Tonight's Movie: Whispering Smith (1948) - A Kino Lorber Blu-ray Review

This month Kino Lorber is releasing some terrific boxed Blu-ray sets.

One of the sets, Western Classics I, was just released this week. It consists of three films in individual cases: WHEN THE DALTONS RODE (1940) starring Randolph Scott, Brian Donlevy, and Kay Francis; THE VIRGINIAN (1946) starring Joel McCrea, Donlevy, and Barbara Britton; and WHISPERING SMITH, starring Alan Ladd, Robert Preston, and Brenda Marshall.

I just watched and thoroughly enjoyed WHISPERING SMITH. I first reviewed the film here over a dozen years ago; in the intervening time I've become a huge fan of Alan Ladd, so I loved circling back to this film after so much time and revisiting it in a fresh context, having seen him in roughly 30 additional films since my first viewing.

The movie begins in fine style with beautiful location photography under the opening credits, scored by Adolph Deutsch. Deutsch began a long association with MGM the same year this film was released.

The credits segue into a shootout which then leads to an evocative nighttime train sequence, where highly regarded railroad detective "Whispering" Smith (Ladd) is unexpectedly reunited with his old friend Murray (Preston), who works for the railroad. Smith is on the trail of a gang which has been robbing the railroad.

Murray is married to Marian (Marshall), and when they're reunited it's soon clear she and Smith still have feelings for one another from days gone by, though they're both honorable people who are loyal to Murray. For his part, Murray is acting increasingly erratically, and it's soon apparent that he's up to no good with local rancher Rebstock (Donald Crisp) and Rebstock's hired gun Whitey Du Sang (an unrecognizable, creepy Frank Faylen).

When Murray is caught looting a wrecked train, he's fired by railroad exec McCloud (John Eldredge) and goes off the deep end, staging repeated train wrecks and robberies with Rebstock's gang. Smith, tasked with putting an end to the mayhem and financial losses, has the painful task of chasing after his one-time pal.

WHISPERING SMITH isn't a perfect movie, but it's one I find very entertaining and enjoy a great deal.

I'll lay the flaws out first, beginning with Marshall as Marian. Marshall was never a multidimensional actress, but I nonetheless have quite a fondness for her; she was a beautiful woman, and I've always enjoyed watching her. Unfortunately in this film she doesn't get to do much more than cry and look sad; part of the problem is that the script by Frank Butler and Karl Kamb doesn't actually give Marian a bigger variety of scenes in the first place. The combination of script and actress leave the character of Marian rather one-dimensional.

Another issue is the frequent mixture of locations with soundstage shots. The movie is very attractively filmed in Technicolor by Ray Rennahan, but it's an odd jumble of effective exteriors, including a nice backlot train station, with soundstage interiors. The strangest moment follows a horse-drawn buggy filmed outdoors, then as the camera pans past a tree the action resumes inside a soundstage. It's extremely noticeable and takes one out of the movie a bit when it's so clear the actors are indoors pretending to be outside.

Finally, there are some noticeable continuity problems, such as Smith knocking a glass off a nightstand, which loudly shatters, but when Marian walks into the room and walks over the area where the glass fell, she doesn't react in the slightest. There's also a harmonica box in the movie which jumps from place to place between shots!

Those are my only quibbles, and in the end they're not particularly big compared to how much I enjoyed the movie. It's a solid, well-paced 88 minutes with the always-compelling Ladd onscreen a majority of the time as he tries to solve the crimes against the railroad. Other than the weak writing of Marian, it's a good story, based on a novel by Frank H. Spearman.

Ladd is great playing his unspoken longing for Marian, and perhaps even better communicating his feelings for his friend Murray; the final scenes with Ladd and Preston have real emotional impact.

Ladd also has some nice lighthearted scenes with actors like Fay Holden, William Demarest, Will Wright, and little Gary Gray (seen here earlier this week in RACHEL AND THE STRANGER).

The deep cast also includes familiar faces like Irving Bacon, Milton Kibbee, Hank Worden, Ray Teal, and Don Barclay. Leslie Fenton capably directed.

The Kino Lorber Blu-ray is a visual treat with excellent sound. The disc includes a commentary by Simon Abrams, a trailer, and an additional trailer for Ladd's BOY ON A DOLPHIN (1957), also available from Kino Lorber.

All in all, watching one of my all-time favorite stars in a gorgeous print of a solid Western rates a definite thumbs up.

I'll be reviewing the other films in the set here at a future date.

Thanks to Kino Lorber for providing a review copy of this Blu-ray.