Kino Lorber
Director Jack Arnold’s The Glass Web is a 1953 B movie that was completely new to me. I had never before heard of it and had no idea what it was about or who was in it.
After a clever special effect with the on-screen title shattering, we find ourselves viewing a rather obvious soundstage set with a couple driving up. I’m watching and wondering just how cheap this movie is when the camera slowly pulls back and shows us…another camera.
It IS a set! We’re watching a TV series episode being filmed, Crime of the Week. They fooled me!
From there we meet the show’s producer (Richard Denning), its writer (John Forsythe), and its technical consultant (Edward G. Robinson), as they assess that week’s live broadcast and begin to discuss the next episode.
We meet the writer’s wife and kids as he tells them he’ll be working late, and then see him ask the consultant to back him up. The consultant agrees, but then taxis off with the show’s young blonde starlet, Paula (Kathleen Hughes).
It seems that unlikely pair is having a bit of a fling, with the older man seemingly oblivious to the obvious-to-the-audience fact that she’s a gold digger. She leaves his apartment and goes back to her own where she’s meeting and blackmailing the writer for an earlier tryst.
On top of all that, she has a crooked ex-husband who shows up in town around the same time wanting to see her. One thing leads to another and Paula ends up strangled to death. The viewer doesn’t see who kills her but we’re left with a pretty definite idea.
One person we know that didn’t commit the murder was the writer, as we were following him sneaking around outside her apartment. Under the odd circumstances, though, he convinces himself that the police will consider him the main suspect!
In a rather perverse move, the consultant suggests that the following week’s episode of Crime of the Week adapt the story of the murder of Paula, who had just played a murder victim on the previous week’s episode. The producer is all about ratings and jumps at the idea.
As complicated as all this is, it’s a tad dull in its execution, saved mainly by its stars. Forsythe (the future “Charlie” from Charlie’s Angels and star of Dynasty) was never a huge big-screen star but he was already a 10-year acting veteran by this point. Robinson, of course, the perennial movie gangster, was a long-established screen legend. Before being killed, Paula is played seductively by B queen Kathleen Hughes, an actress I see is still around in 2025!
With its themes of cheating, blackmail, and murder, plus the calmly commanding presence of Edward G., there are some inevitable Double Indemnity vibes in The Glass Web but it’s nowhere near as riveting. It does hold one’s interest, however, as the viewer has a pretty good idea who did and who didn’t kill Paula, but the characters keep trying to make different cases for the crime. There’s no traditional hero or even villain, but some interesting characters all around.
The TV series setting offers some interesting behind-the-scenes looks at early television studios, even allowing for fake cigarette commercials that are done very realistically, making the movie itself feel like an early TV show at times.
Apparently, The Glass Web was originally shot in Three Dimensions during the early ‘50s 3-D craze but mainly released as a 2-D project. Because of that and music rights clearances (Bing Crosby’s “Temptation” is a running theme and plot point), there’s been no home media release until now. Thankfully, that’s finally changed.
Extras include audio commentary and trailer.
Booksteve recommends.
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