You might have difficulty imagining a movie procedural of Public Health officers quelling an epidemic being described as “lurid”, but then there’s The Killer that Stalked New York (1951). The star is Evelyn Keyes, who plays Sheila, a Typhoid Mary of smallpox. Sheila has made a very bad choice in boyfriends – a guy for whom she has taken one fall already and is now helping with a delivery of stolen jewelry. She’s on the run from the cops until she can deliver the loot – and bad boyfriend (Charles Korvin) wants that loot right away, too. And she’s not feeling well…
Sheila has smallpox, so she’s zipping furtively around NYC infecting people. So the Public Health Department is also tracking her down as Patent Zero. The Killer that Stalked New York is about these two overlaid ticking bombs – the jewelry caper and the smallpox – all while Sheila is getting sicker and sicker. Fortunately, a dreamy Public Health doc (William Bishop) is drawn to save her.
Evelyn Keyes is the best thing about the movie, although she has to play a pretty overwrought role. And she is made up to look worse and worse in the course of the plot, getting really sweaty and finally sporting pustules. I’m not including a n image that would spoil how she looks at the end.
This was the last movie that Keyes was contracted to do for Hollywood mogul Harry Cohn, who was relentlessly sexually harrassing Keyes. She suspected that Cohn cast her in this de-glamorized role because she denied him her favors.
The other characters are even more broadly drawn. There’s no shading in the character of the bad, bad, rotten to the core boyfriend – he’s two-timing Sheila with her sister and is so mean that he fatally clubs an old guy played by the lovable Art Smith. The doc is impossibly saintly – even climbing out on a ledge to rescue Sheila after she has shot him. The Public Health bureaucrats are all sternly efficient – period.The Killer that Stalked New York is not nearly as good as the best of Epidemic Noir – Panic in the Streets from the year before. It’s mainly interesting as an Evelyn Keyes vehicle.
Besides Art Smith, we also get to see film noir favorite supporting actors Whit Bissell and Dorothy Malone (in a wholesome, Good Girl role).
The Killer That Stalked New York has played on Turner Classic Movies. It’s not currently available to stream, but he DVD is available to purchase.
