Arlene Dahl

Philip Carey

Herbert Marshall

Michael Goodliffe

David Kossoff

Marvin Kane

Sid James

Gil Winfield

Patrick Allen

Ralph Truman

Faith Brook

Frederick Valk

John Salew

Totti Truman Taylor

Larry Cross

Paul Sheridan

Tom Gill

Frank Atkinson

Alastair Hunter

Jacques Brunius

Anthony Sharp

Guy De Monceau

Raf De La Torre

Selma Vaz Dias

Ken Hughes

Bill S. Ballinger

Malcolm Arnold

Basil Emmott

Robert Westerby

Sigmund Miller

Donald M. Ashton

Max Benedict

Fred Gunn

Muir Mathieson

Philip Shipway

Cynthia Tingey

Beryl Booth

Gerry Turpin

Len Shilton

Paul Rabiger

Betty Sherriff

Evelyn Gibbs

Terence Morgan II

Maxwell Setton

Fred Ryan

Drama

Wicked as They Come

Columbia Pictures

United Kingdom

Portrait in Smoke.

Wicked as They Come is directed by Ken Hughes who also co-writes the screenplay with Sigmund Miller and Robert Westerby. It stars Arlene Dahl, Philip Carey, Herbert Marshall, Michael Goodlife and Ralph Truman. Music is by Malcolm Arnold and cinematography by Basil Emmott.

Adapted from the Bill S. Ballinger novel, story has Dahl as a poor but beautiful girl who realises that her sexuality will get her all the finer things in life - at whatever cost.

Efficient little British Noirer that makes up for a lack of originality with some strong psychological smarts.

We are all guilty of it, film fans and critics that is, in how we often compare a film recently viewed with something of a similar ilk that is far better. One such case is Wicked as They Come, a piece coming late in the original film noir cycle that sticks a major league femme fatale out there front and centre. Dahl's Kathy Allen (nee Allenbourg) is hot to trot, a viper of the highest order, her beauty and sexuality is stunning, thus men line up to eat out of her hands. Where once was sane and astute business men, now sit lap dogs soon ready to fall into the vipers nest.

If that sounds familiar then of course it is, even from the pre code days there were film makers exploring the sex as a weapon angle, toying with bad girl persona's as a course of cinematic titillation. Ken Hughes knows his draw card is Dahl, who even in black and white is heart achingly gorgeous, a smouldering vixen to literally die for. The story trajectory is nothing new, Kathy tramples on every man she can to feather her own nest, but sooner or later things have to come to a head, where the reason for the distorted psyche will out and the crossroads of life ominously appears at film's closure.

Better films out there that deal with the same themes? Yes, absolutely. That doesn't mean this should be readily dismissed as a viable option to those with an interest in such femme fatale dalliances. Dahl is super, her male co-stars equally so, and Hughes steers it safely to a perfectly ambiguous finale. Welcome to noirville, men enter at your own risk. 7/10

English