For this month of celebrating Noirvember I didn't necessarily find a film noir worth recommending so, I did my usual research and that's find what the good people at Turner Classic Movies and with the assistance of Noir expert, Eddie Muller and on his list for this year was a surprisingly great film noir, The Great Jewel Robber, a film that got me interested in like the first fifteen minutes of the movie itself and for the moment I thought this was going to be a convenient movie but, though I was wrong. Hell, it's almost like I never learned my lesson from Edger Wright's Last Night at Soho. Starring David Brian, whom I don't know a whole lot about, other than he starred alongside John Wayne, and a director who directed my mother’s favorite Christmas films Christmas in Connecticut.
A master thief (David Brian) steals $1 million in valuables from society homes between the years of 1947-48.
The film is based on the real-life jewel thief of Gerard Dennis who stole a sum up to $600,000 in valuables from cities such as Montreal, Hollywood, and Westchester County, New York. The man even stole from movies stars back in the days like Errol Flynn and Bettie Davis moreover made a lot of Jewel heist that he himself forgotten to count; Dennis was later arrested in July of 1949. For which leads to us to Brian Foy back in the hay day of Hollywood, producers wanted to stay away from true crime tales for obvious reasons they don't want to glorify these types of criminals, but Foy was his own man and wanted to tell Dennis story, and so, while serving his time Dennis granted Foy permission to tell his story on the big Screen. At first when watching the movie, I figured the film would be a convenient or typical film noir, where this is a protagonist surviving in America or Canada with his wife by robbing from society houses. Oh, hell no, this guy in like when reuniting with the love of his life ditches her for another for which sparked my interest even more. David Brian, whom I don't know a whole lot about other than the man later in his carrier, starred alongside John Wayne in The High and the Mighty. That being said this guy literally stole the entire movie with his deceiving role as a thief that acts like a saint but doesn't care about the people around him and uses them for pawns to get what he wants and literally terrified me through the course of the movie, mainly because there was a nice puppy dog involved and I feared more for the dogs safety than everyone else but thankfully no dog was hurt through the making of the movie. Now after watching this surprisingly great film noir, I'm making preparations in watching Christmas in Connecticut for obvious reasons director Peter Godfrey directed this movie as well as his 1945 Christmas classic, and having browsed through majority of his work it looks like Godfrey is a solid director that knows how to create a crime drawn atmospheric movie, and transition to a soft and caring romantic comedy in the next, in which some of his movies I do need to check out and see more of his style of storytelling. I'm very grateful to find this sleeper hit of a film noir and gave me some great twists that I never saw coming and intrigued me from beginning to the very end. So, if you’re a fan of the Film Noir genre then I would highly recommend watching this movie on Hulu, though be sure to watch it while it lasts because you never know when they switch out their selection of films.
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