From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-Jack The Ripper Redux- Douglas Sirk’s “Lured”

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for Douglas Sirk’s Lured.

DVD Review

Lured, starring Lucille Ball, Gorge Sanders, Charles Coburn, directed by Douglas Sirk, United Artists, 1947


Some melodramas try to double as thrillers while others just fall into the film noir melodrama trap and be done with it like the film under review, Douglas Sirk’s Lured. Silk was well-known and respected in this melodrama genre but here his wit has failed him in the thriller department and so what he is left with is a so-so boy meets girl (okay man meets woman) drama that has solving some serial killings as a backdrop. In short the film never did decide whether it was serious about solving crime or was a mere send-up on British detective stories.

Here is the plot to give you an idea of why this one didn’t work out. A London taxi-dancer (dime-a-dance girl, okay) goes missing, adding her name to a long list of unsolved pretty young and unattached young women who have gone missing and who have the authorities worried and perplexed. Her American friend Sandra, played by Lucille Ball, concerned, gets in touch with the peelers (okay, coppers) and is recruited to act as, well, a lure, as bait to bring out the dastardly guy who is committing all the murder.
And so we are on our way.

Well almost, because we all know when there are dastardly deeds afoot the butler or the chauffer or somebody like that is knee-deep in the action. All of this is to telegraph to you that you don’t want to follow that path, look for more upscale villains. And by all means don’t get thrown off by some cuckoo ex-fashion designer or even by some white slavery guys. Look to a certain night club owner, played by George Sanders, a man about town who turns head over heels for our amateur detective Lucy. And she reciprocates. He however is also the prime fall guy. So without going further you can see what I mean when I can’t figure out what this film wanted to be.

But maybe it is more that as a child of 1950s black and white television in America and devoted to the comedy shows like Ms. Ball’s I Love Lucy I find it is hard to image back before that time to a time when she was considered something of a femme. And a femme that would catch the eye of a debonair Georges Sanders and have him swooning. Personally I don’t see it. Yes, maybe it is just that, that snappy New York City working class girl meets London swell thing that doesn’t work for me. If you check this one out keep that in mind.