One Girl's Confession

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One Girl's Confession
One Girl's Confession FilmPoster.jpeg
1953 theatrical poster
Directed byHugo Haas
Written byHugo Haas
Produced byHugo Haas
StarringCleo Moore
Hugo Haas
Glenn Langan
Russ Conway
Gayne Whitman
Martha Wentworth
CinematographyPaul Ivano
Edited byMerrill G. White
Music byVáclav Divina
Production
company
Hugo Haas Productions
Distributed byColumbia Pictures
Release date
  • April 6, 1953 (1953-04-06) (United States)
Running time
74 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

One Girl's Confession is a 1953 low-budget film noir released by Columbia Pictures. The movie stars Cleo Moore and was written, produced, and directed by Hugo Haas who also plays a supporting part in the film.[1]

This film was released on DVD by Sony Pictures in 2010 as part of the Bad Girls of Film Noir Volume II collection along with Night Editor, Women's Prison and Over-Exposed.[2][3] The tagline for this film was "I'm the kind of girl every man wants ... but shouldn't marry."[4]

The film has been preserved in the UCLA Film & Television Archive, and was screened as part of their 2008 retrospective "Cool Drinks of Water: Columbia's Noir Girls of the '40s and '50s."[5]

Synopsis[]

Mary Adams (Cleo Moore) is a waitress in a waterfront bar run by a man who had swindled her father years before. One night, she climbs in the man's bedroom window and steals $25,000 from under his pillow. The police arrive the next morning and, to escape pursuit and reprisal of the bar-owner, she confesses her crime. When the money is not recovered, Mary is sent to prison for five years, but earns early release for good behavior. While on parole, she gets another waterfront waitressing job. Dragomie Damitrof (Hugo Haas), the owner of this bar, is a foreign scoundrel father-figure type. Mary believes that she is being watched by the authorities still trying to recover the money, and is somewhat un-trusting of everyone.

Mary meets Johnny (Glenn Langan), and soon begins to entertain thoughts of helping her new boyfriend with a business loan. Then Dragomie nearly loses the bar in a card game and she promises to give him enough money to delay the debtors. Not being able to herself retrieve the money, Mary draws him a map to the location where she buried the loot. When Dragomie realizes this is the same girl that stole money from her infamous employer three years earlier on this same waterfront dock, he tells her. When he returns from the cache, Dragomie bitterly reports that he could not find the money and angrily throws her out of his home.

Some days later, she finds the bar appears to be under new ownership and the boyfriend is worried about her. Upon closer inspection, it develops that the bar is still owned by Dragomie and it is reported that he has taken a vacation and moved into fancy new digs, apparently finding the money after all. With vengeance in her heart, she sets out confront him, and recover the money. In the ensuing argument, she strikes him on the head and leaves him for dead. The owner's girlfriend tells her she is mistaken, as she witnessed Dragomie win the money gambling. Deciding that the remaining recovered money has caused her too many problems, she donates it to an orphanage and confesses to her assault on Dragomie.

[Correction on ending] When Mary goes to recover the money from Dragomie, he actually is drunk in bed and not fully conscience. After hitting him, she realizes that the money is still in the hiding place. Hitching a ride, she digs near the tree she buried the money at and finds it. Thinking Dragomie is dead from her hitting him with a champagne bottle, she goes to the orphanage and donates the money and goes across the street to report her killing Dragomie to the police. When they call his apartment to find out he's still alive, she leaves and tries to recover the money, but realizes it would be too embarrassing to do so. Mary meets Dragomie on a dock where she doesn't confess to assaulting him, but he explains that a cat was responsible for the wound on his head. Johnny pulls up his boat at the dock and invites her to join him for a cruise with burgers, beer, and a shawl for her when it gets too cold. She asks Dragomie what she should do. He tells her she can always come back to work for him, but agrees with what she already knows. They part amicably as Mary joins Johnny on his boat.

Cast[]

Release[]

The film was released theatrically by Columbia Pictures in the United States on April 6, 1953, and European releases included it as Farligt tjuvgods in Sweden and Confessione di una ragazza in Italy.

In October 2000, it had its West German television release as Geständnis eines Mädchens. In 2010, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment included it in volume 2 of their Bad Girls of Film Noir series.[2][3][4]

References[]

  1. ^ Erickson, Hal. "One Girl's Confession (1953)". AllRovi. Retrieved December 29, 2011.[permanent dead link]
  2. ^ a b Clark, Mike (February 8, 2010). "Bad Girls of Film Noir Vol. 2 (DVD Review)". Home Media Magazine. Retrieved December 29, 2011.
  3. ^ a b King, Susan (February 7, 2010). "'Bad Girls of Film Noir'". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved December 29, 2011.
  4. ^ a b King, Randall (November 2, 2010). "review: Bad Girls of Film Noir Volumes 1 & 2". Winnipeg Free Press. Retrieved December 29, 2011.
  5. ^ Turan, Kenneth (September 24, 2008). "Noir's naughty ladies strut their stuff". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved December 29, 2011.

External links[]

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