Partial Re-Make of 'Down Three Dark Streets"(1954)

Amazon Prime has rescued the 1954 FBI thriller "Down Three Dark Streets" from obscurity(it was a staple on 60's afternoon movies) and revealed to us that "Experiment in Terror" is a partial remake of the 1954 film.

But..the 1954 film isn't really very good, or nearly as suspenseful as Experiment in Terror.

The script for "Down Three Dark Streets" is "Dick and Jane" basic; things happen too fast and the characters barely get time to register as real people. Surprising: the star is Broderick Crawford, about five years from his Best Actor Oscar but clearly heading for "Highway Patrol" and a kind of camp fame as that slurry-voiced bulldog in cop roles. Also surprising: Ruth Roman is the above-the-title co-star, only three years out from her role in Hitchcock's classic "Strangers on a Train" but here a slave to really bad dialogue.

That said, what "Down Three Dark Streets" shares with "Experiment in Terror" is the plot and a character name: FBI Agent John Ripley. That's Brod Crawford here; and it will be Glenn Ford(more suave)in Experiment in Terror and the reason for the same name is that the same authors ("The Gordons' --a husband and wife team of former FBI agents) wrote the books for both movies.

In Down Three Dark Streets, Brod's Ripley is investigating three cases -- so as to find out which one of the three cases got his partner(50's monster movie stalwart Kenneth Tobey) murdered. One of these three cases is that of a shadowy extortionist demanding money from Ruth Roman(who has recently inheritied money from her dead husband) to avoid the killing of her young daughter.

Somebody figured that this ONE case in "Down Three Dark Streets" was worth a remake of its own -- 8 years later in a less censored (but still censored, nonetheless) 1962, where the extortionist could be more of a creepy psycho type and the female victim more sexy(her sexy younger sister, not the daughter, is the target.)

Ruth Roman becomes Lee Remick. The money is from Remick's bank job as a teller, not an inheritiance. The action is moved from LA to SF. And Henry Mancini puts a superbly eerie and scary soundtrack on the new movie.

Interesting: the climax in both movies is at a "famous location," ala Hitchcock: Down Three Dark Streets climaxes its most important story(this one) at the Hollywood Sign in the Hollywood Hills; Experiment in Terror climaxes at Candlestick Park during a real SF Giants baseball game.

"Experiment in Terror" is better, bigger, and more scary than "Down Three Dark Streets," but the earlier picture provides a nice exercise in trivia: here's the same plot done with the heavy censorship and lower budget of a 1954 B picture.