Product Details

• Actors: John Payne, Rhonda Fleming, Arlene Dahl, Kent Taylor, Ted de Corsia
• Directors: Allan Dwan
• Format: Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: VCI Entertainment
• DVD Release Date: February 26, 2002
• Run Time: 99 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00005Y70Q
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #37,565 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Slightly Scarlet" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

SLIGHTLY SCARLET - DVD Movie

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

59 of 60 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Slightly Scarlet" : Definitely Get It, April 19, 2002

By 

mackjay (Cambridge, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Slightly Scarlet (DVD)

The DVD from VCI presents this film in its widescreen version and the technicolor photography by JOHN ALTON looks terrific. I admit I was at first perplexed by the color: it did not seem necessary. So I turned the color off on the TV and watched some scenes in black & white--they looked terriic, vintage Alton. But watching again in color I realized what may be the very special quality this film has: it looks like those PULP CRIME NOVEL COVERS we have all enjoyed over the years. The reds, greens, blues, yellows, etc of those wonderful old covers seem to be reproduced here. In combination with the very pulpy, James M. Cain-based plotline, we have an extremely FUN movie.
Rhonda Fleming and Arlene Dahl play sisters who share some sort of duplicitous secret from childhood. Director Alan Dwan (who replaced Kurt Neumann for this film) makes sure we appreciate the doppelgangerishness of the actresses from the opening scene--Fleming picks up Dahl as she exits prison and the two embrace in that movie-ish way, cheek-to-cheek, so their striking similarity of features and RED HAIR can be fully displayed. Fleming really could act, and she gets some choice scenes, but Dahl tends to steal most of Fleming's thunder with her pouty, Dorothy Malone-like, bad girl characterization.
John Payne--by 1956 and aging matinee idol--makes a pretty good conflicted lead. But the other real standout is Ted de Corsia as a mean, mean villain along the lines of Lawrence Tierney or Ward Bond. De Corsia gets to chew garishly colored scenery at several turns.
It's always a pleasure to see the ubiquitous Ellen Corby as Fleming's thankless and clueless housekeeper ("what should I make for supper?"..oops she's being arrested!). And one never tires of Frank Gerstle and Lance Fuller (one of de Corsia's thugs)

The disc has an informative commentary by mystery writer/filmmaker Max Collins. Extras really make the package: a static, luridly-colored main menu leads (via realistic-sounding gunshots!) to the extras menu, which includes a nicely done James M. Cain bio and a little panorama of color reproductions of Cain pulp covers from Collins' own collections. There are also some trailers: for "Slightly Scarlet" (this one looks good) and atrociously awful-looking ones for "Double Indemnity" and "The Postman Always Rings Twice".

Highly enjoyable all around.

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars OVERLOOKED NOIR THRILLER, September 5, 2002

By 

Mark Norvell (HOUSTON) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Slightly Scarlet (DVD)

I like this 50's pulp film because it's an example of what must have been considered "adult" back then. Tough, brutal--with "girlie" shots of redhead Rhonda Fleming in scanty outfits and the all-out performance of Arlene Dahl as her klepto/nympho/psycho sister-both vying for the he-man pleasures of hunky John Payne and everyone caught up in Big City Corruption and Scandal. Lushly photographed and tightly directed ,this is fun stuff--worth repeat viewings any time. Good quality DVD product from VCI that's in vivid 50's color.
I recommend this for buffs who like a little cheese on their cracker--like me.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars BRAVO BRAVAAAA ARLENE DAHL, January 22, 2006

By 

Henning Sebastian Jahre "Judy-Viv" (Oslo, Norway) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Slightly Scarlet (DVD)

This is a fastmoving filmnoir in blazing TECHNICOLOR - and the better for it. The photography by John Alton is spectacular as are the set design and costumes(with Arlene Dahl having a finger in even that)...


John Payne(from SUN VALLEY SERENADE-fame) is quite good as the worldweary guy who take what croms that are offered... Unlike Bogart or Cagney he is a believable character with no high drama or over the top macho stuff. Ted deCorsia is brilliant as Sully the hoodlum - the best I`ve seen really...

But it is ARLENE DAHL who steals the show. At first she is just glamour, but she emerges to what surely is a performance of Oscar material.

Her performance is a beauty to behold - as critic Alison DeWytt in the 20th Century-Fox film "All About Eve" would say: "What a PERFORMANCE... Full of FIRE and music....!"

It`s regrettable that this film has little reputation, because it is 90 minutes of excitement, of fun and intrigue.

I have come to love Arlene Dahl over the years. Posterity names her only as a decorative plant, but with other Norwegian girls in US and UK films - GRETA GYNT, SIGRID GURIE and VERA ZORINA - she remains sadly underrated...

At home I have a collection of films starring these women. I call it the "Susan Dahl collection" hehehe - which includes THE GOLDWYN FOLLIES, ALGIERS, THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO(all 1938), THE DARK EYES OF LONDON 1939, THREE FACES WEST, I WAS AN ADVENTURESS(both 1940), LOUISIANA PURCHASE 1941, TAKE MY LIFE, DEAR MURDERER(both 1947), THE OUTRIDERS, THREE LITTLE WORDS(both 1950), SLIGHTLY SCARLET of course - THE VIKINGS(filmed in Norway)1958 and JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH 1959.

These films showcase these underrated Norwegian girls and themes THAT SHOULD N O T be neglected or forgotten...


The Rhonda Fleming/Arlene Dahl chemistry is good and they seem indeed to be the source of many a trash-book cover of any detective story....

I hope SLIGHTLY SCARLET will find the vast audience it deserves with the likes of LAURA, DOUBLE INDEMNITY and TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT.