-may-care confidence-trickster called Rick Maxon, who is going to save a pretty damsel in distress, grieving war widow Deborah Owens Clark (Joan Caulfield), when she is threatened by greasy crook Silky Randall (Dan Duryea), the boss of Rick (Payne)’s confidence-trick gang of grifters. Rick ingratiates himself with Deborah by pretending he was her husband’s buddy during the war. The sting is to sell her a memorial to her husband and pocket the money. But then Rick starts falling for her, and Silky’s unstable girl, Tory (Shelley Winters) turns up to chase after Rick, followed by Silky. Larceny is a really good, solid film noir, with an engaging story, involving characters and plenty of intrigue, suspense and dynamism, and a strong crime melodrama script. 

The screenplay by Herbert F Margolis, Louis Morheim and William Bowers is based on Lois Eby and John Fleming’s novel The Velvet Fleece. Three years later, writer William Bowers provided the smart-aleck hipster lingo for Dick Powell in Cry Danger, one of the smartest-talking noirs ever. Like Dick Powell, John Payne was another crooner from 1930s musicals—a light leading man—who saw new opportunities waiting in the changing Hollywood of the late ‘40s and seized them in the grittier Bs of the newborn noir cycle. It was a smart move for his career. With rugged good looks but no glamour boy, Payne was a strong, silent type who didn't make it a gimmick. In the half-dozen or so noirs he starred in, he straddled both sides of the law, though he usually found himself stranded in a no-man's land in the middle.

The performances of Dan Duryea as Silky Randall and Shelley Winters as his poisonous gal Tory who falls for Rick Maxon (John Payne) are bright highspots. Duryea is a splendidly slimy and menacing bad guy, and Winters acts splendidly deranged. Duryea is paranoid about his girlfriend being around the all-male members of his gang, and well he should: His woman is messing around with his right hand man, Rick Maxon. Tori gets the film’s best lines, and she’s personified by a smoking hot Shelley Winters in her first major leading role. Winters leaves a lasting impression as the rock-hard and cold beauty who takes no guff from anyone. Whether participating in a slap-fight with Payne or firing off one-liners made from barbed wire, Winters owns this picture. She’s sexy, funny, dangerous, and adept at running her own game. Joan Caulfield’s performance isn’t bad at all, but her character is so jaw-droppingly stupid it’s hard to root for her. There’s a sort of payoff-slash-punchline to Caulfield’s naïveté, and I suppose one over-the-top femme fatale is all a slightly comedic film noir can handle, but she really tried my patience. Payne, on the other hand, is infectious. Source: www.slantmagazine.com

John Payne plays a glib con-artist who specializes in both aping his social betters and in utilizing their own often hypocritical reformist zeal against them. Saddled with the romantic attentions of platinum blonde Shelley Winters, Payne dallies with this desirable paramour at his own peril, considering she is of course the staked-out sexual territory of his sinister boss, played to adjective-appropriate advantage by (almost) always sinister Dan Duryea. When the action switches cross-country to the upcoming Rose Bowl and a real estate-swindle involving pure-of-heart and deep-of-pocket heiress Joan Caulfield, however, Payne’s play-acting among and to the complex participants reaches a breaking point with his shifting and divided personal loyalties. Photographed, like The Web, by ace Irving Glassberg, the shroud of immorality and venality, in equal measure, lowers itself even upon scenes taking place in a youth club, airy offices, plush home interiors, and, most disconcertedly, a stately resort prospect, finding the lower-key lighting casting unmistakable shade on intentions good, ill, or otherwise. These shades of grey receive their most effective reading by depicting the struggle between good and evil in even more ambiguous locales. Source: www.zekefilm.org

Silky has made it clear to Rick that he should steer clear of Tory and admits “Tory’s like a high tension wire. Once you grab on, you can’t let go.” Silky apologies to Rick who maintains he has no interest in Tory (though it’s clear they were having an affair behind Silky’s back). Silky says to Rick, ”I said I’m sorry, but I’m not gonna write it on the blackboard a hundred times.” Shelley Winters probably had the best part as the stop-at-nothing moll. Poor Joan Caulfield has little to do except look at Mr Payne and sigh! Even Dorothy Hart, in a small role as a secretary (who also fancies Payne) is more lively than Joan. Ladies' man Payne catches the eye of both a waitress (Patricia Alphin) and a secretary (Dorothy Hart); the beautiful secretary with glasses, strongly reminiscent of Dorothy Malone in The Big Sleep (1946), plays a key role but one feels that perhaps the movie should have been a bit longer in order to flesh out her part. 

As Rick falls for Deborah he has trouble going through with the plan. The screenplay was based on the novel The Velvet Fleece by Lois Eby and John C. Fleming. One of the screenwriters was William Bowers, who wrote the terrific dialogue for Dick Powell's Cry Danger (1951), and the dialogue has a definite flair at times which must represent Bowers' work. Payne has a snarky line about Winters' brain that cracked me up. Surprisingly, Larceny did receive its share of respectful reviews, with the Motion Picture Herald going so far as to label it a “tiptop melodrama.” Here’s what The New York Times had to say: “Joan Caulfield plays the languid widow to the point of weariness, but there is spirit and fire to the vulgar blonde moll whom Miss Winters portrays. She is a coarse, flashy, provocative dame and even though the scenarists have given her some flamboyant lines to speak in her big showdown scene with Payne, Miss Winters carries her role off remarkably well.” Source: laurasmiscmusings.blogspot.com

 

Larceny (1948): A con-man (John Payne) sets out to swindle a widow (Joan Caulfield) out of the money she's received to build a memorial to her war-hero husband, but winds up falling in love with her instead.