3-D Classics on Blu Ray: Inferno (1953)

There is a very odd thing about the existence of Roy Ward Baker's 3D color noir Inferno, and that is the fact that it was made by 20th Century Fox. When 3D movies went big in 1953, most studios eagerly jumped on the bandwagon. Fox, however, was putting their money on CinemaScope, a widescreen process where the image was roughly 2 1/2 times as wide as it was high. Fox did a ton of press for the new process and even snarkily referred to it as "The Modern Miracle You See Without Glasses". And then they turned around and made a movie that is not only one of the top 10 3D movies of the 1950s, it's a top 10 3D movie for all time.

Robert Ryan is Donald Carson III, an arrogant and not particularly likeable businessman. He goes on a trip to the desert with wife Geraldine (Rhonda Fleming) and speculator Joe Duncan (William Lundigan). What he doesn't know is that Geraldine and Duncan are lovers, so when he breaks his leg at the top of a cliff, they take the opportunity to make it look like he got drunk and ran off, effectively abandoning him to die in the desert. Carson realizes that if he's going to get back to civilization, it's going to be on his own.

The performances in this movie are great. Ryan does a lot with just a voice over and his facial expressions. The look of increasing desperation turns him into a more sympathetic character. While he starts the movie as fairly hateful, by halfway through we're completely on his side. In contrast are Fleming and Lundigan. While Lundigan is straight unapologetically evil, Fleming is far more sinister. She seems to be uncomfortable with what they've done, but is totally willing to abandon her lover in the desert the same as her husband. It's equally interesting since this isn't the type of role I'm used to seeing Fleming in. Those three are the majority of the film, but TV fans will get a kick out of seeing Larry Keating (Mr. Drysdale on The Beverly Hillbillies) as Carson's concerned business manager. Universal monster fans will equally enjoy seeing Henry Hull (Werewolf of London) as the desert old timer who ends up helping save Ryan in the end.

Inferno features one of the most stunning uses of 3D ever. Like several great 3D westerns of the era (Hondo, Gun Fury), the movie makes the most of its desert setting. The screen seems to stretch on forever, letting us know just how isolated Carson really is. There's one absolutely dizzying shot from the top of the cliff looking down that gives us a very good idea of just how precarious Ryan's position is. On top of that, the movie employs a trick that most 3D movies of the era did: concentrating on depth, but having gimmick shots during big movies. In fact, most of the gimmick shots in the movie show up during the climactic fight between Ryan and Lundigan. The only knock on the gimmick shots is when Ryan throws a lantern at the camera towards the end, it comes off a bit as a 3 Stooges style 3D effect.

U.K. company Panamint released Inferno on 3D Blu Ray last year, initially only Region B but later making it Region Free. The Blu Ray comes from a restoration done by the late Dan Symmes in which all the misalignments in the film were corrected. The result is a beautiful looking and practically perfect 3D Blu Ray of one of the all time great 3D movies. Only the credits are in reverse 3D and that's the way they were in the original film. Any true 3D fan needs this movie in their collection.

Classic 3D Movie on Blu Ray: Man In The Dark (1953)

This week Twilight Time Home Video released their first classic 3D Blu Ray, Columbia's underrated 1953 noir thriller Man In The Dark.  Okay, classic may be a bit of a strong word to apply to this movie. It's not as good as House of Wax or Dial M For Murder. But it's not nearly as bad as something like Cat Women of the Moon from that era. And it's certainly better than any 3D movie that came out in between 1956 and 2003. Come to it, it's better than quite a few of the modern era films, too. It definitely has better 3D than most modern films, as tends to be the case with these vintage releases.


Man In The Dark stars Edmond O'Brien and Audrey Totter, a pair of noir icons if ever there any. O'Brien is best remembered today as the doomed protagonist of 1950's D.O.A. while Totter tends to get remembered for the oddball version of Lady In The Lake that was shot almost entirely from the hero's perspective. The movie is an apparently loose remake of a 1936 Ralph Bellamy movie called The Man Who Lived Twice. In it, O'Brien is gangster Steve Rawley, convicted of a Christmas Eve payroll heist of $130,000. He agrees to a brain operation that will remove his criminal tendencies in order to cut down on his 10 year sentence. The operation is a success but leaves him with no memory whatsoever of his former life, much to the annoyance of an insurance investigator and Rawley's old gang members, both of whom want to know where he hid the money. Rawley's gang abducts him and tries forcing him to remember. Rawley's moll (Totter) also initially wants him to remember, but then starts to fall in love with the new Rawley. Slowly, through a couple of bizzare dreams, the location of the dough comes back to him, leading up to a climactic chase through a carnival and a battle on top of a rickety wooden coaster.


Man In The Dark was the second 3D movie of the 1950s. After the runaway success of the genuinely bad Bwana Devil, Warner's announced they were working on House of Wax to be the first 3D film by a major studio (Bwana Devil was an independent production). Columbia honcho Harry Cohn decided to steal Warner's thunder and had Man in the Dark quickly rewritten for 3D and shot in 19 days. To pour salt in the wound, they even released the movie two days ahead of House of Wax. Because of this, the movie tends to get a bad rep since it was a low budget quickie. But the 3D camerawork is excellent, with a great sense of depth. The script is at least serviceable and the actors all do professional jobs. The movie also tends to get beat on by certain 3D enthusiasts for having too many gimmick shots. I'm not sure if I saw a different cut than they did, but it doesn't seem to me to be too much. Oh, sure, if you're going to compare it to Dial M For Murder or Miss Sadie Thompson, it's gimmicky. But it's no Comin' At Ya! or Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over either. And almost every gimmick shot in the movie is motivated by the story, not just throw in there unlike too many 80s films. No straws or popcorn being tossed at the audience. And hey, isn't part of the fun of 3D the gimmick shots to begin with? I'd much rather watch something like this than a lot of the modern films which have neither good depth nor good gimmick shots.


The movie is a fun 3D ride but it does have it's issues. The major one is the fact that at 68 minutes, it's actually too short (there's a complaint you don't hear every day). The movie has some interesting
ideas but doesn't have the length to expand on and explore them. Take the insurance investigator Jawald (Dan Riss) for instance. He's as creepy a character as any in the film, knowing where Rawley is being kept but not tipping the police off despite the APB on Rawley. He's also perfectly content to let the gang keep working Rawley over so that he gets led to the money. Then there's the implications of the entire brain operation in the first place. Unfortunately, the movie blows over these things simply because it doesn't have the time to get into them. One gets the feeling that this could have been as classic as noir as D.O.A., but it just misses the mark. That said, it does have some great noir dialogue and more than competent performances from it's cast. And Twilight Time's Blu Ray is exceptional looking.  Limited to only 3,000 copies (as all Twilight Time's Blu Rays are), this is a must own for any fan of 3D or noir.