 |
| Carol Forman as Sombra |
THE BLACK WIDOW (13 chapter Republic serial/1947.) Directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet and Fred C. Brannon.
"Open the tanks and we'll
cremate them!" -- Sombra.
The beautiful fortune teller Sombra (Carol Forman), popularly known as the Black Widow, takes orders from her father, Hitomu (Theodore Gottlieb) -- who shows up now and then in a puff of smoke in a kind of teleportation chair -- but otherwise seems very much in charge of her assorted underlings. Her chief adversaries are mystery writer (!) Steve Colt (Bruce Edwards) and reporter Joyce Winters (Virginia Lee), to whom Steve is continuously condescending. Sombra, who got her nickname from her use of black widow spider toxin in her victims' bloodstreams, employs such thugs as Nick Ward (Anthony Warde of
Dick Tracy vs Crime Inc.) to do her dirty work, although she's not above getting her own hands dirty when it suits her. She is a mistress of disguise who impersonates more than one woman, causing both consternation and havoc. Sombra and her father particularly want to get their hands on a special formula for atomic rockets if not the rockets themselves.
 |
| Theodore Gottlieb as Hitomu |
The Black Widow is a very entertaining Republic serial with good performances from Forman and Warde, who seemed to make a career playing nasty and efficient bad guys in assorted serials. Alas, Edwards and Lee as the good guys in this are comparatively colorless, although Joyce can be feisty at times, and at one point tries to clobber Sombra with a steering wheel that she had been handcuffed to. Notable cliffhangers include the tunnel filled with fire in chapter five, and a large pane of glass that nearly functions as a guillotine in chapter six. The most outstanding and thrilling sequence is in chapter four, when Joyce is secreted in a crate on a plane as the crate keeps sliding closer and closer to the open hatchway ...
 |
| Virginia Lee and Bruce Edwards |
The Black Widow is full of stock "orientalisms," including the excellent theme music (although the rest of the score is not as memorable), even though none of the actors are remotely Asian. Theodore Gottlieb as Hitomu reminds me of nothing so much as a Borscht Belt comic and apparently that's exactly what Gottlieb was! While he doesn't make the most convincing "Oriental" ruler -- I'm not even certain if that's what he's supposed to be -- he is still effective and fun as Hitomu. A clever bit has Ward using a special mist to instantly change the color of his car when he is being pursued by Colt, although the business with Colt having to use special "triangulation" to find Sombra's HQ is laughable, as by now he should surely have known where the woman was!
Verdict: Whatever its flaws, this serial is a lot of fun! ***.
Actually does look like a lot of fun...no surprise that the casting in those days was far from diverse. I still try to imagine what an Anna May Wong would have done with roles like The Good Earth...but on the other hand, Asian actors do NOT want to play these "inscrutable" stereotypes...
ReplyDeleteJust watched Murder By Death with friends and Peter Sellers steals the show with his take on Charlie Chan--but it would NOT go over well today.
-C
Very good point, Chris! Mickey Rooney got bashed for his Asian caricature in "Breakfast at Tiffany's." And you're right that minority actors are understandably sensitive to playing stereotypes. Then there was poor Dorothy Dandridge, who could have played many ethnicities, but she refused a good part in "King and I" because it was a supporting role and her career suffered.
ReplyDelete