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Dark City Dames: The Wicked Women of Film Noir

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Some 50 years ago, the women of this book worked in relative obsurity amidst the shadows of large studios during film noir's heyday. Now with the resurgent popularity of the film noir genre, these actresses are finally being recognized for the keen talent they possess and the effect they had on a generation of movies.

None of these women are household names because none of these women were given the star publicity treatment that Myrna Loy, Joan Crawford and others were givne during the same time period. But their stories are every bit as interesting and author Eddie Muller tells them wonderfully.

Muller is obviously a fan of folm noir, but does not let this color these biographies. Rather, Muller deftly allows the six actresses featured here to tell their own stories. The result is an honest, touching and insightful view into the Hollywood moviemaking era of the late 30s to early 50s.

Each actress' life is chronicled from the time she was born until the present. The personalities shine through as Muller shows the different ways in which each woman found a love for acting and was later "discovered" by Hollywood. The result is poignant. From the exhileration of the "big" movie to the sorrow at the death of a spouse, each life is fascinating. A great book!

"Dark City Dames": The Wicked Women of Film Noir is a fascinating book about some extraordinary screen actresses from the "good old days" of Hollywood. Eddie Muller's unique work is definitely not the typical coffee table volume composed for Hollywood nostalgia addicts. His superbly researched profiles of six noted actresses from the film noir genre; Coleen Gray, Jane Greer, Evelyn Keyes, Ann Savage, Audrey Totter and Marie Windsor, create real life drama from the femme fatale images of the past. Mr. Muller cleverly organized his book with two chapters for each actress, past and present. In every instance, all of the profiled women freely share their triumphs and disappointments, their loves and heartbreaks. While many of the insider stories and tidbits offered by Mr. Muller will amuse and titillate the reader, it is the admirable spirit, determination and character of these women that truly touched my heart. A case in point was the late Marie Windsor, a prime example of a unique talent who never realized her supernova screen potential. Toward the end of her life, Miss Windsor was desperately ill, taking care of a sicker husband, supporting a stepson, managing a household and holding down an important position with the Screen Actors Guild. Through it all, she remained determined to perservere and was ever grateful for a good life fully lived. Mr. Muller adroitly weaves the central themes of film noir, Hollywood and the studio system through the book, but the actresses and their fascinating personal lives earn the deserved star billing. "Dark City Dames" is a must for the film noir buff, but is a terrific book for anyone who enjoys the indomitability and compassion of the human spirit. They don't make movies like they used to, because they don't have actresses like these six around anymore.

Author Eddie Muller proved himself adept at engaging readers with a lively tour of classic film noir in his popular book "Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir". In "Dark City Dames", Muller presents then-and-now biographies of 6 actresses whose portrayals of femmes fatales will forever fix their images on the consciousness of film noir audiences. The first half of the book, entitled "Hollywood Midcentury", introduces us to these women, who came to Hollywood from a variety of backgrounds and locales, but all aspired to be movie actresses and were under contract to one studio or another in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Jane Greer was brought to Hollywood from Washington, D.C. as a teenager under contract to RKO. She made "Out of the Past" and "The Big Steal", among others, before Howard Hughes vowed to end her career. Audrey Totter was straight-laced, professional, and ambitious. She acted in 6 film noirs, among them "The Lady in the Lake", "The Unsuspected", "Alias Nick Beal", and "The Set-Up" before remarkable coincidence began her married life and ended her film career, just as coincidence had launched it. Marie Windsor was the pride of Marysvale, Utah, who had dreamed of being an actress since childhood. Pragmatic and persistent, her dark hair made her the villain in "The Narrow Margin", "Force of Evil", and "The Killing". Evelyn Keyes was backwards and unworldly when Cecile B. DeMille signed her. But her persistent curiosity and independent nature inspired her to many Hollywood adventures. Her films included "Johnny O'Clock" and "The Prowler" , before she walked away from Hollywood after 13 years in the business. Coleen Gray was an insecure midwestern farmer's daughter, but you wouldn't know it from "The Sleeping City", "Nightmare Alley", or "Kiss of Death". Anne Savage was headstrong and vivacious, as her stage name implies. She will be best remembered for "Detour", which might have ended her decade-long acting career.

In the second part of "Dark City Dames", "Hollywood Fin de Siècle", we meet the 6 actresses today. Now in their 70s and 80s, the ladies of film noir tell us what happened as their film careers dwindled and what they've done since. It's interesting that the revived interest in classic film noir has brought these actresses a lot of unexpected attention and praise that was lacking when it would have helped their careers. Several of them lament the demise of the studio system that protected actors even as it limited them -and studio politics ended many careers prematurely. All of the actresses profiled cooperated with the author, so their stories are personal and very much their point of view. "Dark City Dames" doesn't actually say much about the films or the characters these actresses embodied. It's about the experiences of its 6 heroines, who, as young starlets in post-war Hollywood, probably aspired to be A-list stars, but became indelible vixens of film noir instead.

I met Eddie at a lecture in San Francisco during the Noir Festival at the Castro Theater, and this guy really knows his stuff. He is the quintissential renaissance man; a writer, a thinker, and (more than likely) an artist. His books do nothing less than to amaze the reader how a man so young coud have gained so much knowledge about a genre that happened before his birth.

