While the film's title cards feature a copyright claim, a notice was not properly filed, and in 2007 the United States Copyright Office ultimately rejected the notice.[4][5]
Plot
The film
Police Lt. Leonard Diamond is on a personal crusade to bring down the sadistic gangster Mr. Brown. He is also dangerously obsessed with Brown's girlfriend, the suicidal Susan Lowell. His main objective as a detective is to uncover what happened to a woman called "Alicia" from the crime boss's past.
Mr. Brown, his second-in-command McClure, and thugs Fante and Mingo kidnap and torture the lieutenant, then pour a bottle of alcohol-based hair tonic down his throat before letting him go. Diamond eventually learns through one of Brown's past accomplices, Bettini, that Alicia was actually Brown's wife. Bettini suspects that Alicia was sent away to Sicily with former mob boss Grazzi, then murdered, tied to the boat's anchor, and permanently submerged. Diamond questions a Swede named Dreyer, who was the skipper of that boat but now operates an antiques store as a front, bankrolled by Brown. Dreyer denies involvement and does not want to disclose anything to Diamond, but is nonetheless murdered by McClure shortly after leaving his shop later that day.
Diamond tries to persuade Susan to leave Brown and admits he might be in love with her. He shows her a photo of Brown, Alicia and Grazzi together on the boat. Susan finally confronts Brown about his wife and is told she is still alive in Sicily, living with Grazzi.
Brown orders a hit on Diamond. However, when his gunmen Fante and Mingo go to Diamond's apartment, they mistakenly shoot and kill Diamond's burlesque dancer girlfriend Rita instead. Diamond sees an up-to-date photo of Alicia but realizes it wasn't taken in Sicily (since there's snow on the ground). This leads Diamond to suspect Brown did not kill Alicia but his boss Grazzi instead. Diamond is able to track Alicia to a sanitarium, where she is staying under another name. He asks for her help.
Meanwhile, Brown's right-hand man, McClure, wants to take over. He plots with Fante and Mingo to ambush Mr. Brown, but they betray and murder him. McClure is dependent upon a hearing aid. Fante and Mingo dismantle it and machine gun McClure in pantomime silence, unable to hear his pleas for mercy.
At police headquarters, Brown shows up with a writ of habeas corpus, effectively preventing Alicia testifying against her husband. Brown also takes a big stash of "money" to Fante and Mingo while they are hiding out from the police, but the box turns out to contain a bomb that apparently kills both of them.
Brown shoots Diamond's partner, Sam, and kidnaps Susan, planning to fly away to safety. However, Mingo survived the assassination attempt by Brown, and he confesses to Diamond that Brown was behind all the murders while sobbing over the body of his cohort. Alicia is able to help Diamond figure out that Brown took Susan to a private airport where he intends to board his getaway plane.
However, Brown's plane does not show up and the film climaxes in a foggy hangar shootout. Susan shines the fog lamp from Brown's car in his eyes, effectively blinding him, allowing Diamond to arrest him. The last scene shows the silhouetted figures of Diamond and Susan in the fog, considered to be one of the iconic images of film noir.
The film was initially called The Hoodlum based on a story by Philip Yordan. It was originally going to be directed by Hugo Fregonese for producer Milton Sperling.[6] Sperling tried to cast Spencer Tracy for the lead.[7] The script was reportedly in great demand with Yordan apparently turning down offers of $75,000.[8]
Eventually the film was a co production between Theodora, the production company of Cornel Wilde and Jean Wallace, and Security, a company of Phil Yordan and Sidney Harmon.[9] Wilde changed the title to "The Big Combination" and Jean Wallace suggested it be shortened to "The Big Combo".[10]
Jack Palance was originally cast opposite Wilde. Filming was brought forward to start September 7, because of studio space availability. Palance dropped out of the film, claiming he wanted a week off after finishing Victor Saville's The Silver Chalice (1954) with Virginia Mayo and Paul Newman in his first movie role. Another source says Palance was unhappy his wife was not cast in the second female lead.[11] He was replaced by Richard Conte. Conte's casting meant the start date for another film, Cry Vengeance, had to be pushed back.[12]
The film also marked the conclusion of Helen Walker's film career; she was consigned to a small role in The Big Combo.
The iconic airport conclusion to the film demonstrates John Alton's cinematographic style
The staff at Variety magazine liked the film's direction, music and photography, despite "a rambling, not-too-credible plot." They wrote, "Performances are in keeping with the bare-knuckle direction by Joseph Lewis and, on that score, are good. Low-key photography by John Alton, one of his best,[13] and a jazz-derived score by David Raksin with solo piano by Jacob Gimpel are in keeping with the film's tough mood."[14]
Later reviews of the movie are mostly positive.
