DECOY (1946) ranks -- alongside Edgar G. Ulmer's DETOUR (1945) -- as probably the most astonishing example of poverty row noir, a potent highball of resolute darkness and perversity, best viewed in the early morning hours, preferably just before dawn.
Released by Monogram Pictures and directed by Jack Bernhard, DECOY also features a stunning central performance by JEAN GILLIE, a British-born actress who, sadly, died in 1949. Gillie plays the girlfriend of a convicted murderer (Robert Armstrong) who is about to take the secret of a buried fortune in stolen cash into the gas chamber. With the help of the prison doctor (Herbert Rudley) who she blatantly seduces, Gillie has concocted a scheme to revive Armstrong through the use of a strange chemical gas ("methelyne blue") after the execution. After doing so, in an inexplicably startling sequence of pure pulp science fiction, Gillie then manipulates Armstrong's henchman (Edward Norris) into bumping off Armstrong once he's forked over a map to the stolen loot--before being knocked off himself by Gillie in a particularly grisly and disturbing scene. Gillie's own retribution comes at the hands of the prison doctor who returns to exact revenge before succumbing to his own violent fate. She eventually dies in the arms of the cop (Sheldon Leonard) who has dogged her from the beginning -- but not before bitterly mocking his heartfelt compassion for her.
This is a film not to be missed under any circumstances, and for discerning viewers an experience not likely to be equaled by many other "B" films. Bernhard directed a number of other interesting poverty row titles (VIOLENCE, 1947; UNKNOWN ISLAND, 1948 among them) but nothing quite as remarkable as DECOY. Jean Gillie, incidentally, was married to Bernhard at the time DECOY was made.
Released by Monogram Pictures and directed by Jack Bernhard, DECOY also features a stunning central performance by JEAN GILLIE, a British-born actress who, sadly, died in 1949. Gillie plays the girlfriend of a convicted murderer (Robert Armstrong) who is about to take the secret of a buried fortune in stolen cash into the gas chamber. With the help of the prison doctor (Herbert Rudley) who she blatantly seduces, Gillie has concocted a scheme to revive Armstrong through the use of a strange chemical gas ("methelyne blue") after the execution. After doing so, in an inexplicably startling sequence of pure pulp science fiction, Gillie then manipulates Armstrong's henchman (Edward Norris) into bumping off Armstrong once he's forked over a map to the stolen loot--before being knocked off himself by Gillie in a particularly grisly and disturbing scene. Gillie's own retribution comes at the hands of the prison doctor who returns to exact revenge before succumbing to his own violent fate. She eventually dies in the arms of the cop (Sheldon Leonard) who has dogged her from the beginning -- but not before bitterly mocking his heartfelt compassion for her.
This is a film not to be missed under any circumstances, and for discerning viewers an experience not likely to be equaled by many other "B" films. Bernhard directed a number of other interesting poverty row titles (VIOLENCE, 1947; UNKNOWN ISLAND, 1948 among them) but nothing quite as remarkable as DECOY. Jean Gillie, incidentally, was married to Bernhard at the time DECOY was made.