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Nice effects though.

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

This is a slick Hollywood film from the 1950's made for entertainment purposes. Hollywood at its most confident and smooth, it is made to sell movie theater tickets and give you your money's worth. It delivers in that regard.Good black and white photography and an a-picture gloss in all production values. Speaking of gloss- Mr. Cotton was one of the classiest of film acting gentlemen, and in this film Ms. Peters matches him in a performance that is not in any way b-list. She is first class all the way here.All of the supporting performances are excellent. This is a straightforward movie mystery that does not mess with your head- what you see is what it is. I very much enjoyed the linear script that builds momentum into a swelling wave that reaches a crescendo right before everything is resolved. A nocturne composed by Frederik Chopin in the 1830's matches the dark undertones at work throughout the film as it is applied in a background way as it should be rather than as a boffo film theme. I ordinarily would not recommend such structured classical music for a film but this one is melodic and was deliberately written by Chopin to be quietly dark, so it works.Is "A Blueprint for Murder" just a glossy, slick Hollywood concoction? Yes but it is well edited and well made overall. It will provide you with entertainment from start to finish.

Film noir is an individual taste, and while the genre is certainly one of the most famous of classic movies today, there are so few that can be called "all-time classics". Certainly, when you say "Film Noir", you may think instantly of "Laura", "Double Indemnity", "Gilda", "The Big Sleep", among a few others. But then, there are the "sleepers", low-budget delights like "Detour" and "Decoy", cult classics like "Somewhere in the Night" and "The Night Has a Thousand Eyes", and later day film noir entries like "Cape Fear" and "The Manchurian Candidate". Some might rank the more obscure entries in this genre as just average, but there are hidden delights out there just yearning to be re-discovered."A Blueprint For Murder" took me totally by surprise, and I was not expecting the twists and turns of this exciting melodrama. It all starts with an unseen little girl screaming in ailment, supposedly due to viral encephalitis, but suspicions lead to more being revealed than meets the eye. The poor little girl's uncle (Joseph Cotten) arrives and exchanges pleasantries with Jean Peters, the girl's stepmother and widow of his late brother. They are seemingly very close, but certain factors begin to make him suspicious of her. His close friend (Gary Merrill) and Merrill's mystery obsessed wife (Catherine McLeod) give him the hints that something else could be up. Could the seemingly sweet Peters be a strictnine poisoning murderess? After the poor girl dies, Cotten keeps putting off leaving town on business, afraid that his nephew (Freddy Ridgeway) might become Peters' next victim. But there's no evidence to prove that Peters isn't anything more than a loving woman, and it is up to Cotten to go out of his way (here very desperately) to prove himself either right or wrong.All the twists and turns are there for a desperate measure to reveal the truth, and it all culminates on a European bound steamship where Cotten himself might be revealed to be a killer. This is another chase between cat and mouse where the stakes are obvious. As Peters points out after her possible motives are exposed, Cotten has possible motive too. So the viewer begins to question what seems obvious as possibly being not so, and who seems to be good as being not so. The fact that romance slowly erupts between Cotten and Peters makes them a couple straight out of memories of MacMurray and Stanwyck in "Double Indemnity" and Mitchum and Greer in "Out of the Past". This one has a twist towards the end that left me with a dropped jaw and clutching my hands, both in tension and delight, as to the twists and turns of this film noir roller-coaster.

Unusual movie since it's hard to adequately comment without giving away the ending. It's an efficient little suspenser, but nothing more. And that's too bad because the premise has more exciting possibilities than what's there on screen. The problem lies, I think, with the way the project was conceived as nothing more than a low-budget, 70-minute, quickie. It looks like the producers went out and hired a director then making his reputation on just such uncomplicated movie fare, Andrew Stone. He's perfect for the concept with his straight-ahead, documentary style that cares little for artifice or character. The script too plows straight- ahead with little subtlety or ambiguity. Thus a potential that would add the vital extra dimension of mystery or whodunit is eliminated from the outset, resulting in a straight suspense film with no surprises.Now I was slow to catch on. I kept looking for twists or some kind of ambiguity that would open up a mysterious aspect and leave me guessing. But there isn't any. The streamlined screenplay is utterly without artifice, which may have suited Stone, but left me with an ending that's not only badly contrived but also with the feeling that this can't be all there is. It's like taking a sight-seeing trip that keeps you watching, but ends up without any memorable sights to see.Too bad that fine actor Joseph Cotten is wasted in a role that could have gone to dozens of less talented male leads. There is so much room for ambiguity that would have engaged his talent, instead of turning him into a basically one-dimensional bloodhound. I sympathize with those posters who regret that the master of suspense and subtlety, Alfred Hitchcock, didn't get hold of the material first. Jean Peters is fine, and I can see why the notorious womanizer Howard Hughes slapped a ring on her finger if only for a little while. But that final scene of waiting her out is so utterly implausible. After all, what does she gain by risking agonizing death since she's trapped on board ship where a trip to ship's doctor can be easily verified. Once she drinks the cocktail, her fate is sealed, and it's foolish of the screenplay to pretend otherwise.In passing—note how at ease director Stone is with the cop scenes. I detect a Dragnet influence from the TV series, even down to series veterans Phillips and Kruschen. Put that sort of material, such as The Night Holds Terror (1954), in Stone's hands and his single- minded devotion to procedure and plot works really well. Where it doesn't work so well is reducing potentially complex material like Blueprint to routine docu-drama.

While not a great film by any means, A BLUEPRINT FOR MURDER offers some very fine moments of suspense and is a very good B movie. (B movies are usually never over 90 mins). The two stars acquit themselves well, especially Jean Peters, and underrated actress of the 50's and 50's. (See VICKI as well). The pacing is fine, but the ending needed a little more zip. For a while the movie has the viewer coming and going as to what really happened to the husband and little girl, both who died under mysterious circumstances. This makes a fine double bill with the above mentioned VICKI. Being a fan of Jean Peters, Fox should release a couple of other films she made for them, namely TAKE CARE OF MY LITTLE GIRL.