Product: Detour [VHS] (1945)
Rating: 4.0
Primitive, but Riveting
This film has some laughable features technically, but it is not about sets. Well, maybe it is. The dreamy weirdness of this film is actually enhanced by some of its cheap technical features--its soundlot sets, rear-screen driving shots, the fog machine as director's fast friend. But "Detour" is finally about the faces of the lead actors. This is the "Passion of Joan of Arc" (I am thinking of the 1928 version, in which the camera dwells on faces for long, agonizingly beautiful takes) of B-noir.