Fab Fifties Fan's terrific post on Barbara Payton reminded me of some material that I intended to post on one of my
favorite little movies and its star. The star is Barbara's old boyfriend and fighting companion, Tom Neal:
PRC pictures Inc.
Tom Neal's life followed the same noire-style path as Barbara's. After growing up in a wealthy family,
Neal was educated at Northwestern University, then received a law degree from Harvard. Along with
his law degree, Neal picked up some boxing skills on his college teams.
In his turbulent romance with Barbara Payton, he put his boxing skills to good use, punching out his
rival for Barbara's affections, actor Franchot Tone, and putting him in the hospital with serious injuries.
Not satisfied with partially ruining his life (and career), in 1965 Neal shot his third wife, Gale Bennett,
in the back of the head with a .45 caliber pistol and killed her. He must have had O.J.'s law team on his
side, because somehow he got off with involuntary manslaughter.
He was out of jail on parole by
1971, but dropped dead of heart failure the next year at age 58.
But before all this happened, he made one of my favorite little (as in little budget) movies named:
PRC Pictures Inc.
The charm of these "Poverty Row" films is that they could get so much out of their meager budgets.
Naturally, this usually involved shading the truth when it came to expenditures for such things as
location shots and such. The fun for us, of course, is to ferret out the "fakery", so here goes:
Now I think anyone who has watched the movie has noticed that the scenes where Tom Neal is
hitchhiking westward, must have been originally filmed from left to right, which makes them look like
he is going eastward. Instead of re-filming these scenes, PRC must have just flopped the images and we have this:
PRC pictures Inc.
O.K. minor problem with the steering wheels on the wrong side.
Now we have our hero hitchhiking through "Arizona":
PRC Pictures Inc.
Wait a minute; this area looks familiar:
Google Streetview
We are in the Mojave Desert, east of Palmdale, California in the Antelope Valley. I'm not exactly sure
where they were,
but deserted roads, sand, and Joshua trees are a dime a dozen out there.
(I live over by those hills in the background by the way).
In a few minutes, Tom Neal is picked up and they drive off, still in Arizona:
PRC Pictures Inc.
Sure looks a bunch like this current shot of Sierra Highway heading west into Acton from Palmdale:
Google Street View
The road has been widened and straightened to accommodate traffic for the Metro Link train station in
Acton and the Antelope Valley Freeway is cut into the hill (up where you see the semi truck).
Now finally they arrive at the California border:
PRC Pictures Inc.
The road up ahead sure looks familiar! Go up two pictures.
If you have never watched Detour, you are missing a good movie. Ann Savage is really terrific too.
The movie is in public domain and you can watch it for free here:
http://www.archive.org/details/Detour