Hell's Island

Infobox Film
name = Hell's Island


caption = French film poster
director = Phil Karlson
producer = William H. Pine
William C. Thomas
writer = Story:
Martin Goldsmith
Jack Leonard
Screenplay:
William H. Pine
Maxwell Shane
William C. Thomas
narrator = John Payne
starring = John Payne
Mary Murphy
music =
cinematography = Lionel Lindon
editing = Archie Marshe
distributor = Paramount Pictures
released = May 6, 1955
(U.S.A.)
runtime = 84 minutes
country = United States
language = English
budget =
amg_id = 1:94758
imdb_id = 0048160

"Hell's Island" (1955) is an American color film noir starring John Payne and dircted by Phil Karlson. The film was the last teaming of actor Payne and film director Karlson. The film was shot in the VistaVision wide-screen format. "Hell's Island" was re-released in 1962 under the title "South Sea Fury."

The film is told as a flashback with Payne narrating the story. [imdb title|id=0048160|title=Hell's Island.]

Plot

After being dumped by his fiancée, hard-drinking and depressed Mark Cormack (John Payne) loses his job in the Los Angeles district attorney's office and serves as bouncer in a Las Vegas casino.

A wheelchair-bound stranger Barzland (Francis L. Sullivan) hires him to locate a ruby that disappeared in a Caribbean plane crash. He lures Cormack into doing the job by telling him it may be in the possession of the very woman who jilted him.

The ex-detective flies to remote island Santo Rosario to find the stone and investigate the mystery. When he finds his old flame he finds that her husband is in prison. Cormack, again falling for Janet, is convinced into helping him break out of jail. But Janet has other plans.

Background

The film comes near the end of the film noir cycle and at a time when Payne's unsmiling and fatigued expression in film had become something of a "noir" icon. [Silver, Alain and Elizabeth Ward. "Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style." Film review and analysis by Alain Silver, page 123. The Overlook Press, 3rd edition, 1992. ISBN 0-87951-479-5.]

Cast

* John Payne as Mike Cormack
* Mary Murphy as Janet Martin
* Eduardo Noriega as Inspector Peña
* Francis L. Sullivan as Barzland
* Arnold Moss as Paul Armand
* Paul Picerni as Eduardo Martin
* Walter Reed as Lawrence
* Pepe Hern as Lalo (the bellhop)
* Robert Cabal as Miguel (the houseboy)
* Sándor Szabó as Johann Torbig

References

External links

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