Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Fresh and Exciting

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

Every scene is absolutely exciting, offering us something to ponder about who we really are as human beings and what we'd do if we had the chance to fulfill our desires! The direction is fierce and the viewer is not let off the hook for even a moment. The mood is heart pounding with Lizabeth Scott and Dan Duryea edging to out manipulate the other, delivering some of most thrilling dialogue written for a noir: "Don't ever change, Tiger. I don't think I'd like you a heart". Set against the brilliant dark and seedy landscapes that make noir terrific, Too Late For Tears is an excellent noir and a great example to get someone interested in the genre. It is terrific that the Film Noir Foundation has restored this and released it on BluRay. It it is one of my all-time favorites and certainly ranks among the top of the genre.

Made in 1949 this is one of those films that is a must for all noir fans. Do be warned though as this fell out of copyright some years ago and was widely duplicated – often very badly – but this is the restored version and is an absolute gem.Late one night a couple are driving to a party that is far from inviting when a slow car tosses a bag into their open top car. The bag is choc full f cash. The wife is Jane Palmer (Lizabeth Scott) and she decides that she is going to hang onto the cash – despite what her husband wants. So she decides to convince him to keep it. He is cut from a different cloth and it soon becomes apparent how far she will go to keep it.Now Lizabeth Scott is a show stealer here and that is even though everyone else is great too. She is so convincing as the manipulative and self centred vixen and I just loved it. As I said earlier watch out for poor copies or better still get the restored version. For those of you that love fashion, there are some timeless and elegant gowns on display here too and the men all wear zoot suits so you can't win 'em all. This is a must for all fans of the genre and one that has aged with style.

It's not unusual for a story to begin with a situation in which a character suddenly finds themselves in possession of a sum of money that isn't theirs but what makes this movie so enthralling is the nature of the character in question. As a child, this woman's experience of being brought up in a middle class family that couldn't "keep up with the Joneses" scarred her mentally and emotionally with the result that when her opportunity to become wealthy came along, she wasn't going to stop at anything to achieve her most cherished ambition. Murder, manipulation and deception are just part of her stock-in-trade as she wilfully damages and destroys the lives of the people around her in a way that's incredibly ruthless, cold-hearted and self-serving.One dark evening, Alan Palmer (Arthur Kennedy) and his wife Jane (Lizabeth Scott) are driving along a quiet mountain road outside Los Angeles when a bag full of cash is suddenly thrown into the back seat of their car from a vehicle that's travelling in the opposite direction. After being chased by another car for a little while, they successfully escape and head home where they discover that the bag contains $60,000. Alan is nervous about having the cash in his possession and wants to hand it in to the police as soon as possible but Jane is determined to keep the money and so persuades her husband to take a little time before making a final decision on what to do with their windfall. A little later, Alan leaves the bag in a locker at Union Station and puts the ticket in his jacket pocket.Next morning, Danny Fuller (Dan Duryea) who says he's a private detective, calls at the Palmers' apartment and tells Jane that he's come to collect the cash. She tells him that the money's already been handed in to the police and so he leaves but promises to return if her story doesn't check out. When he inevitably returns, they initially argue but then come to an agreement to share the cash. As Jane knows that Alan would never go along with this arrangement, she kills her husband at a nearby boating lake and persuades Danny to help her dispose of the body. Jane reports Alan's disappearance to the police and tells her sister-in-law Kathy (Kristine Miller) that she thinks he's taken off to Mexico with a girlfriend. Kathy, who lives in the same apartment building, doesn't believe this story and becomes very suspicious of Jane.A man called Don Blake (Don DeFore) who introduces himself as an old wartime buddy of Alan's, soon becomes friendly with Kathy who now has Alan's locker ticket in her possession and together they attempt to find out what's really happened to her brother.The plot of "Too Late For Tears" (aka "Killer Bait") is complicated by a succession of identity issues which begin with the way in which the money comes into the possession of the Palmers and then becomes even more involved as neither Danny Fuller nor Don Blake are who they originally claim to be (with Danny also posing as Alan at one stage). The main focus of the movie, however, is on its extraordinary femme fatale whose greed for wealth knows no limits. Her ability to manipulate men by either acting seductively or threatening them in some way is remarkably successful with one notable exception and the way in which she overwhelms Danny, sees him transform from being a menacing character to one who becomes fearful and very malleable.Lizabeth Scott takes full advantage of the opportunities that her role offers as she skilfully switches her behaviours and expressions whenever the need arises and in the process, makes Jane's wickedness and motivations absolutely clear. Good performances from the rest of the cast (especially Dan Duryea) add greatly to the enjoyment but ultimately, this is Lizabeth Scott's movie all the way.

****SPOILERS**** The husky voiced and icy blond Liazebth Scott is at her deadly best here as the smoldering Jean Palmer who's responsible for the death of three men including her clueless husband Alan, Arthur Kennedy, whom she deep sixth, after shooting him, when he found out what she was really up to. That in splitting her ill gotten gains, $60,000.00, that literally dropped into her lap with her hoodlum boyfriend Danny Fuller, Dan Duryea, whom she later ended up poisoning.It was Jane in her obsession of getting her hands on the $60,000.00 that was meant for Fuller, in a blackmail payoff, that in the end destroyed herself as well. The key to all this carnage was the mysterious Don Blake, Don Defore, who pooped up out of nowhere after Jane dispatched, at the bottom of a lake, her husband Alan. Claiming to be in the same US Army Air Force unit in England with Alan during the war Blake won over her confidence in not quite realizing what his true motives were.***SPOILERS*** The kicker that deflated Janes plans happened when she thought she was home free with the 60 G's down Mexico way. It's then, after she had already murdered two person, that Blake sprung a trap on her in exposing another murder, or suicide, that she was responsible for five years earlier. With the police about to come and arrest her Jean in an attempt to bribe or pay off Blake to keep the lid on, in her criminal past, that in all the excitement Jane lost her footing and fell to her death off her hotel room balcony. A fitting end to this scheming and murderous woman who in the end found out all too well how it feels in getting screwed, or set up, by someone she trusted if not loved.