Edgar G. Ulmer's noir thriller has been newly restored.
Despite it being made on a miniscule budget and released as a 'B' picture, director Edgar G. Ulmer's 1945 thriller Detour has since become one of the most acclaimed films noir of its era.
The film stars Tom Neal as a hitchhiker who runs into trouble when the driver who picks him up dies. Fearing he will be accused of murder, the hapless hitcher finds himself in even further trouble when he encounters a young woman (Ann Savage) who threatens to turn him into the cops.
Ulmer's thriller has been widely available in the public domain in the form of some pretty rough prints, so a restoration is welcome. Thanks to funding from George Lucas, it's now been restored in 4K. Janus Films will release it in US cinemas on November 30th, and hopefully it will be picked up by a UK distributor soon.
Courtesy of The Playlist, you can check out the rerelease trailer below.
The official synopsis reads:
As he hitchhikes his way from New York to Los Angeles, a down-on-his-luck nightclub pianist (Tom Neal) finds himself with a dead body on his hands and nowhere to run—a waking nightmare that goes from bad to worse when he picks up the most vicious femme fatale in cinema history, Ann Savage’s snarling, monstrously conniving drifter Vera. Working with no-name stars on a bargain-basement budget, B auteur Edgar G. Ulmer turned threadbare production values and seedy, low-rent atmosphere into indelible pulp poetry. Long available only in substandard public domain prints, Detour haunts anew in its first major restoration.
