Directed by: Joseph Losey Imagine your significant other is away at work for a late night radio station, and you suddenly hear a noise outside: you know someone is creeping around outside. You call the cops, one of whom arrives, reassures you, and then proceeds to fall in love with you. The cop becomes the one creeping around outside, spying on your marriage and dreaming up ways to get rid of your S.O. That's the first half of The Prowler, and it's done fairly well, with nifty cinematography designed to almost echo the plot as it carries on. The cop, Webb Garwood (Van Heflin) invariably finds out about the life insurance policy on the husband of the woman he's having an affair with, Susan Gilray (Evelyn Keyes). Because, hey, what's a list about Film Noir without at least one insurance scam-murder plot? Naturally, Webb does what any good policeman in love with a married man would do; he kills the husband and stages it as self defense. Then he marries Susan. Now, in a conventional film, the plot would be done here. Caput. But The Prowler is edgier than that. It devolves into some of the more interesting and uniquely dark twists and turns of the genre. Now, when Susan is pregnant (before the two got married), they run away to a ghost town in the middle of the desert, and prepare for a birth in one of the deserted homes. The setting around them is lifeless, and a high strung tension pervades every shot. Webb goes into town and gets a doctor when Susan goes into premature labour, but tries to kill him to remove anyone to be traced back to him - but the doc escapes, along with the newborn, sending Webb into a rage and his true colours painted vividly on screen. By now Susan is scared for her life and beginning to realize that Webb is not as good a person as she thought, and she yells at him to get out. He goes on the run, only to find that the doctor's called the police, who are coming straight for him. It all ends with Webb being shot to death in the middle of the desolate desert landscape by his former partner. The film is daring because of its commentary on society. It builds up the American dream and then proceeds to deconstruct and psychoanalyze its characters until nothing pure remains. Author James Ellroy described it best when he called it ""a masterpiece of sexual creepiness, institutional corruption and suffocating, ugly passion."
