Hey Ho!

Last November I was offline, unable to post. No great problem really, except that I wanted to mark an anniversary on the 10th of the month.

The anniversary, it was, of the day I met the woman whom I called ‘M’, Mavis, a silly name I know, but the one I have selected for my muse, my memory, my dream and my love.

I have written so much about her privately, pages of notes and aborted poems, but have hesitated to make my thoughts public. But the beauty of a blog is that I can give myself the illusion of anonymity and know that only a few people close to me will know the state of my mind, of my heart.

‘My heart’. Those words arouse the cynic within me. I hear him laughing at me. ‘For Christ’s sake, haven’t you learned anything from life? Don’t you know that it never, ever, works? That you always get hurt? That you do a fair bit of hurting yourself?’

But for the first time in years I don’t care. For the first time in years I do care.

*

I met her in an office – let’s call it a bank – where I was transacting some financial matter. She was business-like, but friendly. I detected a sense of humour. I admired the way she dressed and the accent in her voice. I liked the curve at the corners of her mouth, the touch of exoticism in her face, her nose and her eyes. She was slim and her silvery-white hair was threaded through with individual strands of black.

She was beautiful. I realised only later that I had fallen in love.

The older, the wiser? Bollocks! ‘Altior, stultior’ is what I think the Romans said.

*

It took me three months to do anything about it. Three months are pretty precious at my time of life. What happened to that arrogant bastard who once brushed off rejection the way a salesman does, knowing one sale in fifty is a good ratio of success?

But at least I thought I had gauged her personality well enough to know that if I was going to be told to bugger off it would be done in a way considerate of my feelings.

So, in February, we met, and became friends.

Friends.

*

I’ve asked myself why I was so drawn to her. The world is full of attractive women, even Lincoln. What was it that made me want to go and buy flowers – flowers, for heaven’s sake!

She is everything I knew she would be. Hers is the kind of beauty that will never age. And her personality matches it. She is kind, gentle and good. She’s my complete opposite. She’s gregarious, organised, hard-working, positive. My God, she actually likes people! And, not surprisingly, everyone I’ve introduced her to likes her. ‘What a lovely woman,’ they say. With me, it’s ‘Well, he’s all right when you get to know him.’

That’s what they think.

Says it all, doesn’t it?

*

I was doing a crossword the other day. I was struggling until I came across one particular clue. I don’t recall what it was, but the answer came straight into my head and I wrote it in without checking. I didn’t need to check.

The answer was UNREQUITED.

D.O.A. (1950)

Directed by Rudolph Mate; starring Edmond O'Brien

As the credits roll, a man enters a police station and strides purposefully through long corridors until he comes to the door marked ‘Homicide’. He asks for the captain and says he’s there to report a murder.

‘Who was murdered?’

‘I was.’

And the flashback begins. This is film noir. It’s a good opening. Brisk, efficient and arresting. But it’s not maintained, more’s the pity.

Edmond O’Brien is the small-time accountant who fancies a week of fun and relaxation – let’s call it - in San Francisco. When we meet his girlfriend, it’s easy to see why. She’s not exactly a ‘femme fatale’, but she’d certainly be fatal to any man’s enjoyment of life. She whines, she clings and she has a nice line in guilt inducement.

Edmond finds the strength to get to San Francisco and is immediately surrounded by attractive women, each one signalled by an irritating wolf-whistle on the sound track. Having managed, with amazing ease, to pick up a woman in a bar, he has cold water poured over his libido by the arrival of flowers and a ‘missing you already’ note from the girlfriend.

It’s about now that he is poisoned. No, it’s not suicide. It’s a conspiracy. The next morning, feeling that his hangover is unusually bad, he consults a remarkably well-informed doctor, an expert in toxicology, who informs him that he has taken ‘luminous toxin’ and has a day or two to live.

Somewhat taken aback he rushes out and runs through the streets, an impressive sequence, all the better because the crowds on the pavement were probably not informed of what was going on.

A second opinion confirms the first and is reinforced when we actually see the poison glowing in the dark. That settles it. Doomed. There’s nothing left to do but find the man who administered it and solve the mystery.

That’s what the film basically is, a mystery, a standard murder mystery. It attempts to add darkness by the idea of the victim doing the investigation and perhaps a little philosophical weight by alluding to the absurdity of his fate. But this is all forgotten as the puzzle develops with a dizzying parade of look-alike women and villains. O’Brien’s angst is lost in all this. All we get by way of character development is his sudden realisation that he loves his girlfriend. He’s obviously not thinking straight, but then I suppose you can hardly blame him.

It’s a pity, because O’Brien is good. He’s in every scene and carries the whole film. The earliest film of his I recall is The Hunchback of Notre Dame, when he was slim and good-looking and difficult to recognise as the same man hamming it up in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and The Wild Bunch – and let’s not forget The Girl Can’t Help It. Here he’s restrained and solid and makes me wonder if he wasn’t worthy of greater things than he achieved.

My overall judgment: good basic concept, let down by the script. Worth watching for efficiency of direction and photography. And O’Brien’s performance.