Ida Lupino (1918-1995) is best known as an actress whose career spanned over 30 years and included such Hollywood classics as HIGH SIERRA, LADIES IN RETIREMENT, and THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES. It is only in recent years that her work as a pioneering female director of film and television is finally being recognized. Between 1949 and 1966 she directed 9 films and over 100 episodes of various TV shows including THE TWILIGHT ZONE, HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL, THRILLER, & GILLIGAN’S ISLAND. 6 of her films (including the 4 in this set) were made between 1949 and 1953.
This Kino Lorber set features her first 2 films (NOT WANTED, NEVER FEAR) which were made in 1949 and two from 1953 (THE HITCHHIKER, THE BIGAMIST). Left out were her most controversial film OUTRAGE which deals with the aftermath of a rape and THE HARD, THE FAST & THE BEAUTIFUL about a female tennis player and her domineering mother. 3 of the 4 deal with social issues while THE HITCHHIKER is a thriller in the film noir tradition. Tired of being given increasingly uninteresting parts after World War II, Lupino and her then husband Collier Young founded The Filmmakers, an independent company that wanted to produce small low budget films that dealt with social issues as seen and experienced from a woman’s point of view. All of these movies were made for less than $200,000 and most were shot on location in Los Angeles and the surrounding area.
Her first film, NOT WANTED, was to have been called OUT OF WEDLOCK but the censors objected. The movie is about an unmarried young woman (Sally Forrest) who has a child . It starts off with her in jail reflecting on how she got there. The story then unfolds in flashback. Bored with her small town existence, waitress Sally Kenyon falls for handsome, brooding piano man Steve (Leo Penn). After he skips town she meets crippled war veteran Drew (Keefe Brasselle) but then discovers that she is pregnant. She winds up in a home for unwed mothers, has her baby and gives it up for adoption. Sad and depressed she picks up a baby from a stroller and is arrested for kidnapping. Lupino co-wrote and co-produced the film and took over the direction early on but the on screen credit went to Elmer Clifton.
She is fully credited for her next film NEVER FEAR (also 1949) which features the same two young leads (Forrest & Brasselle) and deals with a dancer who is stricken with polio. Lupino herself contracted polio at age 16 but she recovered, making this film almost autobiographical. It’s a fascinating look at how polio was viewed and treated before the advent of the Salk vaccine. An unforgettable set piece is an old fashioned square dance done by people in wheelchairs. The film ends on an upbeat note as the dancer regains the use of her legs and may even dance again.
The third film in the set and by far the best known is THE HITCHHIKER from 1953. This film-noirish character study stars William Talman in his best known role before becoming the DA on PERRY MASON. He plays a psychopathic killer who holds two men (Frank Lovejoy and Edmond O’Brien) hostage as he tries to escape to Mexico. This is Ida’s most polished film thanks to rugged location shooting and the RKO tech crew she used, most of whom had worked previously on the Noir classic OUT OF THE PAST (1947) and the Val Lewton horror films from earlier in the decade.
Lupino’s last film before spending the next 13 years in television was 1953’s THE BIGAMIST featuring a love triangle between Joan Fontaine, Edmond O’Brien, and Ida herself. It marked a return to her “social problem” theme and its box office failure bankrupted her company and sent her off to the greener pastures of the small screen. Even though the O’Brien character is punished in the end for having two wives, he is treated with compassion not revulsion and that was just too much for 1953 audiences.
All four films in this new Kino Lorber Blu-Ray edition are digitally restored and probably look better than when they were first released. They came from 4 different sources which shows how scattered and how disregarded Lupino’s directorial efforts were. Luckily they were found and restored and are now available for a whole new generation of filmmakers to study and appreciate. Film lovers can do the same. While they are not long lost cinematic treasures, they are thoughtful and well made movies. They show that social issues and low budget filmmaking are still vital to an art form which has grown increasingly commercial and demographically challenged in the 21st century.
The Capsule Critic 