Framed (1947)

Janis Carter steals this film; she is the femme fatale who is responsible for much of the mayhem that takes place in the movie. Glen Ford (Superman's dad) does a fine job as the pigeon that is set up by everyone in the town except the newspaper boy. Barry Sullivan plays his role with the usual suave faire that he was capable of in several of his other roles. The film has excellent atmosphere and dialogue, and suffer from only one silly occurrence, which I will not mention, as it would be a spoiler. But a high school kid would know better than to commit this mistake. Other than that, the film is very watchable, and better than most other films from this genre. Recommended.

FRAMED", Columbia, 1947, 82 min. This the one in which a slightly scruffy Glen Ford (just after "'Gilda", which made him a highly bankable Star) plays a mining engineer down on his luck, drifts into town, gets busted for a brakeless truck driving accident for which he gets thirty days in the local hoosegow, but is bailed out by a mysterious blonde (Janis Carter) for no apparent reason other than that she seems to have eyes for him. If he knew what she really had in mind for him he would have taken the ten days, gladly! As the plot thickens the incredibly alluring Carter really racks poor lovesick Glen over the coals setting him up for an insurance scam where he will be "accidentally killed" in a car crash so she and her real boyfriend (Barry Sullivan) can collect on the policy and scram. Glen barely survives and Janis gets her just deserts but her performance is so subtly-shaded with both hidden menace and obvious allure, and she is just so all-around fantastic in "Framed", that I couldn't help thinking that, all kidding aside, this must have been the Best Performance by an Actress for all of 1947 - - the year that Loretta Young actually got it for "The Farmer's Daughter".

Glenn Ford, young and brittle, plays an unemployed, hard-drinking mining engineer saved from ten days in the hoosegow by a blonde waitress with evil in her eyes; turns out she and her partner need a fall guy once they swindle the local banker. Crosses and double-crosses in a mostly predictable vein, though just about saved by excellent directorial touches and intriguing noir detail (the wrench in the backseat, the poisoned cup of coffee). Ford isn't really convincing playing drunk and reckless--and it doesn't sit well with us having him cast as the possible dupe--yet he cuts a solid presence on the screen and the picture would be nothing without him. ** from ****

The moment JANIS CARTER pays GLENN FORD's fine for driving recklessly you know the two are going to meet their fate together in FRAMED. At this point in his career, Ford seemed to be specializing in playing men hooked by a dame at first glance and willing to suffer the consequences.FRAMED is a neat little crime melodrama from Columbia in which the title almost gives away the plot. Carter and BARRY SULLIVAN devise a crooked scheme to get their hands on a quarter of a million dollars, involving GLENN FORD and a bank robbery.JANIS CARTER resembles a blonde version of Ann Sheridan as she plays a cunning femme fatale with silky ease planning to make mining engineer Ford take the fall for an embezzlement.Like all good noirs, there's a final plot twist that comes as a surprise and confirms suspicion that Carter was even more of a schemer than she let on.Well worth seeing--maintains taut suspense all the way. And, of course, Ford's moral fiber wins out over Carter's amoral seduction.