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Storm Warning (1951 film)

Storm Warning
Stormwarningposter.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Stuart Heisler
Produced by Jerry Wald
Screenplay by Richard Brooks
Daniel Fuchs
Starring Ginger Rogers
Ronald Reagan
Doris Day
Steve Cochran
Music by Daniele Amfitheatrof
Cinematography Carl E. Guthrie
Edited by Clarence Kolster
Distributed by Warner Bros.
Release date
  • January 17, 1951 (1951-01-17) (Miami Beach)
Running time
93 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Box office $1.25 million (US rentals)

Storm Warning is a 1951 American Film Noir thriller, directed by Stuart Heisler, and featuring Ginger Rogers, Ronald Reagan, Doris Day and Steve Cochran. Lauren Bacall was originally cast in the part eventually played by Rogers. Bacall turned it down and was put on suspension by Warners for her defiance.

Marsha Mitchell (Ginger Rogers), a traveling dress model, stops in the town of Rockpoint to see her newlywed sister, Lucy Rice (Doris Day). Within minutes of entering the town she notices unusual behavior by the townsfolk, such as dozens of people closing up shop and getting out of sight. As she walks down the almost-pitch-black main street, she sees loud noises coming from the police station. She hides but sees a drunken KKK mob, beating and berating a man whom they had just broken out of jail. The man untangles himself from their clutches, and he starts to run but goes only a few yards before someone in the mob twice fires a shotgun, killing him by striking him in the torso and the head. The mob, confused, approaches the fallen man, arguing among themselves. Marsha, hiding around a corner from the crime scene, gets a good look at two of the men, who have removed their hoods during the fiasco.

After the mob quickly leaves the scene, Marsha runs to the nearby bowling alley, where her sister works. Lucy quickly notices the shocked and horrified look on her sister's face and inquires. Marsha tells her about the murder she just witnessed, which causes Lucy to tell her about the undercover work of Walter Adams, whom, she believes, must have been the slain man. She explains that Adams arrived in town recently and got a job with the phone company, but he was secretly a journalist, writing critical material about the town's klavern. The police decided to put an end to his reporting and arrested him on a false charge of driving while intoxicated.

Lucy takes Marsha to her home and encourages her to tell her husband, Hank, about what Marsha saw. However, there is a problem: As soon as Marsha meets Hank, she recognizes him as one of the two men who removed their hoods. Within minutes, while Marsha and Lucy are alone (at least she thinks they are alone), Marsha tells her sister that her husband was one of the Klansmen. Hank, eavesdropping, with a clear look of guilt on his face, denies everything. However, he's not able to hold his own against Marsha's insistence, so he confesses. He sobs and says that he was drunk and was forced to go with the other men to the scene, and did not intend for the man to die. All they wanted to do, according to Hank, was to talk to the guy and persuade him to leave and to stop criticizing their town. Hank then desperately tries to persuade Marsha to keep her mouth shut for the sake of his life and his marriage to her sister, who is pregnant. Lucy forgives her husband and decides that he was simply a part of something beyond his control. Marsha, still viewing him as a vile person, reluctantly agrees to leave town and "forget" about the incident.


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