I have a fascination with carnivals and circuses. Many filmmakers have as well Fellini, Bergman both made films set in the circus. So when I first read about this long forgotten film noir gem, I was hooked by the combination of a dark seedy crime story set in the carnival world. Surprisingly what I got was more than that — a thoughtful drama on the psychic con game.

Stanton Carlisle (Tyrone Power, THE MARK OF ZORRO) is a streetwise hustler who finds a home working as the talker at a carnival. He warms the crowd for low rent psychic Zeena Krumbein (Joan Blondell, A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN), who use to be in the big time until her partner/husband Pete (Ian Keith, QUEEN CHRISTINA) became lost in the bottle. Zeena and Pete’s legendary act was based on an intricate code, which allowed one person in the crowd to hold up objects obtained from the spectators and relate covertly what they were to the blindfolded “psychic” on stage. The code is worth a fortune and Stanton works his charms on Zeena to learn it. Now with the code, Stanton teams with the beautiful carnie girl Molly (Coleen Gray, RED RIVER) to go legit on the nightclub scene. But as his career skyrockets, Stanton gets greedy and hooks up with the cool and beautiful psychiatrist Lilith Ritter (Helen Walker, CALL NORTHSIDE 777) to turn his mentalist act into a medium.

Harry Houdini made a side career out of debunking psychics. Like Penn & Teller today, he despised tricksters who tried to pan themselves off as having supernatural abilities. This film uncovers how many of those charlatans perform their seemingly otherworldly acts. Stanton is a hustler from the start, a good one. He has a gift for feeling people out. At first we admire him because he is so skilled at what he does, but when he begins to pray on people’s weaknesses and the pain of loved ones they have lost, he begins fooling himself and his own loved ones too.

Matinee idol Power is very charming as the gifted huckster. He plays the audience as much as the marks in the film. But then he steps over a line and we see his downfall coming, which was foreshadowed by a tarot card reading. Power is supported well by the other performers in fairly stock roles. Gray is the cliché supportive wife while Ritter is the icy femme fatale. Blondell has a richer role as the former star, who puts up with traveling the sticks circuit because she loves her drunk of a husband, who is played with great conviction by Keith.

Director Edmund Goulding, best known for the 1932 Oscar winner GRAND HOTEL, doesn’t shy away from the noir conventions of the story, but seems more interested in playing the material as human drama rather than playing up the pulpy side. His pacing is dead on for the most part until he races through the overwrought comeuppance arriving at the pat happy ending. Despite, the forced cheery outlook right before The End card roles, the solid set-up and second act make for a taut and convincing examination of the moral corruption of a con man. As for its relevance today, with psychics on SCI FI crossing over and mediums on Discovery and A&E helping cops with murder investigations, the skepticism of this film is refreshingly progressive now as it was 60 years ago.