In 2004 Chris Dashiell on the website CineScene found the dialogue "run of the mill" but praises the film's director, writing that "Lewis had a remarkable ability to infuse poetry into the most banal material, and The Big Combo is one of his best efforts... it's not as startlingly inventive as Lewis's best film, Gun Crazy (1949), but it's a quality B-film, satisfying and dark."[15]
Film critic Ed Gonzalez lauded the film in his 2006 review, writing, "Shadows and lies are the stars of The Big Combo, a spellbinding black-and-white chiaroscuro with the segmented texture of a spider's web ... John Alton's lush camera work is so dominant here you wouldn't know Joseph H. Lewis was also behind the camera. The story doesn't have any of the he-she psychosexual politicking that juices the director's Gun Crazy, but that's no loss given this film's richer returns. The set-pieces are fierce, as is the Casablanca tweak of the last shot, and Wallace's performance—a sad spectacle of a hurting creature caught between light and dark, good and evil—is one of noir's great unheralded triumphs."[16]
A pair of late 20th century critics compared the quality of The Big Combo to Fritz Lang's The Big Heat as one of the great film noir detective classics in terms of style.[17]
In 2019 the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 93% of critics gave the film a positive review, based on 13 reviews, with a weighted average of 7.00/10.[18]
Home media
The film was released on Blu-ray by Olive Films in 2013 with a restoration completed by UCLA Film & Television Archive and the Film Foundation.[19] A new HD restoration was completed in 2018 by Arrow Films in the UK.[20]
Soundtrack
Most film noir movies feature scores that are orchestral, with strings. In contrast, The Big Combo is one of the few that have a score with brass and trumpets and with woodwinds and saxophones.[citation needed] In a scene, pianist Jakob Gimpel (credited as Jacob Gimpel) appears playing Chopin's Scherzo No. 3, Op. 39. In a previous one his performance of the same piece had been heard from a recording.
Cornel Wilde was a Hungarian-American actor and filmmaker.
Nicholas Peter Conte, known professionally as Richard Conte, was an American actor. He appeared in more than 100 films from 1939 through the 1970s, including I'll Cry Tomorrow, Ocean's 11, and The Godfather.
David Raksin was an American composer who was noted for his work in film and television. Raksin had more than 100 film scores and 300 television scores to his credit. Some sources called him the "Grandfather of Film Music".
Wintertime is a 1943 Twentieth Century-Fox musical film directed by John Brahm and starring Sonja Henie and Cesar Romero. It also features Woody Herman and His Orchestra.
Jean Wallace was an American television and film actress.
Philip Yordan was an American screenwriter, film producer, novelist and playwright. He was a three-time Academy Award nominee, winning Best Story for Broken Lance (1954).
The Chase is a 1946 American film noir directed by Arthur Ripley. The screenplay by Philip Yordan is based on Cornell Woolrich's 1944 novel The Black Path of Fear. It stars Robert Cummings as Chuck Scott, a veteran who suffers from hallucinations. When he returns a lost wallet to violent mobster Eddie Roman, Eddie offers to hire him as a chauffeur. Chuck becomes mixed up in a plot to help Eddie's wife Lorna run off to Havana to escape her cruel husband.
Edward Small was an American film producer from the late 1920s through 1970, who was enormously prolific over a 50-year career. He is best known for the movies The Count of Monte Cristo (1934), The Man in the Iron Mask (1939), The Corsican Brothers (1941), Brewster's Millions (1945), Raw Deal (1948), Black Magic (1949), Witness for the Prosecution (1957) and Solomon and Sheba (1959).
House of Strangers is a 1949 American black-and-white drama film directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and starring Edward G. Robinson, Susan Hayward, and Richard Conte. The screenplay by Philip Yordan and Mankiewicz is the first of three film versions of Jerome Weidman's novel I'll Never Go There Any More, the others being the Spencer Tracy western Broken Lance (1954) and The Big Show (1961).
Susan Slept Here is a 1954 American romantic comedy film directed by Frank Tashlin and starring Dick Powell and Debbie Reynolds. Shot in Technicolor, the film is based on the play of the same name by Steve Fisher and Alex Gottlieb. Tashlin later revised the film's plotline and reused it in 1962 for the production Bachelor Flat. Comedian Red Skelton has a minor role.
