Film Noir and Technicolor have never really mixed well, so in the few of them made, the plot has needed to be extra colorful in order to make it work. For Paramount's "Desert Fury", the color isn't a metaphor for the lives of the characters here, but definitely a contrast to it. The film could also be considered an update of George Bernard Shaw's "Mrs. Warren's Profession" where a seemingly devoted mother is actually a madame, and the daughter (here played by Lizabeth Scott) is a seemingly sweet young socialite. But Scott, like her mother (Mary Astor), is attracted to the dangerous, and for her, that is gambler John Hodiak, whose right-hand man (Wendell Corey) is a bit too "devoted" to his boss.
A young Burt Lancaster is cast against his normal type as the local lawman, patiently in love with Scott while out to get the goods on Hodiak. Tension arises as the possessive Astor has her own designs on Hodiak (not to mention a slight mustache, accentuated by the color photography and really obvious in a big screen revival of this which I saw) and Corey gets more possessive of his employer. Astor's showy part (her best since "The Maltese Falcon") outshines the others, although Scott's sultriness in this role makes her unforgettable as well. The truth of the matter is that Ms. Astor and Ms. Scott do not at all seem like mother and daughter, as if Lizabeth's character was actually one of Astor's "girls" rather than her own. The Arizona desert is even more impressive in color and is a unique feature to make this must-see film noir, even if it is filled with flaws.
A young Burt Lancaster is cast against his normal type as the local lawman, patiently in love with Scott while out to get the goods on Hodiak. Tension arises as the possessive Astor has her own designs on Hodiak (not to mention a slight mustache, accentuated by the color photography and really obvious in a big screen revival of this which I saw) and Corey gets more possessive of his employer. Astor's showy part (her best since "The Maltese Falcon") outshines the others, although Scott's sultriness in this role makes her unforgettable as well. The truth of the matter is that Ms. Astor and Ms. Scott do not at all seem like mother and daughter, as if Lizabeth's character was actually one of Astor's "girls" rather than her own. The Arizona desert is even more impressive in color and is a unique feature to make this must-see film noir, even if it is filled with flaws.