Pic of the Day: “Finger Man” revisited

Posted by Marisa on February 3, 2015

It’s time to take another look at Lou Terpe, the grabby yet cowardly torpedo of Finger Man (1955), directed by Harold D. Schuster. Here he enjoys a drink with his boss, Dutch Becker (Forrest Tucker) and one of Becker’s B-girls, Gladys Baker (Peggie Castle).

Ms. Castle was one of the more memorable B-movie bombshells of the 1950s, both in feature films and on television. My MSTie pals will recognize her as intrepid girl reporter Audrey Aimes from Bert I. Gordon‘s Beginning of the End (1957) (starring another of Timothy’s future co-stars, Peter Graves). Sadly, she fell victim to alcoholism and died in 1973 at the age 45 of cirrhosis of the liver.

Quote of the Week

Posted by Marisa on August 4, 2013

Finger Man (1955) Allied Artists. 81m. (B&W) […]

CAST: Frank Lovejoy, Forrest Tucker, Peggie Castle, Timothy Carey […]

Ex-convict Lovejoy is caught by the feds heisting a truck shipment; to keep from gong back to the slams, he works undercover to nail syndicate head Tucker. Lovejoy’s ex-girlfriend and gangster’s moll Castle throws in with Lovejoy and gets murdered by Tucker’s henchman, Carey. In the end, after nearly being killed himself, Lovejoy brings down Tucker’s gang and is allowed to go on his way.

Lovejoy, who played in other noir films such as Try and Get Me, The Hitch-Hiker, and I Was a Communist for the F.B.I. turns in his usual steady, low-key performance. Carey, playing – as usual – a psychotic killer, is as convincingly weird in this film as he was in every other film he ever played, leading one to wonder what he was like in real life.

– Arthur Lyons, Death on the Cheap: The Lost B Movies of Film Noir (Da Capo Press, 2000)

Video of the Week: “Finger Man”

Posted by Marisa on July 10, 2013

EDITOR’S NOTE 10.14.15: Another one bites the dust. Sorry folks.

This week’s video is a clip from Finger Man (1955), directed by Harold D. Schuster. Timothy is Lou Terpe, the sullen muscle behind bootlegger/white slaver Dutch Becker (Forrest Tucker). Also appearing is Peggie Castle as Gladys Baker, one of Becker’s girls who wants out of the whole racket.

As I mention every chance I get, this was the film that brought Tim to the attention of a young indie filmmaker named Stanley Kubrick, who was casting his first big Hollywood film The Killing (1956). The rest, as they say, is history.