The history of remakes is full of failures. In 99% of cases the opinions of critics and viewers consider that remakes do not live up to the original films. When it comes to American productions that take ideas and stories from European films and Americanize them, opinions are likely to be even more outspoken. It is not a novelty, by the way. One of the most famous cases is that of the 1951 film ‘M‘, one of the last films made in the United States by Joseph Losey, before he was blacklisted as a filmmaker suspected of communist political activities and self-exiled to Europe . Losey was entrusted with directing this film which was a remake of Fritz Lang’s 1931 German masterpiece. The film had the same producer as the original, Seymour Nebenzal, also an exile who had fled Germany after the rise of the Nazis to power. Losey‘s confrontation with the material of his famous predecessor was not easy, and the result is not quite a masterpiece like the original, but it is a good and interesting film that demonstrates the talent and professionalism of the young man who would also become a great director.
Much of the story takes place on the streets of Los Angeles. We are in the post-war years, the economic recovery does not seem to be easy, and a large part of the economy is controlled by the mom. When a serial killer who kidnaps and kills little girls appears, the whole town is in terror and the police step up their raids. The heads of the organized crime gangs decide to join the effort to catch the criminal as the intense police activity disrupts their business. Unsurprisingly, controlling the street and with informants in every environment, the mob proves to be more effective than the police.
The audience knows and follows the criminal. In a style influenced by psychoanalysis very fashionable in the middle of the last century, his motifs are related to childhood traumas. The role is played by an actor named David Wayne, who faced a very high benchmark. Peter Lorre, who had played the part in the German version 20 years earlier and who was also an immigrant to America, was offered the part but he turned it down. Wayne has done a very honorably job in my opinion. In general, all acting is highly expressive, even if it suffers from an excess of melodrama according to current taste. The human portraits gallery is diverse and interesting. John Miljan‘s portrayal of the blind balloon vendor deserves a special mention, in a style that today would earn him an Academy Awards nomination for supporting role. Joseph Losey demonstrates in this early-career film a good collaboration with cinematographers that he would perfect in many of his subsequent films. The location shooting on the streets of Los Angeles predicts the images of Paris that Truffaut, Godard and other French New Wave directors would begin to make famous only at the end of the decade. The scenes of the search for the murderer in a huge retail shops building allow him to create complex images with many characters, excellently organized and coordinated. The social background is different, but both the psychological approach to the profile of the criminal and the description of his hunting, capture and ‘peers trial’ bring this variant of ‘M‘ to a level close to that of the original. A remake that does not disappoint and one of the good noir films of the early 50’s.