Eddie Muller has written a delightful follow-up (of sorts) to his incredible Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir that focuses solely on the women, Dark City Dames: The Wicked Women of Film Noir. This book is much more focused than the previous work (and perhaps not quite as much fun) as it looks at the screen work and personal lives of six women of noir, Jane Greer, Audrey Totter, Marie Windsor, Evelyn Keyes (my personal favourite for the totality of her marvelous life), Coleen Gray, and Ann Savage. The book is divided in two parts. The first part looks at the period of their noir work and the second part looks at their lives afterwards, right to the present. One should not look for a theme in the lives of these women and, instead, one should look at how individual each of these women are despite playing similar femme fatales (with exception of good girl, Coleen Gray) on the screen. This is a lovely tribute to these women and all the others who created that dark magic so long ago. The author did a fantastic job with his noirish prose making these women as interesting as people as they were as mysterious as screen characters.

A sequel of sorts to Muller's earlier Dark City, which was a spirited surveillance of the terra incognita of film noir. Here, he selects six dark stars of the noir cycle, women who left an indelible impression on film history but never achieved supernova status; each of had to be available for a follow-up interview half a century after their heyday (alas, the sensational Marie Windsor died before publication but after contributing). The women in question are Jane Greer, Audrey Totter, Windsor, Evelyn Keyes, Coleen Gray (does she belong?), and Ann Savage. More than mere thumbnail bios, the profiles here blend to form a vivid snapshot of the B-movie business in the 40s. Muller's style is a left-handed homage to the snappy prose of the scandal sheets, bringing to mind the Kenneth Anger of Hollywood Babylon (except Muller is much more humane). When the stars share their peccadillos (and they have more than their share), he neither snickers nor wags a finger. The concluding reveries by these phenomenal women show what a false firmament Hollywood was, and that there's a lot more to life -- good and bad -- than installation into the pantheon of the silver screen. The only thing that could have made this book better would have been the inclusion (and Muller admits in his preface that it was impossible) of Lizabeth Scott and Claire Trevor. By the way, the then-and-now photographs are extraordinary. Strongly recommended.

One of the most challenging roles for an actress is that of a femme fatale. She must exhibit far more than mere treachery. The femme fatale must convince audiences that what the poor male succumbing to her charms is experiencing is plausibly merited. She must exhibit the kind of overpowering appeal combined with a Svengali manner to sell audiences that the poor man's captivated fascination is plausibly worth it. Otherwise the whole story falls flat.

Eddie Muller writes about women who accepted that challenge and surmounted it convincingly. Jane Greer is a classic example. While only 22 when she appeared opposite Robert Mitchum in the classical noir work, "Out of the Past," she revealed a native intelligence and air of sophistication of a woman who had been around forever. Mitchum, while fully aware of her treachery, found himself incapable of turning away until it was too late and he was ultimately doomed.

Ann Savage was a former model who found her niche as a femme fatale in one of the most remarkable low budget triumphs in Hollywood annals, "Detour," directed by independent film genius Edgar Ulmer, who took a no frills, low budget project and carved out a classic by using limited space to commanding advantage. Tom Neil could not get away from Savage, who exuded a suffocating presence on the hapless musician, who was trying to reunite with his singer girlfriend in Los Angeles. Savage clearly had other ideas.

Marie Windsor was a willowy former beauty contest winner who traveled from her small Utah hometown to Hollywood in search of fame. Her height was a turnoff initially in her career and she was compelled to work in a lot of low budget westerns before getting her opportunity to shine, which she did in Stanley Kubrick's "The Killing." Her scenes as the faithless wife in love with gigolo Vince Edwards and her shamefully sadistic usery of husband Elisha Cook Jr. serve as a dramatic highlight of a superb, hard-hitting movie about an ex-con played by Sterling Hyden, who seeks to engineer a holdup of a racetrack on the biggest pay day of the season. The more Cook begs and implores, the more savagely biting the wisecracks which emanate from Windsor, but in the final analysis the henpecked husband hits back in a way neither she nor Edwards are able to anticipate.

Coleen Gray and Audrey Totter are also included in Muller's work. His penetrating interviews enable the reader to get familiar with the personalities and their lives away from the cameras. Gray played the girlfriends of Sterling Hayden and Tyrone Power in two noir gems, "The Killing" nnd "Nightmare Alley," while Totter was the love interest of detective Philip Marlowe, played by Robert Montgomery, who also directed, in Raymond Chandler's "The Lady in the Lake."

Dark City's leading citizen has done it again with Dames. In this beautiful book, 'hiz honor' introduces us to the lives and work of Jane Greer, Ann Savage, Audrey Totter, Coleen Gray, Evelyn Keyes and Marie Windsor. Do you dare argue?, the quintessential Noir Babes?

It is fair to say that the author's work here is nothing less then visionary. These actresses have never received the credit that they deserved and now in the their golden years someone has come forward to celebrate the contributions that they made to the American Cinema. The word on the street in Dark City is, that no one could have done it better than the Mayor, Eddie Muller.

Among his works, Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir and a recently released novel 'The Distance'. He is the co-director of the American Cinematheque's Annual Festival Of Film Noir at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood during March and April.

Terrific tribute to these wonderful underrated actresses. So sad that Lizabeth Scott and Rhonda Fleming were not included. Well maybe next time. If there is a second volume , I would love to find out more about Dorothy Malone and perhaps Peggy Cummins ("Gun Crazy"), Jan Sterling and Eleanor Parker.

If you liked DARK CITY, Muller's previous book , you'll love his latest! He interviews six Noir dames who starred in the most notable films of that era. You'd be hard pressed to find ANYTHING on any of these ladies, since they were not BIG stars. But Muller gives them their due and the praise they deserve. The photos are great, but you wish there were MORE (my reason for leaving off a star in my rating). If you want to know about the women behind such great Noir classics like Narrow Margin, Kiss of Death, Detour, you'll really enjoy this book. It's a great companion to all the other Noir books out there! Recommended!