Richard,
Re your comment below:
> Certainly the movie Webb worked on and met
the
> technical advisors was a
> greater influence. I've read the excellent book
on
> "Dragnet" and talked to
> the writer at our old time radio club here in
DC.
> Nothing influences the
> future like a big money hit. "He Walks By
Night"
> was well received by
> critics but "The Naked City" was a mega-hit in
1948.
> In that same year,
> another major movie success was "Call Northside
777"
> starring Jimmy Stewart
> that featured a similar semi-documentary style.
So
> granted the greater
> impact on Webb of "Night" I think the popularity
of
> this style of
> story-telling as demonstrated by the big hits had
to
> be an influence on the
> overall entertainment industry as well as to
some
> extent on Webb.
Absolutely right! In fact, the proliferation of
"semi-documentary" cop films is another example of the
tendency to meticulously research police work before turning
out cop fiction (in any medium) that seemed to germinate in
the '40s.
And I think the success of big-studio films like HOUSE ON
92ND STREET, THE STREET WITH NO NAME, BOOMERANG, and, of
course, THE NAKED CITY, is probably what inspired a smaller
studio like Eagle-Lion to turn out lower-budgeted but still
excellent examples of the form, such as T-MEN, THE PORT OF
NEW YORK, and, of course, HE WALKED BY NIGHT. Which, in turn,
means that this whole trend in film, and not just HE WALKED
BY NIGHT, influenced Webb, directly or indirectly.
JIM DOHERTY
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