Noirvember Fatale Attractions: Jane Greer in Out of the Past (1947) 💋

 

She walks into the shadows of a Mexican café, sunlight in her hair and on her lips, and Robert Mitchum never stood a chance. In Out of the Past (1947), Jane Greer plays Kathie Moffat, the woman every man in noir has been warned about and still can’t resist.

 

 

 

Directed by Jacques Tourneur and shot in lush black-and-white by Nicholas Musuraca, the film follows private eye Jeff Bailey (Robert Mitchum) as he’s hired to track down a gambler’s runaway lover only to fall for her himself. The gambler, played by Kirk Douglas, wants her back. But Kathie doesn’t belong to anyone, and that’s what makes her so dangerous.

 

 

 

“I never told you I was anything but what I am. You just wanted to imagine I was good.”

 

 

That line defines her. Kathie isn’t pretending to be pure. She’s daring men to see her as she is and love her anyway. She’s soft-spoken, radiant, and utterly ruthless, the kind of woman who can make betrayal look like affection. Greer’s performance is subtle but electric. One smile and you’re lost.

 

 

Mitchum, at his most weary and magnetic, matches her perfectly; together they turn fate into flirtation. Tourneur directs with a dreamlike touch, smoke curling through doorways, danger whispered rather than shouted. It’s noir perfection, earning Out of the Past its status as one of the genre’s crown jewels.

 

 

This was Jane Greer’s breakout role, hand-picked by producer Howard Hughes, who famously tried to control her career. Ironically, she became immortal playing a woman no man could ever control.

 

 

Kathie Moffat doesn’t destroy men out of malice; she does it because it’s the only way to survive in her world. She doesn’t pull you in...she lets you think you’re choosing her.

 

 

 Fade to black… until the next Fatale Attraction.   

 

Peggy Cummins in Gun Crazy/Deadly is the Female (1950)