I had never heard of The Whistler before buying the Powerhouse/Indicator blu-ray box set Columbia Noir #6: The Whistler.  However, this is a series of movies labeled as noir, so I was doubtlessly going to exposed to these sooner or later.  And this would be the way to do it, what with Indicator’s focus on quality, including the obligatory thick, perfect-bound book.  I also noticed one of the special features is an appreciation from critic and author Kim Newman, and I always like to hear his thoughts on movies.

It also doesn’t hurt that William Castle directed a few of these pictures in that weird era before he became a horror movie producer best remembered for his gimmicks.  I have seen some of his other noirs from around this time, and he turned in solid work.

These are definitely B-pictures, with each just a few minutes over an hour long.  As always, I appreciate something taking the appropriate amount of time for its material, instead of being bloated from having to fill the usual 90-minute runtime.  These are lean, but the ones I have watched in the set so far have had quite a few developments and plot twists.  They are not too different from episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, though not as clever as the better installments of that series.  Ironically, that show may have been influenced by this film series.  At least, that’s what Mr. Newman believes.

Richard Dix is the star of seven of the eight Whistler pictures.  Cast in a different role in each installment, he brings an odd presence to the proceedings.  His voice has an odd quality to it, and his line readings often seem to be a bit slurred.  Unusual pauses and emphasis only increase the weirdness.  On occasion, he looks more terrified than the particular moment warrants.  Mr. Newman speculates the actor, a known alcoholic, struggles through these productions.  What I saw on the screen supports that.  More than anything, however, I was hoping the guy preferred to be called Dick in real-life, as “Dick Dix” never stops being funny to me.

Anywho, it has been years since Dix’s wife went missing after a boat capsized, and she has since been declared dead.  The despairing man decides to pay for a hit on himself.  A telegram arrives almost as soon as he has done that, announcing his wife is alive, and has been a prisoner in a Japanese prisoner of war camp all that time.

Now Dix’s disposition does a 180, and the suddenly chipper guy tries to cancel the contract on himself, only to discover the person through which he arranged the hit was gunned down by police in the alley behind a bar just after Dix met with him.  But that guy was just the intermediary.  So, Dix is one step removed from an assassin he can’t get in touch with.  He doesn’t even know who the guy is.  And since the middleman died immediately after meeting with our hero, all the shady characters Dix tries to communicate through will have nothing to do with a guy they believe to be the guy who ratted him out to the authorities.

J. Carrol Naish plays the hitman.  When we first see him, he’s reading a book titled Studies in Necrophobia, which I keep misreading as Studies in Necrophilia.  Now, that would have made for a different movie.  Naish has a scene which got under my skin, where he gets a read on his target by going to Dix’s office under the guise of being an insurance salesman.  Dix gives him the brush-off, but Naish chastises him, as he recognizes a man who really needs insurance, and now.  Now that I know an insurance salesperson could be an assassin, I will be twice as hostile to anybody who tries to sell me a policy.  What’s really strange is Dix cancelled his insurance policies when he placed the hit, so wouldn’t he want those in effect more than ever, know that he knows when he’s supposed to die?

Slightly less interesting is Gloria Stuart as Dix’s secretary, though I’ll admit I suspected she was in cahoots with Naish, or at least up to something nefarious.  Dix comes home one night, confused by a light that shouldn’t be on and then worried when it turns off.  It is Stuart, just hanging out in his living room.  Presumably, she broke into the house, but he doesn’t seem to have any questions.  She claims she didn’t know whose footsteps she heard approaching, and didn’t want anybody to know she was there.  But didn’t turning off the light immediately let whoever it was know she was there?

Another character I found intriguing is barely in the film.  William Benedict plays a mute messenger boy, and he looks like Willem Dafoe and Andy Warhol somehow had a child together.

I liked The Whistler and look forward to the rest of this film series.  Although it was only a couple of minutes over an hour, it didn’t feel slight or subpar in any way.  I’m just wondering if we’ll ever find out who or what The Whistler is.  Here, he is just a narrator and a shadow on the wall.  That covers some of the shtick of the similar The Shadow, except that character actually did something.

Dir: William Castle

Starring Richard Dix, Gloria Stuart, J. Carroll Naish

Watched as part of the Powerhouse/Indicator blu-ray box set Columbia Noir #6: The Whistler