The Night Has a Thousand Eyes Francis William Bourdillon (b. 1852) THE NIGHT has a thousand eyes, And the day but one; Yet the light of the bright world dies With the dying sun. The mind has a thousand eyes, And the heart but one; Yet the light of a whole life dies When love…
Tag: spook racket
Spook Racket: Psychic Mafia
Oddly enough in the seemingly endless line of grifters and con artists in and around the spook racket, I had not read this volume. I first ran across the BBC radio series on it — part of their ongoing fascination with grifters like Anna Delvey. Lamar tells his story (with Spraggett’s help) with relish, albeit…
Saturday Matinee: The Clairvoyant (1935)
Apropos for Derby Day (no, the other one, my American friends) I can recommend the early Gainsborough film starring Claude Rains, Fay Wray and Jane Baxter. Rains and Baxter are music hall performers with a mind reader act very familiar to Nightmare Alley fans. It’s a family tradition and they seem happy on the circuit…
Film Noir Friday: Fallen Angel (1945)
FALLEN ANGEL (1945) Dir Otto Preminger Attempting to capture the magic of Laura the year before, Preminger got Dana Andrews back into a fedora and Joseph LaShelle lensing but no Gene Tierney, alas. Instead we have a ripe Linda Darnell as the bad girl Stella (she shines at night of course) and Alice Faye as…
Got Gothic? Turney’s The Other One (1952)
The Dell paper back edition: ‘Black magic — and a modern sorceress!’ That ghastly green: I love it. Last week’s film Back from the Dead was based on this mid-century Gothic thriller and scripted by the author, who certainly streamlined the narrative — perhaps a little too much. By coincidence (or due to us both…
Saturday Matinee: Back from the Dead (1957)
BACK FROM THE DEAD (1957) You know I can’t help but wonder whether Hitchcock saw this before he made Vertigo the next year, but of course I am too lazy at present to do any research on either film. In any case, if he did yer man also decided ‘But why don’t we focus on…
TAROT IN GRESHAM’S NIGHTMARE ALLEY
[N.B. Written when I first heard that GDT was remaking it] When I showed Nightmare Alley to the students in my noir film course, one came up at the end to complain that the tarot readings were way off. I agreed and encouraged him to pick up Gresham’s novel. I assured him that the author cared a…
FFF: The Mystic (1925)
THE MYSTIC (1925) Tod Browning’s silent film can be watched on the ‘tube. Sometimes it shows up on MUBI, too. Of course it involves the ‘spook racket’ and grifting, two things I am fascinated by always. The film opens in the familiar ambience of the traveling carnival, where Aileen Pringle plays the titular role of…
K. A. Laity 