The Big Heat (1953) on Netflix
NR19531h 29mCrimeFilm-NoirThriller
Detective Dave Bannion accepts a fellow officer's death as suicide until the dead man's mistress disputes it. His questions lead him toward Mike Lagana, the mob boss who runs the city.
- Netflix3.6/5
- IMDb7.9/1033,243 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes94%
Trailer
Plot summary
In Kenport, homicide detective Dave Bannion is handed the death of a fellow officer, Tom Duncan, and the case looks like suicide. Duncan's widow Bertha attributes it to her husband's poor health, and the department wants it closed with as little grief to her as possible. Duncan's mistress, Lucy Chapman, says he was in perfect health and had agreed to a divorce. Lucy is later found strangled, her body burned with cigarettes. Bannion keeps working the matter after Lieutenant Ted Wilks tells him to drop it, and he learns that the Duncans owned a lake property his police salary could not have covered. Threatening calls reach his home, and he confronts Mike Lagana, the syndicate boss who controls Kenport, in a city too frightened to testify against him.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Big Heat (1953)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Columbia Pictures wanted Marilyn Monroe for the part of Debby Marsh in The Big Heat, but would not pay the loan fee 20th Century Fox demanded for its star, so Gloria Grahame was cast in the role instead.
- Rex Reason was slated to play either Tierney or Detective Burke, but his agent wanted a larger part, so Reason lost the roles to Peter Whitney and Robert Burton respectively.
- Producer Jerry Wald, who first held the rights to William P. McGivern's novel, wanted Paul Muni, George Raft or Edward G. Robinson for the role of Dave Bannion; Robinson had already worked twice with director Fritz Lang.
SPOILER
The film changes the novel's ending: in William P. McGivern's book Debby Marsh shoots the blackmailing widow and then mortally wounds herself, while in the film she is shot by Vince Stone.- In the bar scene where Stone and Bannion first meet, the house band plays "Put the Blame on Mame," a song also heard in the 1946 noir classic Gilda, which likewise starred Glenn Ford and was produced by Columbia.
