An Overlooked Bogart Gem Is Re-Released
I love this photo of Bogey from the new Criterion Bluray release of Nicholas Ray‘s 1950 picture, “In A Lonely Place.” Not only does the image show the actor in stylish disarray — as if he’s just come home after a long night breaking up with his girlfriend and belting bourbon — but it has stylish typography in the title. What? You’ve never seen this movie? Bogart stars as Dixon Steele, a troubled screenwriter suspected of murder and Gloria Grahame co-stars as Laurel Gray, a neighbor who falls under his spell. Beyond its surface plot of confused identity and tormented love, the story is a mordant comment on Hollywood mores and the pitfalls of celebrity and near-celebrity, similar to two other American films released that same year — Billy Wilder‘s “Sunset Boulevard” and Joseph Mankiewicz‘s “All About Eve.”
