Slightly Scarlet
Made independently by former zipper manufacturer Benedict Bogeaus and released by RKO, Scarlet is bold from the opening red title, looking like a John Waters ’70s flick. Incorrigible, fragile, psychologically stunted kleptomaniac Dorothy Lyons (Arlene Dahl) is picked up after a stint in jail by her sister, June (Rhonda Fleming). Both sisters, oozing in sex appeal, are being watched and photographed by Ben Grace (John Payne), a middle-aged character I first understood to be working for the police, but who ends up doing the bidding for racketeer Solly Caspar (Ted de Corsia). Thus begins an elaborate tale of politics and murder as Grace wheedles his way into the sisters’ lives in order to bring down a mayoral candidate running on an anti-crime campaign.
Scarlet has a unique look. Filmed in SuperScope, it’s wide and garish, plush and mysterious. The interiors of the sisters’ residence is a mid-century modern-lover’s dream. The bold cinematography by noir veteran John Alton (T-Men, 1947 and Raw Deal, 1948) uses a technique he excelled in: low-angle shots casting great shadows on the walls. Some shots reminded me of similarly atmospheric scenes in David Lynch’s postmodern noir Blue Velvet (1986).
Carrying the film through a plethora of bizarre characters is John Payne. Until I saw this film, Payne was nearly a non-entity. He was a major player in two productions I’ve seen recently: Miracle on 34th Street (1947) and his very last role in the 1975 Columbo episode “Forgotten Lady” (with Janet Leigh), but I hadn’t made the connection between the two roles. Payne is arresting in Scarlet, though; he conveys a world-weariness and understated anxiety that runs against the grain of the role. In fact, he looks in Scarlet uncannily like a cross between the James Stewart of the ’50s and David Lynch. The camera he uses, looking like a prop from Rear Window (1954), helps the illusion.
Scarlet was directed by the amazing Alan Dwan, who directed more than a hundred and thirty feature films, and nearly three hundred silent shorts. He began working on films in 1911 and kept going until 1961. He was born in 1885 and directed Slightly Scarlet in his ’70s. That’s a career!
The studio lot Slightly Scarlet was filmed on could be a movie story itself. Built in 1919 by former Charles Chaplin co-worker John Jasper, Hollywood Studios (one of its several names) was used throughout the decades by creators as diverse as Harold Lloyd, Howard Hughes and Mae West. I Love Lucy was shot there, as was The Rockford Files. Major motion pictures and TV shows are still being filmed there. At the time of the making of Slightly Scarlet, Bogeaus owned the studio, having purchased it from the Western Electric division of AT&T after the government ordered it to be sold. He later co-owned it with James Cagney’s brother, William.
Slightly Scarlet is available on VCI DVD in a transfer I can’t vouch for, not having seen it (though I support the company in general; they release a lot of fine and obscure work). The version I saw was a rare original IB Technicolor (three-strip dye-transfer) 16mm print at the 2016 Cinevent. What it lost in size ratio, it gained in eye-popping color and a clarity of detail I’m unfortunately not seeing in online footage of the film.
—Michael R. Neno, 2016 Jun 9