I am currently in love with the film noir actor Dan Duryea.
No matter how horrible the movie is, he can elevate it. Seriously, in World for Ransom, which is a very bad movie, he says the most wretched dialog and somehow makes you think you're watching an urbane comedy, because his delivery is just a delight. In fact, often it shines brightest because everyone else in the movie is awful. The more wooden they are, the more captivating he is. He spits out garbage in his special snappy cadence and makes it sound like gold.
This means I've been watching some seriously awful movies just because he's in them. You wouldn't have heard of those movies; most are boilerplate film noir.
However, he was in two excellent movies: The Little Foxes and Flight of the Phoenix (1965). Oddly, I don't remember him in either, probably because he couldn't shine in the darkness as per usual, given he was playing opposite Bette Davis and Jimmy Stewart. I had to look it up on IMDB (instead of watching both those movies again), and he's the very Catholic passenger in Phoenix and Bette's craven nephew in Foxes.
Here he is in something good: Scarlet Street. For cat's sake.
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