Lack of good storyline.

It is a performances centric movie

good back-story, and good acting

Blistering performances.

"Where Danger Lives" is a surprisingly complex film noir with a deliciously vicious undertow. Robert Mitchum, Claude Rains and Faith Domergue are superb. What stands out is that Domergue is the strongest performance, and perhaps because she bears the strongest character. Domergue is refreshingly overpowering. If we consider that Harlow was actually a seasoned actress prior to "Hell's Angels," Domergue is arguably Hughes' best discovery. Seductive danger with surprise twists, indeed.

Film noir plots in which a fall guy gets framed by a femme fatale are not exactly rare but what distinguishes this movie from other similar ones is the way in which the victim's personal road to hell is depicted as a nightmare. The respectable man's normally good judgement deserts him when he becomes infatuated by an attractive woman and later, the effects of alcohol and concussion further impair his powers of reasoning. The disorientation and confusion that follow make his predicament increasingly worse as he experiences the kind of illogicality and loss of control that are common in dreams and feels himself being helplessly propelled towards an uncertain destiny.This sense of everything being off-kilter is also reflected elsewhere in the movie as the femme fatale is mentally unbalanced, the people that the couple meet when they're on the run are extremely eccentric and a whole series of wonderfully off-balance visual compositions are also featured.At the end of a long shift in a San Francisco hospital, hard-working Dr Jeff Cameron (Robert Mitchum) attends to an attempted suicide case. The patient is a young woman known simply as Margo (Faith Domergue) who recovers quickly and is soon discharged. Mysteriously, neither Margo or the man who brought her to the hospital disclose any other details of their identities or addresses but shortly after, Jeff receives a note from his patient containing her address. In an attempt to ensure that she doesn't try to commit suicide again, he visits her mansion and she gives him an account of why she tried to kill herself. Although he already has a regular girlfriend, Jeff continues to see Margo and falls in love with her.When Margo tells Jeff that she's got to accompany her very old father to Nassau the next day, he decides to meet Mr Frederick Lannington (Claude Rains) in the hope of changing his mind and in order to overcome his nerves, fortifies himself with a number of strong drinks. At the mansion, the young doctor tells Mr Lannington that he's in love with Margo and is shocked to be told that Margo is actually the old man's wife who married him for his money. Disgusted by this revelation, Jeff leaves the mansion but then goes back in after hearing Margo scream.Lannington had apparently ripped a earring out of one of Margo's ears and then hits Jeff with a poker before the younger man knocks his attacker out. Jeff is perpetually shaken and unsteady after this incident and after going to the bathroom to freshen up, returns to find that Lannington is dead. Margo persuades him that the police will be suspicious of the circumstances under which her husband died and so the couple go on the run together. Their journey to the Mexican border proves to be difficult and hazardous as Jeff realises he's suffering from concussion and they also get swindled by a whole succession of unscrupulous people.Robert Mitchum and Claude Rains are so good in their roles that they easily outshine everyone else in the cast and make the whole production far better than it might otherwise have been. The growing tension and paranoia that prevails during the couple's road trip is expertly created and maintained and their experiences of feeling trapped and disorientated are also strongly emphasised by the movie's wonderful cinematography and the use of some terrific low-angle shots. "Where Danger Lives" is extremely enjoyable and some of its twists are top class.

I'm graciously giving this a five, only because of Robert Mitchum and what he added to the film. After the interesting opening, where you see him as a caring doctor, and loving fiancé, followed by a visit to the female suicide attempt he is treating, things start to fall apart in a hurry. A follow-up on the suicidal woman, who unexpectedly leaves the hospital early, is naturally done by Mitchum (read above) the ultimate nice guy.Tracking her down to a mansion, she explains strangely about "her father" basically running her life-demanding Mitchum to leave, only to say she will need him later. After the later meeting, following her home, one surprise leads to about five over the top circumstances. The last hour of the movie you are just waiting for the obvious conclusion to arrive, and it does. Mitchum, doing as much as he can with not much to work with.

Film-noir wasn't all about amazing masterpieces by Orson Welles, John Huston and Alfred Hitchcock. The genre is full of b-class stories from which the most remembered ones are by Edgar G. Ulmer and Joseph H. Lewis. Robert Mithcum was a big star of these b-class noir films, but he wasn't a bad actor at all. He made on impressive performance in a very good film-noir, which wasn't even close to a b-class movie, Out of the Past (1947) by Jacques Tourneur. Mitchum is also remembered for Angel Face (1952) also a film-noir. Moral complexity, outlaws, dangerous women and desperate men were the trademarks of the genre, which can all be found is this commercial - mostly made for entertainment - film by John Farrow, who directed a few other film-noirs as well such as Calcutta (1947), The Big Clock (1948), Night Has A Thousand Eyes (1948) and His Kind of Woman (1951).The direction by Farrow is at times very conventional and he accidentally makes unintentional comedy in a few scenes. The story gets going when Jeff Cameron, a doctor (an unusual role for Mitchum) sees a suicide patient at his department. The following day he gets a suspicious note from the woman and is asked to meet her at an apartment. Eventually Jeff falls in love with the woman and gets framed for a murder. The rest of the film shows the running away of Jeff and her lover.Running away from the law was also a very common subject for film-noir. Anthony Mann's Desperate (1947) and Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound (1945) probably being the most remembered ones. Running away always meant something more than just the concrete escape. In Hitchcock's Spellbound John is running away from the police, but also from his subconsciousness. In Where Danger Lives Jeff (Mitchum) is running away from the law and the difficulty of stable life.To my mind Where Danger Lives was a very well made film-noir. It is a very interesting film for all of those interested in film-noir and history of cinema, but it is also a treat for those who enjoy an entertaining thriller every now and then. Even that Mitchum's performance isn't the best one could find it has its own greatness - something similar that Vincent Price has. An entertaining common film-noir.