Robert Siodmak's masterpiece and one of the greatest, and least
known, of all film-noirs "Phantom Lady", adapted by Bernard C Schoenfeld
from a Cornell Woolrich novel, published as William Irish, and
stunningly shot in black and white by Elwood Bredell, even manages to
overcome the one-dimensional performances of Alan Curtis and Ella Raines
as Siodmak wastes absolutely no time in getting down to basics. Curtis is the engineer whose wife is murdered. His alibi is that he met a mysterious
woman in a bar and spent the evening with her but when he tries to
track her down she has not only disappeared but no-one else remembers
seeing her and it's left to his secretary, (Raines) to prove his
innocence.
The plot doesn't
really stand close scrutiny but Siodmak handles it with tremendous brio
with several scenes worthy of Hitchcock at his best. The real killer is
revealed midway through but again, with a typically Hitchcockian
flourish, Siodmak shifts our attention to the killer and his efforts to
make sure Raines doesn't achieve her goal. The movie is a classic but
the best we can say is that's a cult classic and one that shouldn't be
missed.
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