Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for the film Hangover Square.
DVD Review
Hangover Square, Laird Cregar, George Sanders, Linda Darnell, 20th Century Fox, 1945
Yah, not all film noir is created equal. And not all crime noir either. This one is kind of ho-hum ( I am being kind) about a late 19th century English composer who has this odd-ball habit of doing murderous things when he hears strange sounds in his head and steps away from being a skillful composer to turn into British pyscho (including some bizarre cinematic tricks to show this transformation , really bizarre). Of course, the old story is he can’t remember (until it is too late) that he off-handedly put to flames a few victims after murdering them. Including one gold-digging songstress who played him the fool just once too often, and maybe we will cry few tears over. Naturally she had to go up in flames, since this film is supposed to take place in 19th century London, on Guy Fawkes Day, leaving all those Americans not familiar with the Gunpowder Plot, with early Stuart kingship history, and with no clue why that day is important to put a two-timing (maybe three) wench to the bonfire a little befuddled. Naturally those who live by the flame must die by the flame and so our composer (and perhaps this film) suffer that fate.
