Customer Reviews

Film Noir Vol. 1: The Stranger/Cause For Alarm

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The Roan Group DVD, "Film Noir #1: The Stranger/Cause for Alarm" has the 95 minute version of the Stranger. Great transfer and a great film. You also get Loretta Young in "Cause for Alarm" on the other side. Watta deal!

This two-sided DVD by Roan Group is region 0 and contains two classic noir films: the excellent and widely available The stranger (1946), and the melodramatic and rarely seen Cause for Alarm (1951). This DVD is by far the best region 0/1 version available of The stranger and the only DVD version currently available of Cause for Alarm. Both versions are excellent: sharp images, with excellent contrast and very good blacks and whites. Both films have some scratches and dropouts, but these are not especially objectionable. This DVD version of The stranger is the best I've seen and reputedly only slightly inferior to the region 2 (UK) MGM version.
Neither film on the Roan DVD has menus or any extras. The stranger is divided into 20 chapters, Cause for Alarm into 16.
The stranger runs a full 95 minutes. Cause for alarm is supposed to run 74 minutes. The version on the Roan Group DVD actually runs 71 minutes and 44 seconds. Apparently the missing footage is at the beginning of chapter 4 (TT18.10), which begins abruptly. This DVD originally listed for $29.95 but lately has had a list price of $9.95. I recently obtained the latter version, which has been remaindered (closed out). Reportedly a new version of this DVD will be available to restore the two minutes of footage missing from Cause for Alarm. However, the present version of The stranger is fine and at $9.95 list, or less, this DVD is a great buy considering its overall image quality.

This presentation from Roan is quite good. Since The Stranger is available by MGM Film Noir now, the principal reason for this double feature would be to have Cause For Alarm. In response to another review, the disc I have runs 73:40, so I must have the corrected version. As to the chapter 4 scene referred to, the 2 minutes must have been missing after Loretta Young goes into the house with the paper. The first 2 minutes of the bedroom scene must have been missing. In the original film that scene blends in with the next scene where she enters the bedroom. On the Roan disc, they faded to black and then faded back in for some reason when they must have corrected this. Now the only thing missing is the transition from one scene to another.

This double-sided DVD contains two suspenseful Loretta Young movies, and is well worth the bargin price, though video quality is not quite top notch.

The Stranger, 1946
The setting is a small New England town shortly after World War II. Loretta Young plays a young woman who returns from her honeymoon to find that a war crimes investigator (Edward G. Robinson) suspects her new husband (Orson Welles) of being a secretive high-level Nazi. The dramatic conflict concerns the wife's willingness to believe her husband is a war criminal, as the audience knows the truth almost from the beginning. Suspenseful, with good acting.

Cause for Alarm, 1951
Loretta Young plays a housewife caring for an invalid husband in post-war California. One day her husband (Barry Sullivan) tells her he believes that she and his doctor, a mutual friend, are planning to kill him, and that he has sent full details of their "plot" to the district attorney. When the husband suddenly dies of a heart attack, the wife's otherwise innocent actions seem to point to her guilt. The story is suspenseful and well-written, with everything falling into place at the end.

Very satisfied. The Stranger is much better quality than my version that I purchased from England through Amazon.co.uk.