Impact (1949)

Directed by Arthur Lubin; produced by Leo C Popkin

Walter Williams (Brian Donlevy) has everything he could want. A powerful industrialist, he is confident, wealthy and respected, with a fine home and a beautiful wife, Irene, whom he adores. But one day, all that changes. Irene (Helen Walker), is not only having an affair but plots with her boyfriend, Jim (Tony Barrett), to kill Williams. In executing the homicidal scheme, however, it is Jim who is killed, accidentally, and in a fashion that makes the world think it is Williams who died. Will the would-be victim remain hidden or seek his revenge?

Donlevy rarely filled the parts given to character actors; neither did he often play the lead. But he has his chance in Impact, and he succeeds admirably. Often a villain, he is usually gruff, irascible or hard even when a good guy; his naturally stern expression helps. Here, he turns that to advantage. Williams is a tough man, used to getting what he wants. But he is also, as his unfaithful wife rightly assesses, a ‘softy’: he is concerned with others’ welfare, will do favours for strangers and becomes embarrassed when anyone sees how much he feels for his wife.

Williams is portrayed, in fact, as quite human. Donlevy’s conveyance of a man crushed by betrayal is convincing, especially so at the moment when he deduces that his spouse had tried to have him murdered. Thereafter, Williams develops a different kind of hardness than he had had, yet with vulnerability.

Donlevy’s performance is crucial to Impact’s success, but other actors do as well. Ella Raines, as Marsha, the small-town widow who takes a liking to Williams, conveys a forthright freshness that is needed, while Walker makes her treacherous character suitably vile, twisting at every angle to gain whatever advantage is to be had. Charles Coburn, perhaps a bit too old to play a police detective, even one facing retirement, is energetic and amusing in his search for justice.

Director Lubin fit Impact between several Abbot and Costello films on one side and a couple of Francis the Talking Mule flicks on the other – and he does a fine job of it. He keeps things subtle, for the most part, even in the scene when Williams is overwhelmed by the enormity of the plot against him. At one point, Williams, who had been ten years a mechanic before taking a desk job, hesitates before beginning a car’s repair job: as someone points out, his hands show he hadn’t done such work in a while. That’s typical of the small touches Lubin includes.

The script is also good, though it becomes rather too complicated in the final act, and, at 111 minutes, could have been tightened a bit in the editing room. Nonetheless, it complements the direction in its use of almost incidental moments. When Marsha talks about continuing to run her garage after her husband’s death in combat, she – and the script – hurries past the admission, as if dwelling on it for more than a second or two would be too painful.

Impact is a good crime-film with a concentration on character. That is so much to its advantage, in fact, that when the plot looms larger than the people, it rather hurts the movie. Nonetheless, thanks to the acting and directing, this is an entertaining and enjoyable picture.