Ethel Whitehead from THE DAMNED DON'T CRY (1950)

Film noir and its losers...

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Noir-ish melodramas or melodramatic noirs? And where does Pre-Code come into all of this? Because I have always believed that there’s a link somewhere, somehow, between all three. And we all know Joan Crawford is at the centre of it all, more often than not.

Written by Harold Medford and Jerome Weidman, and based on Gertrude Walker’s story ‘Case History’, The Damned Don’t Cry (dir. Vincent Sherman) tells the story of Ethel Whitehead (Joan Crawford), a down-on-her-luck housewife who is unhappy in her marriage and whose only source of happiness is her young son. When he dies in a road accident, she decides to leave her husband and look for a better life elsewhere. She leaves town and starts working low-paying jobs and attracting wealthy customers. Soon, the money starts rolling in and the connections get more and more sophisticated. Ethel Whitehead becomes Lorna Hansen Forbes and Lorna Hansen Forbes becomes a crime syndicate darling.

‘Don’t talk to me about self-respect. That’s something you tell yourself you got when you got nothing else’ Ethel Whitehead

Ethel Whitehead didn’t know what she was getting into, but she knew she wanted to get somewhere. So she tried to go somewhere, be somebody… and she never stopped. And as she went from client to client, man to man, she achieved what she… sort of wanted. She was respected, admired, desired. She was in control, it seems. She had Martin Blackford (Kent Smith), George Castleman (David Brian) and Nick Prenta (Steve Cochran) in the palm of her hand. Until Prenta ended up murdered. This jarring moment opens the film and the rest is told is flashback. Just what happened?

‘This isn’t a party you can leave when you get bored. We could have left, you and I, a long time ago. We were only guests then. But we stayed too late.’ Martin Blackford

Lorna Hansen Forbes/Ethel Whitehead is no different than most noir characters. She had nothing, she wanted the world and she had it for a little bit. Then she realised she asked for too much and got even more than that. The journey we go on with her is a familiar one; one we’ve seen in countless noirs. Joan Crawford gives one of her best performances and we get one of the best-realized characters in early 50s noir. Ethel Whitehead is, above all, a survivor. And what that ending shows us is that, unlike most noir characters, she is invincible.

We bid farewell to Ethel Whitehead and The Damned Don’t Cry. Our next loser is an elusive man, until he isn’t. The film is The Third Man (1949), the actor is Orson Welles and the loser… is Harry Lime.

See you on the sunny side of the street.