Vicki (1953)

the audience applauded

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties. It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

Richard Boone singlehandedly lifts this modest but engaging whodunit to a higher plane: from a regular "genre piece" to a psychological study on obsession, delusion and loneliness. The cop he plays (also a suspect) is creepy, disturbing, and ultimately pitiable. In addition, Jean Peters (the murder victim, seen only in flashbacks) is one of the sexiest actresses of her era. *** out of 4.

***SPOILERS*** On his first vacation in years New York cop Let. Ed Cornell, Richard Boone, sees the local newspapers headline story of the brutal murder of top fashion model Vicki Lynn, Jean Peters. It's then without as much as a second thought Let. Cornell drops everything and shoots back to the Big Apple in trying to solve Vicki's murder.With Vicki's publicist Steve Christopher, Elliott Reid, found at Vicki's murder scene, her hotel room, it becomes very obvious to Let. Cornell that he's the murderer and doesn't bother looking for anyone else. Even though Christopher emphatically denies killing Vicki saying that he just happened to come upon the scene after Vicki's killer left the room. Despite being brutalized by a brutish Let. Cornell, who in some scenes looks and behaves like the famed movie Creeper Rando Hatton, Christopher sticks to his story; As him being the wrong man in the wrong place at the right time, for Let. Cornell, when Vicki was murdered!It's later when Christopher checks out Vicki's murder for himself that he runs into her big sister Jill, Jeanne Crain, whom she shared her hotel room with. It's Jill that informs Christopher about this creepy looking guy who was aways watching her little sister when she was a waitress at the Webster Cafeteria in midtown Manhattan. Even though the very outwardly and sociable Vicki took it all in stride Jill was very concerned about him and what he had in mind for her kid sister! It later turned out that this weirdo was non other then Let. Ed Cornell! The man who insisted to be placed in charge of the Vicki Lynn murder case!Re-make of the 1941 film noir classic "I Wake up Screaming" the movie Vicki is pretty good on its own merits. Jean Peters is absolutely gorgeous as the ill fated Vicki Lynn whom men just go completely bananas over at the very sight of her. In fact it was Vicki's haunting and smoldering, as well as all-American girl, good looks that in the end lead to her brutal murder! Let. Cornell had it in for Steve Christopher even before Vicki's murder in him being jealous of Christopher being Vicki's lover, which in fact he wasn't, while he, an admitted Peeping Tom, was left out in the cold, with his raincoat, or the outside looking in.****SPOILERS**** As we and Christopher later learn it was Let. Cornell who was at the Vicki Lynn murder scene doing his usual Peeping Tom act by staying hidden in her closet. And it was Let. Cornell, in not wanting to expose himself, who let her killer go free. Not wanting to be exposed as some kind of pervert, why was he hiding in Vicki's hotel room in the first place, Let.Cornell instead turned his sights on the innocent Steve Christopher who dropped in to see Vicki after her killer checked out! Not because Christopher murdered Vicki but because it was him, not Let. Ed Cornell, whom she was in love with!

Before it collapses under the weight of cliché and wooden performances Vicki is a suspenseful whodunit that keeps you second guessing most of the way. In a triumph of form over content this Laura lookalike is textbook economical story telling in its first half hour as tight editing and revealing composition give the film a well ordered pace and a handful of plausible suspects.Overnight, cafeteria waitress Vicki (Jean Peters) becomes an instant celebrity when she catches the eye of an actor and a theatre critic who promote her. Confident and ambitious she sets her sights on Hollywood but is brutally murdered. An obsessive detective (Richard Boone) demands to be put on the case and his judgment and intent is soon called into question.Vicki is filled with Freudian and fetish inferences. Suspect intent is ambiguous and the police are brutal in their methodology. All of the characters are petty and unremarkable which levels the playing field most of the way and allows the mystery to flourish. The imagery runs from striking to banal and some of the turns at the end defy logic but for the most part it does what a good mystery does-keep you in the dark for as long as possible.

Richard Boone steals the show here as a completely demented cop. He screams at everyone while harboring a deep secret of resentment.The picture starts with a picture of the murdered Vicki on the wall. I immediately thought of 1944's "Laura," but it was not meant to be.The picture offered Eliot Reid, a usual second-hand jerk in films, the opportunity of a life-time in playing a Broadway promoter, hounded by Boone as the major suspect in Vicki's murder.Boone is a cross between Inspector Javers and the Columbo characters. He screams and is vicious in his ways of trying to obtain the truth. Truth is he knew the real story here and covered it up to get revenge on the man he thought took Vicki away from him. This is where the picture falls apart- the completely off-the-wall cop is hard to swallow yet alone fathom.Jeanne Crain stars as Vicki's sister, but the plot does her in as well as the picture. Interesting to see Max Showalter in a small role as a newspaper writer. He co-starred with Peters in "Niagara" and was memorable in "With A Song in My Heart," as well as a one-scene stealer as the deaf mute whose hearing is restored in "Elmer Gantry."