Naked Alibi (1954)

Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Good concept, poorly executed.

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

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

This is top-notch noir. The queen of the femme fatales, Gloria Grahame is perfectly cast in this sleazefest. Even the miscast Gene Barry (Bat Masterson, War of the Worlds) as a really bad guy is very good in the film as well. It was amusing to see Chuck Conners (The Rifleman, The Big Country) as a cop; a role he was well-suited for. He was a much better actor than baseball player. The story is pretty good with one exception; why would you hold on to a gun that killed a cop if you were wealthy? The escalation of violence and the gruff Sterling Hayden (perfectly cast) harassing the suspect from the beginning of the film without let-up is perfectly logical, although not legally sound. The film is in the top echelon of this genre; don't miss it.

With having seen actor Sterling Hayden mentioned in a number of posts on various IMDb boards for the last few months,I was thrilled,when a DVD seller revealed that he had recently tracked down a near forgotten Hayden Film Noir,which led to me getting ready to see an alibi undress.The plot:Attempting to beat a confession out of him, Chief Joe Conroy and his fellow police officers find out that due to a strong alibi and a lack of evidence,that Al Willis must be freed from his cell.Shortly after Willis is freed,two of the officers that beat him up are killed.Suspecting Willis,Conroy goes to interrogate Willis,but is caught in a photo threatening him,which leads to Conroy getting fired from the force.Trusting his instincts,Conroy decides to go above the law and secretly follow Willis.Quickly finding out that Willis has suddenly decided to stay in a different town for a few days,Conroy decides to follow Willis on his "travels" in the hope of being able to finally undress his alibi.View on the film:For the opening 30 minutes,the screenplay by Lawrence Roman, J. Robert Bren and Gladys Atwater offers a tantalising glimpse that the movie may give the characters a real moral ambiguity,thanks to Conroy acting more like a real gangster than Willis ever does.Disappointingly ,once Conroy and Willis head to a new town,the writers give up on any criss-crossing morals,and instead give them each clear moral lines,which whilst they lead to a nice,downbeat Film Noir ending,do lead to the movie really struggling to build any tension.Matching Jerry Hooper's rather stilted directing, Hayden gives an unexpected stoic performance as Conroy,with Hayden giving Conroy a calmness when the character should have a real thirst for Willis blood.Keeping the character away from any hint of being straight-lace, Gene Barry gives a very good maniacal, smirking performance as Willis,with Barry showing Willis increasing desperation to keep his alibi naked.

This is worth watching because Gloria Grahame is in it. But otherwise it is a rather disappointing noir. Gene Barry certainly manages to be very menacing and volatile as the bad guy. Sterling Hayden is rather wooden as the tough cop. But Gloria Grahame, though she is not particularly good at shimmying when she sings, keeps our attention with her pouty lip, her doubtful look, her slumbering voice, her worldly-wise fragility, and all those other qualities too numerous to mention which are irresistible about her. So consider this 'a minor Gloria Grahame picture' and it is at least able to entertain, if not to enthrall.

Two great film noir actors - Sterling Hayden and Gloria Grahame - star in this movie. Hayden is excellent as a tough cop bound-and-determined to get a killer than has been turned free (Gene Barry).Barry is very good as the criminal who falsely claims "police brutality." In that respect, this movie was ahead of its day as that term became widely used two decades later.Overall, this a good film noir that's a bit different from the normal fare, but certainly not different when it comes to great noir photography and good suspense. Where is the DVD of this film? (In fact, where was the VHS, in the first place?)