Based on William P. McGivern’s serial in The Saturday Evening Post, later published as a novel, Fritz Lang’s The Big Heat is a captivating crime story that sees the hero, homicide detective Sergeant Dave Bannion (Glenn Ford), behave like a villain as he transforms from a police detective seeking justice to a man seeking revenge.
Buy The Big Heat (Criterion Collection) Blu-rayThe film opens with a man committing suicide at his desk. A woman (Jeanette Nolan) walks in, unbothered by what she finds. She opens a letter addressed to the District Attorney and reads it. She proceeds to call Mike Lagana (Alexander Scourby) stating she’s Tom Duncan’s widow and he agrees to meet with her.
Although no note is recovered, the coroner rules it a suicide. After talking with Tom’s wife, who says he was ill, Dave believes it. That is until Lucy Chapman (Dorothy Green) meets him. She says Tom never would have killed himself. She knows because they had a close relationship. Tom’s wife says there were four other women over the years who also had close relationships with Tom, so she doesn’t care what Lucy says. After Lucy ends up brutally killed, Dave cares what she said.
When Dave investigates, the higher-ups dissuade him. He starts getting harassed at home, leading to his family no longer being safe there. Dave calls out his supervisors, including Police Commissioner Higgins (Howard Wendell), of being in league with Lagana. Higgins suspends Dave, who turns in his badge but keeps his gun. That may have been Dave’s plan. With Lagana having corrupted the system Dave believed in, he may have realized he could no longer be a part of it to see justice done.
As Dave works the case, the violence increases from both sides. Dave has to get more heavy-handed with people to get the answers he needs. Lagana’s main fixer, the fiendish Vince Stone (Lee Marvin), badly hurts his girl Debby (Gloria Grahame) because she spent time with Dave and presumes she gave him information. She seeks her own revenge after she gets out of the hospital. The bodies continue to pile up, but will Lagana stay above the fray or will Dave get the evidence to take him down?
The video has been given a 1080p/MPEG-4 AVC encoded transfer displayed at the film’s original aspect ratio of 1.37:1. The liner notes state, “this new 4K restoration was undertaken by Sony Pictures Entertainment and was created from the 35mm camera negative and a 35mm fine-grain master positive.” Blacks are rich and the image offers a wide spectrum of grays. Consistent film grain is apparent and the image delivers fine texture details in the costumes and sets. Some close-ups on the female actors have a softer focus, which is intentional.
The audio is available in LPCM Mono. “The monaural soundtrack was remastered from the 35mm original magnetic track.” Dialogue is clear. The music balances well in the scenes. The track is free of hiss and signs of wear and age.
The Special Features are:
- New audio commentary by film-noir experts Alain Silver and James Ursini
- The Women of The Big Heat (28 min) – A video essay by critic Farran Smith Nehme on the female characters
- Fritz Lang – Audio interviews with film historian Gideon Bachmann in 1956 (16 min) for Film Forum and filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich in 1965 (7 min)
- Interviews with Martin Scorsese (6 min) and Michael Mann (11 min) praising the film.
- Trailer
Although I would disagree with the film-noir designation due to the traits of a few characters, The Big Heat is a wonderfully gritty look at corruption and what it takes to uproot it. Even when he does bad things, it’s hard not to root for Ford’s Dave Bannion, whose steely resolve is required to clean up the city. The rest of the cast create authentic characters that adds a believability to the setting and the story. Not a scene feels like it goes on too long as the film moves at a brisk pace. The new 4K restoration looks quite good on the Criterion Blu-ray.
