Secret File: Hollywood

This is a black and white movie with camera work by Ray Dennis Steckler. Ray didn't receive a mention in the credits because he wasn't in the union at the time. I think he should have welcomed this bit of fortune and not mentioned to anyone that he did the camera work, because it's horrendous. Now, in many low budget movies, there are times when you can see a microphone at the top of the screen for a few seconds, or the crew's shadow in the scene, and that just adds to the charm of the whole thing. But there is hardly a frame in this whole movie that does not have the microphone hanging over the scene. Really. You can also see the lights on the set peering down over the fake walls of the rooms, etc., etc. And almost every camera setup is static. Really really poor.

This is some sort of Film Noir film. A private dick loses his license when he is involved in a beatnik bar shooting. But, a scandal rag offers him a job to take covert pictures of celebrities so that they can be humiliated in the magazine. He needs the cash so he accepts the job. His first job is to take pictures of a famous movie director named James Cameron (not kidding) while he is in the throes of passion with a blonde while his wife is hidden away in a sanitarium. But things are even more sinister than this. After the former private Dick turns the pictures in to the woman who hired him, the woman and her male partner blackmail the movie director. He pays up, but the bastards run the pictures anyway, and send a copy of the pictures to his wife, who shoots herself. And it's even more sinister than this because the woman and the guy work for a mystery man they never met who leaves instructions on tape, and his motive is to destroy the lives of certain Hollywood figures out of revenge. But our private Dick, caught in the middle, is going to find out who Mr. Big is and bring down the whole corrupt organization and some people are going to die or end up in jail.

This movie is very poorly done. There is no reason to recommend it at all. Perhaps it can be watched as a ridiculous example of all the things that you should not do when you're making a movie. This movie also stars Francine York in her first movie. I'd give it a rating of 1, but I did enjoy the following dialog, so I'll give it a 2.

Evil scandal rag guy in hat: You'd cross up your own grandmother, wouldn't ya Maxy Boy?
Max: I'm just protecting myself in the clenches, Hat Boy.
Evil scandal rag guy in hat absolutely disgusted at being called Hat Boy: Hat Boy...
Evil scandal rag women: You didn't think you could get away with it did you?
Max: Well, you can't kill a guy for trying.
Evil scandal rag guy in hat: That's what you think! [Cuffs him on the side of the head with his gun, knocking him down.]