I Watch Films: Dark City

Dark City

Charlton Heston’s first professional Hollywood film. A group of gamblers in Chicago have their illegal bookies raided. To try and recoup their losses they scam a guy out of $5,000 at the poker table; he has the money to buy athletics equipment for a club in Los Angeles. The man hangs himself in shame.

His brother, who as flying in to meet him, goes on a revenge spree, strangling one of the gamblers. The survivors try to track him down in Los Angeles, in which Danny, Heston’s character, befriends the dead man’s widow and son under the guise of an insurance man, and comes to regret his part in what happened.

Eventually he flees to Las Vegas and gets a job with an old pal, wins money to send to the widow. He meets his old singer girlfriend Fran, but with unfinished business turns her away, again. There will be a confrontation, and this is a noir film – who will get their comeuppance?

Watch This: For a competent 1950 film noir, lifted by the presence of several superior actors
Don’t Watch This: If you want to know which of the three cities is the Dark City because they never say