Female on the Beach (1955)

Moving into a beach house involves Lynn Markham in mystery, danger, and romance with a beach boy of dubious motives.

Director:

Joseph Pevney

Writers:

Robert Hill (play), Robert Hill (screenplay)

Stars:

Joan Crawford, Jeff Chandler, Jan Sterling

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Joan Crawford	...	Lynn Markham
Jeff Chandler	...	Drummond Hall
Jan Sterling	...	Amy Rawlinson
Cecil Kellaway	...	Osbert Sorenson
Judith Evelyn	...	Eloise Crandall
Charles Drake	...	Police Lieutenant Galley
Natalie Schafer	...	Queenie Sorenson
Stuart Randall	...	Frankovitch
Marjorie Bennett	...	Mrs. Murchison

Storyline

Lynn Markham moves into her late husband's beach house...the morning after former tenant Eloise Crandall fell (or was pushed) from the cliff. To her annoyance, Lynn finds both her real estate agent and Drummond Hall, her muscular beachcomber neighbor, making themselves quite at home. Lynn soon has no doubts of what her scheming neighbors are up to, but she finds Drummond's physical charms hard to resist. And she still doesn't know what really happened to Eloise.

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Plot Keywords:

seduction | murder suspect | based on play | man in a swimsuit | balboa beach | 

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Taglines:

He was the kind of man that her kind of woman CAN'T LEAVE ALONE!

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Film-Noir | Mystery | Romance | Thriller

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

27 August 1955 (UK)

Also Known As:

Das Haus am Strand

Filming Locations:

Universal Studios - 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Universal International Pictures (UI)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

97 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

According to Natalie Schafer, halfway through filming she was invited by Joan Crawford to her house for a small dinner party, but had to decline as she already had plans. When Schafer arrived onto the set the next morning, she found that her trailer had been physically moved almost to the parking lot of Universal.

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Goofs

The type of doorbell that is featured prominently in Crawford's beach house, with four large chime tubes, in reality makes a very different sound than the doorbell sound effect that is heard on the soundtrack whenever the bell is rung.

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Quotes

Osbert Sorenson: [to Queenie] I have an uneasy feeling that our honesty is being questioned.
Queenie Sorenson: I think we're being asked to leave.
Osbert Sorenson: So do I.
[to Lynn]
Osbert Sorenson: Would you like us to go?
Lynn Markham: [Sarcastically] As far as you like. Another continent, preferably.
Queenie Sorenson: Au revoir, then.
Lynn Markham: [as they are leaving] Arrivederci.

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Crazy Credits

The opening credits are written om wet sand and succeeding waves wash them away.

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Connections

Featured in Joan Crawford: The Ultimate Movie Star (2002)

User Reviews

A campy trashy treasure of a film

Recently widowed Lynn Markham (Joan Crawford) returns to her late husband's beach house to take up residence until a buyer can be found. She returns to a house in which police are looking at something on the on the beach beneath her house, there's a broken railing on her balcony, and random items of mens clothing can be found strewn throughout the place. What's going on here? Lynn soon finds out that her last tenant, Eloise Crandall, fell off of her balcony to her death and the police are still trying to decide if it is an accident or homicide.

A beach bum (Jeff Chandler as Drummy) has moored his boat to her pier, and apparently thinks he can pick up with Lynn where he left off with Eloise and doesn't seem to have the phrase "personal space" in his vocabulary. Lynn is not just another bored lonely near middle age socialite. She's an ex-specialty dancer from Vegas and she can see right through Drummy. However, time and the solitude she says she's always wanted begin to have a negative effect on her x-ray vision. Nobody dresses to the nines every night just to pace the floor of their dark empty beach house.

Drummy's story - he's hired beefcake by a couple of refined card sharks, Osbert and Queenie Sorensen, who need a steady flow of cash through loans and ill-gotten gambling debts to keep them in the lifestyle to which they are accustomed. The source of that cash had been Eloise, but now the Sorensens are eying bigger fish - next door neighbor Lynn Markham.

Throughout the film a cop investigating Eloise's death will pop up out of nowhere (Charles Drake as Lieutenant Galley) spouting come-ons mixed with veiled warnings while flashing bedroom eyes. Does he suspect murder or is he just trying to squash the competition by casting Drummy as a murder suspect?

So who if anyone did kill Eloise Crandall? Drummy to get rid of her? The card sharks to make sure she didn't go to the police about the ruse? Someone else I'm not telling you about just to keep it interesting? Watch and find out. Watch and find out if Lynn thinks she's getting so close to the truth that she thinks she is in danger too.

This is A1 late-career Joan Crawford material all the way.- great fashions, good speeches, Joan tough yet vulnerable, and angry confrontations mixed with pure lust. Plus great beefcake shots of Jeff Chandler and the fact that no female seems immune to this beach bum's charms even though he's not exactly your prototype ideal man of the 50's ... or maybe that's exactly WHY they pant after him! After all, Ward Cleaver clones might be dependable, but variety is the spice of life. I highly recommend it if you can find a copy.