His Kind of Woman

Dir: John Farrow, Richard Fleischer

1951

****

Howard Hughes’s 1951 His Kind of Woman could easily be overlooked as a standard film noir with a few messy errors but it is actually much more than that. It is well known that Post-production on the film was rife with problems thanks to executive producer Howard Hughes becoming increasingly dissatisfied with director John Farrow. I like the film very much and it isn’t until the final half hour that you would guess that anything was out of the ordinary. Up until that point it is a classy noir with plenty of mystery, a snappy script with a sizzling chemistry between its two leading actors; Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell. Mitchum plays Dan Milner, a down on his luck professional gambler who accepts a mysterious job that will take him out of the country for a year but pays $50,000. He accepts a $5,000 down payment and tickets that will take him to an isolated Mexican resort, Morro's Lodge, where he will receive further instructions. Milner meets Lenore Brent (Jane Russell) in a run down bar next to the airport singing to an empty room. He tries it on but is rejected, as is typical in these sort of films. As luck would have it, she is the only other passenger on his chartered flight to the resort, and he gets a second chance to get to know her (and for her to get to know him). When he arrives, Milner finds that several guests at the luxurious Baja California resort have hidden agendas. He is disappointed to find that Lenore is the girlfriend of famous movie actor Mark Cardigan (Vincent Price) but continues to flirt with her anyway. Just as he becomes frustrated with all the secrecy, he overhears two guests, self-proclaimed author Martin Krafft (John Mylong) and a man named Thompson (Charles McGraw), planning something which he suspects involves him. When Milner confronts them, he is given $10,000 and told that someone is on his way to Baja to see him. Seemingly drunk Bill Lusk (Tim Holt) flies in, despite warnings of very dangerous storm conditions. Milner thinks he must be the contact but when the two are alone, Lusk claims to be an undercover agent for the Immigration and Naturalization Service. He tells Milner that the U.S. government suspects that underworld boss Nick Ferraro (Raymond Burr), deported to Italy four years earlier, is scheming to get back into the country posing as Milner. The two men are a close physical match and Milner is a loner, so no one is likely to miss him. Krafft turns out to be a plastic surgeon. The plot begins to feel far-fetched but it is a relief when things start to happen. However, there are many sub-plots that just feel like time filler. Cardigan's wife Helen (Marjorie Reynolds) and his personal manager Gerald Hobson (Carleton G. Young) show up. She had gone to Reno to get a divorce, though not really intending to go through with it, as she is still fond of her husband. Hobson also thinks it is a poor idea because Cardigan's film contract is expiring and the bad publicity would make it hard to get a new one. With her own plans ruined, Lenore confesses to Milner that she is really just a singer looking to hook a wealthy spouse. Another sub-plot sees Milner shows his softer side when he helps unhappy newly wed Jennie Stone (Leslie Banning) by cheating at poker to win back her husband's gambling losses from investment broker Myron Winton (the great Jim Backus). Things get back on track when Lusk sneaks into Thompson's room and is caught and killed. Milner and Lenore stumble upon his body dumped on the beach and Milner becomes convinced that the dead man must have been telling the truth. The film gets a little strange from then on in as that night, Thompson and his men take Milner to a yacht, that has recently arrived in the bay. Milner is able to pass along a veiled plea for help to Lenore. She persuades Cardigan, who is tired of just pretending to be a film hero, to help out. While the actor keeps the mobsters pinned down with his hunting rifle, Milner sneaks back onto the boat, knowing that the only way out of his mess is to deal with Ferraro once and for all. He is caught and brought to the crime lord. After killing two of the thugs and wounding and capturing Thompson, Cardigan mounts a rescue with the reluctant assistance of the Mexican police and a couple of the more adventurous guests. A gunfight breaks out aboard the boat, followed by a melee. Milner manages to break free and shoot Ferraro dead. Suddenly the film noir thriller turns into an action film with light comedy. Cardigan and his wife are reconciled, leaving Milner and Lenore to finally get together. The last scene isn’t typical either, as Mitchum embraces Russell half way through ironing his underpants, leaving them to burn as the credits roll. Initially Hughes asked director Richard Fleischer to change and re-shoot the ending, estimating that the re-shoot would take ten days or two weeks. Fleischer re-shot most of the film during post production, which he describes in detail in chapter five of his book that was aptly titled Just Tell Me When To Cry. Story conferences between Hughes, Fleischer and the writer Earl Felton, took several months to complete. The big changes to the original were the added new action scenes on the yacht. As more and more action sequences were added in the rewrite, the set was expanded bit by bit to a set for a full size 150-foot yacht, including interiors. After two months of shooting and a month of editing, an hour and 20 minutes of new material had been added to the film. When Hughes viewed the new material, he decided that he did not like Ferraro's original actor, Lee Van Cleef and ordered the scenes with that character re-shot with a different actor. Robert J. Wilke was chosen for the re-shoot after a careful search and screen tests; this second re-shoot involved nearly every scene of the new material and a number of scenes earlier in the picture. Three quarters of the way through this second re-shoot, Hughes saw Raymond Burr in a movie and ordered Wilke's scenes re-shot using Burr. The re-shoots cost about $850,000 to complete, which as it happens was approximately the same amount of money which the film lost in its initial 1951 release. This sort of thing doesn’t happen these days as there aren’t any producers like Hughes anymore but for good reason. No one becomes an executive producer to lose money and films are planned before they are shot. The idea of changing everything after the film has been completed it staggering today but at the time it was done. It’s a good thing too, as I can’t help but think that His Kind of Woman is the father of the action film as we know it today. There is drama, mystery and romance but with humour and character development. I know they are worlds apart but whenever I see Arnold Schwarzenegger’s True Lies or John Woo’s Face/Off, I always think of His Kind of Woman. The Bond films also owe it some gratitude. In all honesty the film is a bit of confusing mess but I love it. The largely improvised script is as sharp as a knife and the cast is brilliant. Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell are perfect opposite one another, Vincent Price and Jim Backus provide comedic light relief, Tim Holt provides the most bizarre fake drunken performance of all time and Ironside (Raymond Burr) is the film’s villain. What’s not to love?