Character Introductions 006: Dusty Chandler

A Formula and Cigarettes

The next in our series of Character Introductions is from 1947’s Dead Reckoning.

We meet Dusty Chandler (Lizabeth Scott) in a fairly straightforward noir fashion, with one little trick and two neat bookends which make the scene hum.

Rip (Humphrey Bogart) has been looking for a woman named Chandler, with no photo or reference. He’s mulling over why he doesn’t like the casino’s goon when he hears the barkeep greet “Hello Mrs. Chandler.” The rest, well, clap your eyes on it.

Rip’s eyes shift, and then with a simple cut (0:12) the camera becomes his POV.

His eyes fall first (like the gaze of John Garfield the year before) on a shapely leg, and then drift upwards. So far so typical / lascivious / noirish / lusty, take your pick.

The drifting camera movement is timed with Dusty taking out a cigarette; first her hand moves up with the camera, then when she pauses to tap it gives the camera reason to pause and to watch.

Note Dusty’s wedding ring is clear in frame; it becomes plot-relevant later, but it’s prominent right from first sight.

By the time Dusty’s hand brings the cigarette up to her lips, motivating the camera again, we’ve been plenty teased and want to see her face.

Though she became quite well-known, this was only Scott’s third film role, and the year before Barbara Stanwyck (who has already had her own entry in this series) apparently and infamously objected to Scott as not being a ‘recognized’ actor — well, this face (and voice!) would become recognised, all right.

When a hand comes into frame holding a match, we know it’s Rip.

Having met, they chat and the scene breaks into a 2-shot and OTS shot-reverse-shots

Just as Dusty seems to want to change the subject, our goon returns to interrupt and bookend the meeting, much to Rip’s annoyance.

Takeaway

Sometimes you don’t need to subvert anything or reinvent the wheel, you can just execute a classic, so long as you do it well.

The choice to meet Dusty with a POV drifting upwards is a perfectly fitting noir take. Director John Cromwell executes it with motivated camera movements and pauses, clear ‘ins and outs’ with Rip’s eye shift and then match proffer, and visual information such as the wedding ring, so that Dusty makes a perfect entry while sitting dead still.