Road House (1948)

Road House is in some ways a straight up romance with noir stylizing. The setting is great, out in some isolated and spectacular club/bar of a type once known as a roadhouse (often out of town to avoid local laws about drinking and cavorting). The core is that the troubled and cocky Jefty, played by the inimitable Richard Widmark, wants the troubled Lily, played by a tough Ida Lupino. Widmark as the roadhouse owner is pure Widmark, so that even when he's charming he's scary, and when he's not so charming he becomes demonic. This repels Lupino, who though hard edged is decent deep down, and she falls for the nice guy, played by Cornel Wilde, who is a sweetheart with an inability to stand up for himself. This gets him, and everyone else, into trouble.

The steady, downward drone of this movie from a just barely tense introduction as Lily comes to town to be the new entertainment to a love conflict and a frame up is subtle and effective. Don't look for fireworks--it's all smoke until the very end. A full hour passes before you reach the movie's one major plot twist (the bizarre parole conditions announced in the courtroom),and then the gun has finally been cocked. Now all that we wonder about is how it will go off.

And Lupino. There is no one in Hollywood quite like her, one of the best women for making bitter arrogance smart and snappy. Her husky-voiced singing is far more provocative than awful, and perfect for this roadhouse in some unlikely mountain town fifteen miles from Canada. Not only is Lupino brilliant with her lines, she has brilliant lines to deliver, almost as though she invented them, they fit so well. The fourth main character, the "second woman" played by Celeste Holm (the beguiling voice-over in Letter to Three Wives),seems to have a smaller role, but she's ultimately the sensible and good gal, not as sexed up and headturning as Lupino's Lily, but steady and practical and a key to everyone's salvation in the end.

The camera-work starts out as pretty straight 1940s greatness (aided by an astonishing series of period sets),with Joseph LaShelle as cinematographer building up the drama through the last half hour to some searing, dramatic face shots. The final scenes in the woods presage the similar foggy ending to Gun Crazy, which has more of a cult following (and which has visual innovations this one doesn't),and these scenes are worth the ride by themselves. Director Jean Negulesco has only a few features of note to his credit, but Road House, along with How to Marry a Millionaire and Johnny Belinda, makes a great case for his ability.

It's easy to fault the film for some small things (Pete seems inexplicably powerless to fight the frameup) and even for larger ones (the romance that holds it together isn't all that convincing),but the moods and sets and lines are all great stuff. The plot has some gratuitous moments (including an exhibitionist Lupino) but taken another way they emphasize her difference from the others, her insouciance and her confidence. It's curious, and maybe defining, that the natural match between the troubled characters, the Widmark and Lupino leads, is rejected, but then Lily's shift to Pete ought to catch fire.

In a way, the film's theme, of a man being overwhelmed by his wanting and expecting a woman, is defined best in Lily's matter of fact line, "Doesn't it enter a man's head that a girl can do without him?" Not usually.

Following up his sensational movie debut in Kiss of Death, Richard Widmark got another psychopathic role in Road House. His characterization of Jefty, the owner of a road house in the rural middle west near the Canadian border, is Tommy Udo once again, right down to the maniacal giggle. Good thing for Widmark he got out of that typecasting as soon as he could.

The actors have to be good here because the story as some real big holes in it. Richard Widmark owns the Road House and his World War II buddy Cornel Wilde manages it. Widmark on a trip to Chicago hires a singer, Ida Lupino at a good deal beyond the normal rate. Of course Widmark has other things on his mind for Lupino.

But it's Wilde that Lupino falls for and when they tell Widmark, he goes psycho on them, but in a coldblooded maniacal sort of way. He frames Wilde for embezzlement and then successfully pleads with the judge to suspend the sentence and commit Wilde on parole to Widmark's charge. The rest I won't say.

Celeste Holm is in this film and I'm not sure what her function is other than to be a witness for Wilde and Lupino in the end. But worse than that she's a musical performer who could have been a believable singer. Ida Lupino croaked her numbers out like a bullfrog. The woman, talented actress that she was, could not sing.

The song Again was introduced in Road House and if it could become a hit with Lupino's croaky singing of it, it must be a great song.

A key piece of evidence also turns up rather conveniently in the end to destroy Widmark's nefarious scheme. A piece of evidence that should have been destroyed months ago as a matter of course. I won't say more.

And I also cannot believe that Wilde would have agreed to the parole conditions. Where was his lawyer?

Despite all the holes in this plot, the characterizations of Wilde and Lupino caught in a psychotic's jealous rage ring true. And Richard Widmark was a psychotic for the ages.

Fans of the above players and I'm one of them should see this film. I wish these four had been given a better script.

There is a lot to like about ROAD HOUSE. The plot idea is very good and it's enjoyable throughout. The only problem is that the film really looked like the script should have been polished a bit first as there are just a few too many plot holes--particularly at the end.

The style of this film is rather Film Noir, though it doesn't feature the usual gangsters or cops. Instead, Ida Lupino plays a world-weary lounge singer who acts much like your typical Noir femme fatale. She's a chain-smoking and smart-mouthed dame through and through, though later in the film she inexplicably changed to a "nice girl in bad girl's clothing". This is a bit unexpected because I assumed the film was about how she trapped poor Cornell Wilde in her evil clutches--but the film takes a much more unexpected detour. You see, once Lupino catches Wilde, their boss (Richard Widmark) oddly switches from a nice guy to a calculating psycho bent on destroying the lovers. This is where the plot really kicks into high gear and the next 20 minutes of the film are exciting.

Unfortunately, the ending where there is a final confrontation doesn't work at all because again and again there are plot problems. Widmark is obviously crazy and dangerous, but once Wilde beats him up, he doesn't even bother to tie up Widmark or plug him to make sure he doesn't return for round 2--which he naturally does. Again and again they need to fight off this mad man even though one time should have been enough! Despite the hole-riddled ending, it's still worth seeing because of Lupino's and Widmarks' performances. She is great as the 2nd-rate singer (singing her own songs with a decent but obviously less than stellar voice--which was perfect for the role) and she exuded sleazy sex appeal. Widmark was interesting because he combined two totally different performances in one film--one a nice guy and the other highly reminiscent of his psycho from KISS OF DEATH! A great film? Nah. But an enjoyable bit of Noir, that's for sure.