Walk Softly, Stranger (1950)

Director:

Robert Stevenson

Writers:

Manuel Seff (story) and
Paul Yawitz (story) ...

Release Date:

14 October 1950 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Film-Noir | Drama | Romance

Tagline:

A Strange Lie! A Strange Love!

Plot:

A charming, smooth-talking gambler calling himself Chris Hale arrives in Ashton, home of the Corelli shoe factory...

Plot Keywords:

Handicap | Disability | Wheelchair | Gambling | Beautiful Woman

Cast

Joseph Cotten	...	Chris Hale aka Steve
Alida Valli	...	Elaine Corelli (as Valli)
Spring Byington	...	Mrs. Brentman
Paul Stewart	...	Whitey Lake
Jack Paar	...	Ray Healy
Jeff Donnell	...	Gwen
John McIntire	...	Morgan
Howard Petrie	...	Bowen
Frank Puglia	...	A.J. Corelli
Esther Dale	...	Miss Thompson
Marlo Dwyer	...	Mabel
Robert Ellis	...	Skating Boy

Also Known As:

Weep No More (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

81 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15

Company:

Dore Schary Productions

Trivia:

Completed in 1948, copyrighted in 1949, but not released until 1950.

Quotes:

Bowen: Why don't you sit down?
Chris Hale: I wouldn't sit on your death bed.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "American Masters: Jack Paar: 'As I Was Saying...'" (1997)

Decent noir cops out at end.

On the run gambler, con man Chris Hale Joseph Cotton inveigles his way into a small All- American town to lie low for awhile. He charms his way into the good graces of locals and begins a relationship with a local shoe titan's wheel chair bound daughter (Valli). While he envisions starting anew in this town he can't resist making one more big score by ripping off a vicious thug. The theft is cleanly pulled off and Hale disappears back to his small community where he has assumed another identity. Unfortunately his unstable partner in the robbery tracks him down and from here things begin to unravel.

Fresh from their Third Man pairing Joseph Cotton and Valli made this stylish little noir that at times evokes masterworks of the genre such as Shadow of a Doubt and Out of the Past. It has some tightly edited and well filmed suspenseful moments and Cotton as always gives a strong understated performance. Valli on the other hand is still in her post war Vienna funk so enigmatic in Third Man but dull and lifeless here. Upbeat Spring Byington and especially surly and troubled Paul Stewart provide effective opposite examples of the human condition that pull at Hale's conscience.

Unfortunately in it's final scene, Walk Softly Stranger takes advice from its title and signs off with a mawkish tacked on ending that obliterates the impact of the previous scene which is infinitely more compatible to the overall doomed mood of story and character.