Another "What's this movie?" thread

General Questions
#1

I have a recollection of a scene from a movie, but I don’t know what the movie is. I’ve tried searching IMDb, but nothing seems to come up. Maybe the Teeming Millions can help.

It’s a Film Noir movie from the 30s or 40s. The scene takes place in a roadside diner, I believe in the Arizona desert. There is a man who is a customer and a woman who owns or works in the diner. The man is on the run, and is being chased by either the police or a criminal gang (I don’t know which). The woman ends up helping him hide out, I think.

My first inclination was that the name of the movie was The Painted Desert, but a search of IMDb didn’t turn up any films by that name that matched the plot I remember. A little more looking led me to The Postman Always Rings Twice, which also takes place in a roadside diner. But after reading a synopsis of that film, I’m pretty sure that it isn’t this movie. If I am remembering correctly, the film I’m thinking of takes place somewhere in the desert, whereas Postman takes place somewhere between Los Angeles and San Francisco. I’ve only seen clips of Postman and while the woman in my film is blonde, I’m pretty sure she wasn’t Lana Turner. She had a different hairstyle than Lana had in Postman.

Any idea what movie this could be?

#2

Why not check out both of the films you have mentioned from your library or local video store. Watch them both.

Perhaps you are combing memories from two different movies. It could happen.

#3

Ooops! The title of this thread was supposed to be Another “What’s this movie?” thread. Apparently the code didn’t like the quotation marks.

Can a mod fix this for me?

Thanks.

#4

I tried doing this, but my local Blockbuster only had the Jack Nicholson remake of Postman and nothing for The Painted Desert. Apparently, Blockbuster doesn’t stock very many “classic” movies. I’ll try to find another video store that has a more extensive selection.

#5

The Petrified Forest?

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0028096

(not too far from the painted desert, you know).

#6

OK. Mystery solved. I’ve been trying to think of the answer to this all day long with no luck. But as soon as I post it here, the answer pops right into my head - even before Cabbage posted his/her reply.

The movie I’m thinking of is The Petrified Forest with Bette Davis, Leslie Howard, and Humphrey Bogart.

Painted Desert. Petrified Forest. I knew it was somewhere in the Arizona desert.

#7

Done… I figured it’d be something like that when I saw the subject line. For future reference, if you include “double quotes” in a title, and then preview, it’ll truncate. If you leave off the preview, or use ‘single quotes’, or hit “back” to go back to the original “new thread” screen before hitting “submit”, it’ll work fine.