NAKED ALIBI (1954)

Bakery owner Al Willis (Gene Barry) is being held on suspicion of involvement with a series of robberies. The drunken Willis loses control and punches Lt. Parks who punches him back. The department is skittish because of current headlines concerning police brutality, so Joe Conroy, the chief investigator (Sterling Hayden), lets Willis go. In the middle of the night, Parks is shot dead on the street and the cops chase down Willis, who claims he was in a neighborhood church at the time. Despite Willis seeming to be an upright citizen and family man, Joe is convinced that he's guilty. When two other cops who were involved in Willis's interrogation are killed in a car bombing, Joe goes after Willis but a journalist gets a photo of Joe manhandling Willis and he is kicked off the force. Joe hires a private investigator to follow Willis 24/7, which spooks Willis enough that he goes on the run to Border City (i.e., Tijuana) where he hangs out with his mistress Marianna (Gloria Grahame), a second-rate club singer. Now we see what Willis is really like: he practically assaults Marianna backstage, and when he kisses her, he thrusts his whole body against her, over and over. By now, Joe is also in Border City and when he gets rolled by three thugs and knocked unconscious, he is taken into a boarding house where, coincidentally, Marianna also lives. She and a friendly lad named Petey take care of him. Joe doesn't tell Marianna about his mission, but soon he sees her with Willis, and she finds a photo of Willis in Joe's possession. The climax occurs back in California when the destiny of the three main characters plays out.

This little-known film noir doesn't have a great critical reputation because the direction of Jerry Hopper is seen as weak, especially in dialogue scenes. But though the film does bog down a bit at times, I liked it quite a bit. Interior scenes may be unimaginative, but exteriors, shot by Russell Metty (who photographed a wide range of films such as Touch of Evil, Flower Drum Song, Written on the Wind, Spartacus and Thoroughly Modern Millie), are beautiful noir scenes of shadow and light, as pictured above (though the location shooting in Tijuana, which might have been done by a second unit man, leaves something to be desired). The three central performances are all great. Hayden excels as the restless, obsessed cop who presents a deceptively laid-back demeanor. Not a pretty boy, he is beefy and rawly attractive, and Grahame is his equal as a sexy woman a bit past her prime, seemingly unable to imagine a romantic life in which she is not abused. Gene Barry is a revelation; I think of him as an average, tamped-down guy in his famous role on Burke's Law, an actor I might occasionally accuse of phoning in his performance. But here, once we know his character is guilty, he gives a violent, unhinged performance that is, at times, scary. Some critics think he overdoes the psycho aspect of his character, but I think he's spot on. The shots of him banging disturbingly against Grahame while kissing her are startling. The general story line is predictable, and the final chase scene goes on a bit too long, but otherwise this is a noir that is a notch above average. My favorite line: Grahame, to Hayden, "I don't understand you and you don't understand me—we got a lot in common.” Thank you again, Eddie Muller, for showcasing this on TCM's Noir Alley. [TCM]