Chicago Deadline (1949)

Chicago Deadline is a 1949 Paramount release that is difficult to classify. It’s definitely not film noir. There’s a mystery, but not of the usual type. There are crimes, but they’re peripheral to the main plot. Perhaps it’s best to think of it as just a hardboiled newspaper movie.

Ed Adams (Alan Ladd) is a reporter for the Chicago Journal. He comes across a young woman, dead in her apartment. Her name was Rosita. There’s no mystery to her death. She died of tuberculosis. And this is not one of those movies in which what appears to be death by natural causes turns out to be murder. She really did die of tuberculosis.

Ed finds her address book. Being a reporter he naturally steals it before the police arrive. It’s unethical but no big deal. This is not a suspicious death.

This is at best a very minor human interest story. A pretty young woman dies alone in a seedy apartment. Ed, being a reporter, decides to track down some of the people in her address book. He discovers something that interests him as a newspaperman. All of these people suddenly get really nervous when Rosita’s name is mentioned. Maybe there might be a bit of a story here after all.

He slowly uncovers Rosita’s story through the people in her address book. We see Rosita (played by Donna Reed) in a series of flashbacks.

Rosita seemed to have lousy luck with men. Some of these men are now having lousy luck. Getting murdered certainly qualifies as lousy luck.

Some of these people have colourful backgrounds of a less than strictly legal nature. Some are important people. It seems more and more likely that there’s a real story here. Ed wants that story, but he gradually becomes obsessed with Rosita herself. How did her life fall apart? It’s a mystery that Ed wants to solve.

Alan Ladd is in good form. Ed Adams is the hero but he’s a slightly tarnished hero. He’s a reporter, which means he has never had any morals. A story is a story. He’s hardboiled and cynical and that has never bothered him but as he uncovers Rosita’s story he starts to like himself a lot less. He starts to become slightly uncomfortable with the idea of treating people’s lives as nothing more than material for stories. Rosita was a real woman. Ed wants her story told fairly.

The touch of cynicism about newspapers adds some interest.

Rosita is supposed to be an enigmatic figure. That’s the whole point of the story. Was she a bad girl, a femme fatale, a victim or an innocent? Or just a very ordinary young woman whose life got out of control? Donna Reed’s performance reflects this. It’s not a showy performance because it’s not supposed to be.

The plot is perhaps a little over-complicated, with perhaps too many characters. That of course is to some extent the point - Rosita met her destiny as a result of all kinds of involvements with all kinds of people, good and bad. Some used her. Some loved her. You do have to pay close attention though.

There’s no need to worry too much about spoilers here - the movie tells us how Rosita’s life will end right at the beginning. Of course there could be no question of a happy ending - we already know that she has died alone and unloved. The pay-off at the end is satisfactory but it is just a tiny bit bleak. No-one was saved. This is is probably the movie’s only valid claim to being borderline noir. The one moderately bright spot at the end is that Ed has perhaps become a bit more of an emotionally mature human being.

Chicago Deadline is pretty decent entertainment. Recommended.

This one is included in Kino Lorber’s Film Noir: Dark Side of Cinema XVI Blu-Ray set (I’ve 
also reviewed Mystery of Marie Roget from that set). Chicago Deadline gets a lovely transfer.