Frank Tuttle
This Gun for Hire

This 1942 film marked the launch of Alan Ladd's career, who until then had more cameo appearances than speaking roles and whose name appears as supporting cast in the original poster because no one expected the success of his character. The historical context was far from relaxed: the United States was at war with Japan, and Hollywood was churning out films laden with sabotage, spies, and Asian threats like doughnuts. This Gun for Hire fits into this genre, distinguishing itself, however, thanks to the character of Raven, a professional hitman with the afflicted air of a stoic philosopher forced to use a gun.

The film is more or less loosely based on a 1936 novel by Graham Greene, This Gun for Sale, and tells the story of Raven, a silent and antisocial killer hired to take out a chemist and steal a secret formula. The boss is a certain Will Gates (certainly not related to Bill) who tries to remain anonymous. However, Raven discovers his identity and realizes he has been paid with marked bills. The cherry on top: Gates tips off the police to track him down.

Thus begins a chase from San Francisco to Los Angeles, during which Raven meets Ellen, a nightclub artist and, of course, the girlfriend of the policeman pursuing him. A brazen and highly improbable coincidence, but essential to kickstart the emotional engine of the film: the relationship between Raven and the girl. Ellen succeeds in getting him to open up about his past as an abused orphan, introducing the theme of child abuse and the attempt to "rationalize evil" by showing that even behind a killer lurks a human being.

“Raven isn't bad,” the screenplay whispers to us with the heartfelt tone of someone trying to get him acquitted: “It's the world that's ruined him.” To reinforce this view, in the opening scenes we see him petting a cat, which in the universal language of cinema means “I have a heart, I swear.” A second cat, Tuffy, makes an appearance at the end when Ellen has almost persuaded him not to kill Gates but to expose the real culprit: the tycoon Alvin Brewster, ready to sell the chemical formula to the Japanese. Patriotism and redemption all in one go.

Naturally, the Hays Code couldn't allow a happy ending for a murderer, no matter how sensitive and feline-loving. But Alan Ladd's performance hit the mark: icy, tormented, elegant, and lethal, he was described as “a professional killer with desolate and poignant ferocity, which made him unique among the anti-heroes of the era.”

Alongside him, Veronica Lake, platinum blonde with a languid gaze, became Ladd's ideal partner in other films as well. On-screen chemistry and, most notably, the perfect proportion: she was one of the few starlets shorter than him, a detail that in Hollywood counts for more than talent.

The direction is by Frank Tuttle, a sincere craftsman with a filmography as long as a shopping list, active from 1922 to 1956. In Italy, the film was distributed with the brilliant title Il Fuorilegge - an imaginative effort that screams “two-hour lunch break, washed down with a few glasses.”

For the purists: a television fiction was also made from Greene's original novel in 1971, with the exact title Una Pistola in Vendita. No one remembers it, but at least it had the right title.

Available in its original version on Internet Archives.