Forever Amber is a 1947 American romantic historical drama film starring Linda Darnell and Cornel Wilde. It was based on the book of the same title by Kathleen Winsor. It also starred Richard Greene, George Sanders, Glenn Langan, Richard Haydn, and Jessica Tandy.
Woman's World is a 1954 American CinemaScope and print by Technicolor drama film about corporate America directed by Jean Negulesco and starring Clifton Webb, June Allyson, Van Heflin, Lauren Bacall, Fred MacMurray, Arlene Dahl and Cornel Wilde. The screenplay concerns three men who compete for the top job at a large company.
Seven Cities of Gold is a 1955 American historical adventure film directed by Robert D. Webb and starring Richard Egan, Anthony Quinn and Michael Rennie, filmed in DeLuxe Color and CinemaScope. It tells the story of the eighteenth-century Franciscan priest, Father Junípero Serra and the founding of the first missions in what is now California. The screenplay is based on the 1951 novel The Nine Days of Father Serra by Isabelle Gibson Ziegler. The tag line of the film was "This is the story of the making ...and the forging...of California...when men chose gold or God...the sword or the Cross".
Valentino is a 1951 American biographical film directed by Lewis Allen and starring Anthony Dexter and Eleanor Parker.
Star of India is a 1954 British-Italian swashbuckling adventure film directed by Arthur Lubin and starring Cornel Wilde, Jean Wallace, Herbert Lom, and Walter Rilla. It was shot at the Riverside Studios in London and on location in Aosta. The film's sets were designed by the art director Cedric Dawe. It was released in the United States in April 1956 by United Artists.
Beyond Mombasa is a 1956 Technicolor adventure film directed by George Marshall and starring Cornel Wilde, Donna Reed and Leo Genn. It was set in Kenya and shot on location there and at the Elstree Studios near London. The film's sets were designed by the art director Elliot Scott.
Joe MacBeth is a 1955 British–American crime drama, directed by Ken Hughes and starring Paul Douglas, Ruth Roman and Bonar Colleano. It is a modern retelling of Shakespeare's Macbeth, set in a 1930s American criminal underworld. The film's plot closely follows that of Shakespeare's original play. It has been called "the first really stand out movie" of Hughes' career.
Storm Fear is a 1955 American crime drama film noir directed by Cornel Wilde, starring himself, Jean Wallace and Dan Duryea. It was Wilde's feature directorial debut.
Passion is a 1954 American Western film directed by Allan Dwan and written by Howard Estabrook, Beatrice A. Dresher and Joseph Lejtes. The film stars Cornel Wilde, Yvonne De Carlo, Raymond Burr, Lon Chaney Jr., Rodolfo Acosta and John Qualen. The film was released on October 6, 1954, by RKO Pictures.
Slaves of Babylon is a 1953 American adventure film directed by William Castle and starring Richard Conte and Linda Christian
↑ Schallert, Edwin (Sep 16, 1953). "Warners, Metro Slate African Subjects; Jimmy Wakely Back in Cinema". Los Angeles Times. p.B9.
↑ SCHALLERT, EDWIN (Oct 12, 1953). "Drama: 'Hannibal' Lurks as Big New Italian Undertaking; Phillip Terry Resuming". Los Angeles Times. p.B9.
↑ Schallert, Edwin (23 June 1954). "'Big Combo' Will Star Cornel Wilde; Vanessa Brown Debates Musical". Los Angeles Times. p.B7.
↑ THOMAS M. PRYOR Special to The New York Times.22 June 1954. "PALLADIUM STARS SOUGHT FOR MOVIE: History of Famous London Music Hall Would Include American Entertainers". p.24.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
↑ HEDDA HOPPER (July 9, 1954). "Jean Wallace to Act Opposite Her Husband". Los Angeles Times. p.B6.
↑ "MOVIELAND BRIEFS". Los Angeles Times. Sep 1, 1954. p.21.
↑ THOMAS M. PRYOR (Sep 1, 1954). "PALANCE LEAVES 'BIG COMBO' FILM: Richard Conte Will Replace Actor in Co-Starring Role -- Prologue for '7 Year itch'". The New York Times. p.32.
↑ Kemp, Philip. International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers. Vol 4: Writers and Production Artists, New York-London, 2000.
↑ Variety. Staff film review, December 31, 1954. Last accessed: March 18, 2024.
↑ Silver, Alain, and Elizabeth Ward, eds. Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style, film noir analysis by Carl Macek, page 29. Woodstock, New York: The Overlook Press, 3rd edition, 1992. ISBN0-87951-479-5.
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