Noir Nook: Supportive Fellas of Film Noir

Noir Nook: Supporting Types of Film Noir

A few years back at Noir Nook, I remedied my penchant for focusing on the distaff side of noir by spotlighting some of my favorite noir actors. Now that 2023 is around the corner I thought it was time to show the gentlemen some more love; This time I’m not looking at the main characters, but at a couple of guys supporting the main character who deserve just as much attention.

Chickamaw Mobley (Howard da Silva) in They Live By Night (1948)

One of my (many) favorite noirs and one of the few that ended up making me cry, They live at night Farley Granger plays Arthur “Bowie” Bowers, who escapes from prison with two other inmates and falls in love with Keechie Mobley (Cathy O’Donnell), the niece of one of his fellow escapees. Like many noirs, this is a “one last job” plan – and like the best plans of mice and humans, things don’t go as intended.

Howard da Silva plays one of the escaped men, Chickamaw Mobley, whom we see in the first scene driving the getaway car impounded by the unfortunate farmer sitting next to him. When the car blows out a tire and Chickamaw pulls off the road into a nearby field, we get our first glimpse of this guy’s personality. The car’s owner makes a simple remark (“I knew the tire had to go”) and Chickamaw (who is blind in one eye, by the way) is off to the races. Telling the man he’s talking too much, he snatches him out of the car and is ready to shoot him on the spot – if he hadn’t been pulled over by the third inmate, T-Dub (Jay C. Flippen), who was driving Der Owner would certainly have met its creator that day. So Chickamaw pushes the man to the ground and knocks him unconscious.

Chickamaw is a mass of contradictions. He sometimes seems easygoing and amused by what’s going on around him, but he’s also spooky and quickly flies out of control. He’s cold-blooded, as we see with the farmer and later in the film when a cop tries to arrest him after a car crash, but he’s overly sensitive to clues about his blind eye. He stresses that the three former inmates “need to look and act like other people,” but he lusts for fame and is furious that the local paper “didn’t print a big article” about their prison break. Of the three men, Chickamaw is the most menacing – the one you least want to be left alone in a room with. But one thing is for sure – you won’t soon forget him.

Marty Waterman as Elisha Cook, Jr. in Born to Kill (1947)

Born to Kill is another personal favorite. In it, Lawrence Tierney stars as the aptly named Sam Wild, who in the first 10 minutes of the film commits a double murder, throws himself into an affair with Helen Trent (Claire Trevor), the (fiancé) woman who finds the bodies – and then tries to rise to higher social status by marrying Helen’s wealthy foster sister, Georgia (Audrey Long). Meanwhile, his crimes are about to be uncovered as Mrs. Kraft (Esther Howard), a friend of one of Sam’s victims, is determined to find who is responsible.

Elisha Cook’s Marty is Sam’s best friend and lifelong friend. We don’t know exactly what kind of relationship they have or how long they’ve been in it, but we do know that they were roommates in Reno and that Marty takes care of Sam like a mother bear takes care of her favorite cub. When Sam flees to San Francisco, Marty is not far behind. When Sam marries Georgia, Marty is the best man. When Marty learns of the ongoing relationship between Sam and his sister-in-law, he has a few words of warning for Helen. And if Mrs. Kraft comes to town and hires a private investigator…well, Marty has something to say about that, too.

Marty is the kind of friend we all want. He doesn’t encourage Sam’s misdeeds, but he’s not judgmental either. He is supportive and understanding, reassuring and empathetic. When Sam tells him about the murders, Marty doesn’t scold him, but he gives his friend some practical advice: “Honestly, Sam, you don’t go nuts. Nothing at all. You have to watch out for that,” warns Marty. “You can’t just go around killing people when the thought occurs to you. It’s not feasible.” No matter what Sam does, he can count on Marty to have his back — and not just have his back, but do whatever he needs to do to keep Sam safe. It’s unfortunate for Marty that Sam doesn’t realize what a good friend he has.

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Stay tuned for future Noir Nooks where I will discover more top notch supporting gentlemen. Now you can catch both They live at night and Born to Kill for free on YouTube and see these characters for yourself!

You will not regret it.

…

– Karen Burroughs Hannsberry for Classic Movie Hub

You can read all of Karen’s Noir Nook articles here.

Karen Burroughs Hannsberry is the author of the Shadows and Satin blog, which focuses on films and performers from the film noir and pre-Code eras, and is the editor-in-chief of The Dark Sides, a bi-monthly newsletter dedicated to film noir. Karen is also the author of two books on film noir – Femme Noir: The Bad Girls of Film and Bad Boys: The Actors of Film Noir. You can follow Karen on Twitter at @TheDarkPages.
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