Clash by Night (1952)

Barbara Stanwyck, Paul Douglas, Robert Ryan and Marilyn Monore: wow, not a bad leading foursome of actors! I bought this because it was labeled a film noir, and I am always willing to give them a chance. Plus, with this cast, it sounded good. It turned out to be only fair because it was more of a soap opera than a noir. I guess the presence of some amoral people and a lot of wise-cracking lines made it be considered "noir."

The "amoral" people were played by Stanwyck and Ryan, of course.....who else? They are effective in those roles, too, but they should be since those two fine actors played those roles on numerous occasions. Douglas plays the simpleton good guy who gets shafted by his wife Stanwyck who has an affair with Ryan.

Monroe and her boyfriend (played by Keith Andes) have a smaller role but are just as fascinating a couple, of not ore so than the leads. The final third of this movie didn't match up the first two-thirds or this would be rated at least a 9 simply because of the great dialog in that first hour. There were so many good lines I couldn't count them all. I just wish it had stayed that way all the way thorough.

The fishing docks of San Francisco certainly was a different site, too, for a noir. To me, this should be simply classified as a "drama."

Fmovies: clash by night is a great example of what a difference great acting can make. those were the days! story is full of usual cliches, but stanwyck, paul douglas, robert ryan, and a young marilyn monroe: wow!!! and it shows how sexy a film can be without any "sex scenes" or even a hint of nudity.

Raw, emotional drama with top performances. Seething with pent-up emotions Barbara Stanwyck is the seen it all gal who comes home as she says because she's run out of places to go. She's brilliant here giving a finely judged portrayal of a woman at the end of her rope, you can feel her weariness. Paul Douglas is touching as the somewhat clueless schlub who falls for Barbara and Robert Ryan adds another superior performance to his gallery of less than honorable men. Keith Andes as Barbara's brother is fine even if his character is a sexist jerk. It's interesting to see Marilyn Monroe playing just a regular girl, albeit a very attractive one but no sexpot, coming across well in a part that is an anomaly in her filmography. Moodily directed by Lang which is perfect for the material.

Clash by Night fmovies. Barbara Stanwyck is so good at playing rough-hewn women, characters with a cynical edge, that it's easy to take her presence here for granted. Once again, she is remarkably good as a tough cookie returning to her hometown along the waterfront and eventually reuniting with her estranged brother. Marilyn Monroe is also good as a sassy local girl-- although her lines sound as if they were looped in post-production--and Paul Douglas is terrific as a lovestruck skipper. Tempestuous melodrama is decent fare; it has heated emotions and florid dialogue, but perhaps more subtlety and nuance would've made it a more memorable picture. **1/2 from ****

The subheading in the IMDb page for "Clash by Night" calls this film noir. Many fans of the genre may be disappointed. It does have one of the great film noir directors in Fritz Lang and stars two of the genres foremost performers in Barbara Stanwyck(DOUBLE INDEMNITY) and Robert Ryan(The Set Up). However, the style is more romantic drama than film noir. It reminds me of the filmed plays by Elia Kazan like "A Streetcar Named Desire". It even has a character screaming a name out the window. I guess the crime element is missing here but I guess infidelity would fit. The dialogue is up to the standard you'd expect a luminary like Clifford Odets to create. I was unsure if I would agree with the way the film ended but the characterization and plot were so well done, I knew that the ending would not disappoint. I was right.

Why did Fritz Lang want to make this movie? Did he select the cast? "Clash by Night" was part of the recent TCM tribute to Lang, and following after the early European masterpieces, "Metropolis," and "M," one wonders how much Lang modified and compromised his early filmmaking ideals and style in resettling in Hollywood and jockey for financial support. I've not seen or read the original Odets play on which the film is based, but whatever Lang's reason for choosing it, one has to ask how the finished movie fits into Lang's output, especially the stark, powerful, stylized early pieces. A couple of features stand out: Lang always had a message-- nothing was mere observation -- that shaped the plot and characters' motivations. If Good and Evil stand out too sharply in black and white terms, Lang is still intent on sharp analysis of the turns and twists on the road to Good or Evil. Forces beyond individual characters' control are harnessed and made part of the characters motivations. Then Lang sets them on their inevitable course, and we watch, sometimes in shock or agony.

In "Clash," the imagery-- contrasting shots of sea, clouds, birds,etc, register his endorsement of the natural order of things as Good. In Metropolis, the natural order of humanity toward others was stamped out by the drive for materialism and industrial supremacy, Evil (historically predicating Nazism), symbolized always by the grinding and spouting machinery. All of the characters are tuned to a high pitch and respond with intensity. Lang's style of directing brought out the extremes -- the fortissimos-- in his actors, no matter whom he cast. Lang must have been an extraordinarily demanding director to elicit such razor-edge performances from his actors.

The fact that all the actors in "Clash" are familiar to us from other films meant Lang had to pit them against each other to an even keener degree. They are all desperate for something, whether they reveal it on the surface or not. For an actress like Stanwyck, this was an easily achieved emotional state, and she had to accept the concept of "aging" in her role. If anything, Lang forced her to keep her hard edges up a bit too much, allowing some softening only in the rather quick ending. This bit of character transformation happens only after she sees the true desperation that she's driven Paul Douglas to in the final scene in the film room.

Ah, yes, the film room. If that isn't an obvious set piece, I don't know what is. Ryan, as the third wheel, runs the projectors. Much of his dialogue is double-edged. And Ryan's character is the most desperate, the least yielding, even to Stanwyck, making his profession as a film projectionist ironic and something artificial, compared to the "natural" metier of Douglas and his father's as fishermen. They draw on the bounty of nature and so symbolize -- purposely and obviously -- pure goodness in human nature. Douglas gives a generous, sweet-tough-guy performance that is Ryan's match. Douglas never guesses what temptation he presents to his wife Stanwyck when he casually invites his best friend to stay with them. This generosity extends in particular to his overlooking faults, whether of his leeching uncle or his friend's sarcstic selfishness.

The role of the father, as a link to the Old Country and its solid gold ways is well-placed. His speech at the wedding puts his character in a nutshell: God made love, God made wine, God