Too Late for Tears (1949)
A satchel of stolen cash lands in a Los Angeles woman's convertible by pure accident, and she kills her way through husband, blackmailer, and rescuer alike rather than give it back.
Too Late for Tears turns its femme fatale loose without a single redeeming instinct — Lizabeth Scott’s Jane Palmer out-plots, out-lies, and outlives every man foolish enough to trust her, right up to the vertiginous finish.
Background
Too Late for Tears is a 1949 film noir directed by Byron Haskin. Lizabeth Scott plays Jane Palmer, a woman whose car is suddenly filled with a satchel of stolen cash, and she decides to keep it rather than return it. Dan Duryea plays the blackmailer who pursues the money, and Arthur Kennedy and Don DeFore are also in the cast. The film is a typical late-1940s noir in its cynical plotting and its focus on a femme fatale. It runs about ninety-nine minutes and is notable for its uncompromising portrait of a central character with no redeeming qualities.
What to watch for
Look for the way Scott’s character handles each man who threatens her, lying, manipulating and killing to hold on to the money. The film offers no sympathetic center, and Duryea’s blackmailer provides a memorable antagonist whose pursuit keeps the plot tight. The Los Angeles setting, with its nighttime streets and automobiles, supports the story’s sense of entrapment. The plotting is built around a series of escalating decisions, each of which deepens the central character’s trouble. The ending is harsh, consistent with the film’s cynicism about the people who try to take advantage of a chance windfall.
