Laura – (1944) While investigating the murder of Laura Hunt (Gene Tierney), listening to accounts of her brief but remarkable life, detective Mark McPherson (Dana Andrews) falls in love with her. Plenty of suspects are at hand: the cynical but popular newspaper columnist Waldo Lydecker (Clifton Webb), who as her patron helped her rise to prominence in the world of advertising but who jealously interfered with her romantic associations; her fiancé Shelby Carpenter (Vincent Price), who had become entangled with a young model; Mrs Ann Treadwell (Judith Anderson), who schemed to have Shelby for herself; and Laura herself.

Skillful misdirection keeps the murderer hidden in plain sight. “A quiet, streamlined little murder mystery that brought a new adult approach [lots of cigarettes and booze?] to the genre and heralded the mature film noir of the later forties,” Halliwell’s Film Guide. (Farley Granger played Shelby Carpenter’s part in a 1968 TV version of Laura, screenplay by Truman Capote.)

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Copyright © 2007 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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