TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Jenna Walter The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Dana An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

vert001 Even when I first saw STORM WARNING as a teenager on a late night television broadcast long, long ago, I realized that Ginger Rogers, Doris Day and Ronald Reagan were very odd casting for a film about the Ku Klux Klan. Still, the movie worked for me then and it works for me now. As many have noted, this is no documentary on the Ku Klux Klan. It treats the Klan more as your typical crime syndicate, a subject that was coming into prominence at around this time (see THE PHENIX CITY STORY among many others). Take STORM WARNING for what it is rather than for something that it is not and you'll find plenty to admire about it.Ginger Rogers plays a dress model, presumably modeling for some small garment district company, who's hitting the small town Southern circuit (we must deduce 'South' from the bus's itinerary on which Rogers is traveling. Otherwise the town could plausibly be anywhere in the Midwest, or even much of the West, though 1930 would be a more likely date for Klan domination of a city than was 1950). It's a modest position, and with a still marvelous body together with her rather worn face, Ginger very much looks the part. The first scene shows her kidding around a lot with her traveling companion. Such levity completely disappears once she witnesses the killing. It's a nice touch.Ginger also looks very plausibly the older sister of Doris Day. The psycho-dynamic similarities with A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE are too striking to be missed. This must have been the influence of the stage production of STREETCAR as STORM WARNING seems to have completed filming before the film version of STREETCAR began (the 10 month difference between the films' premieres indicates this time-line). Indeed, besides the obvious similarities with STREETCAR: older sister coming to visit recently married and now pregnant sister; meeting her in a bowling alley; younger sister sexually enthralled with blue collar hubby to the point of blinding herself to his animalistic nature; elder sister's attempts to get her away from husband; husband's attempt to rape sister-in-law, etc., there are also similarities with Elia Kazan's later ON THE WATERFRONT: Siblings strive to protect one another rather than aiding the cause of justice, in both cases by covering up the guilt of a crime syndicate involved in a murder; similar criminal hearings feature absurdly lying witnesses and interrupt the narratives; protagonists receive brutal beatings during the melodramatic climaxes, and crime bosses scream at their underlings to hang together or they will all hang separately. I think it's pretty clear that Elia Kazan took a look at STORM WARNING and that the influences go both ways.But be that as it may, we have here a Noir-tinged social drama notable for its generally sunny cast and extreme dark violence (was there a more explicit scene of its kind than the attempted rape in STORM WARNING between, say, 1934 and PSYCHO in 1960?). Stuart Heisler and Carl Guthrie were at the height of their directorial and photographic powers respectively when shooting STORM WARNING. Ginger Rogers' grim, emotionally buttoned-down portrayal of her character is perfect for the role and completely unlike her usual screen persona. Steve Cochran's pseudo-Stanley Kowalski is brutal and effective, and Doris Day is fine in what I believe was her first serious role. They give us a fine movie that should be much better known.

jarrodmcdonald-1 Ginger Rogers and Doris Day are believably cast as sisters in Storm Warning. Steve Cochran plays one of his usual shady characters. And Ronald Reagan appears in his last picture for Warners as a prosecutor who saves the day.The subject matter is rather dark. It's a story about Civil Rights and the Ku Klux Klan. Shot in black and white photography, the film's noir aspects are gripping to say the least, and aside from a somewhat melodramatic ending, the film has a fair amount of social realism in it.Originally Jack Warner wanted Joan Crawford to do this picture at the end of her contract. But she told him that nobody would believe she was Doris Day's sister.

Spikeopath Storm Warning is directed by Stuart Heisler and written by Richard Brooks and Daniel Fuchs. It stars Ginger Rogers, Ronald Reagan, Doris Day and Steve Cochran. Music is by Daniele Amfitheatrof and cinematography by Carl E. Guthrie. Stopping over to see her sister in Rockpoint, model Marsha Mitchell (Rogers) witnesses the Ku Klux Klan committing a murder and sees two of the perpetrators with their hoods off. Upon arriving at her sister's house, she is stunned to find that the beau of Lucy's (Day) life is one of the killers! Should she do what is morally right? What District Attorney Burt Rainey (Reagan) wants her to do? Or should she think of her sister and keep Hank Rice (Cochran) out of prison? Lets get the big complaint out the way first. What has been written before is true, the issue of race hatred and the KKK is not dealt with, this really does soft soap that particular issue in favour of a more - less - controversial angle. Film does still portray them as cowardly murderous thugs hiding behind hoods, even portraying them as dimwits following one almighty Grand Wizard (or is it Dragon?) who is more concerned about cash than colour of skin, but trivialisation of a hot topic occurs. We are the law here. The judges and jury! So, accepting it on its own "non social issue message" terms, then it's a thoroughly engrossing piece of film noir styled melodrama. Thematic noir staples are within, with bigotry, fate, family dysfunction and a woman in peril scenario (the fox in the hen house situation is super) all bubbling away under the moral obligation surface. Laid over the top is no short amount of atmospheric style, as Heisler (Among the Living/The Glass Key) and Guthrie (Backfire/Caged) produce dank shadowed streets, misty jails and a big court room segment bathed in slatted shadows befitting the moral discord filtering around the room. Don't give me that Halloween routine. Heisler proves to have a good eye for imagery as well as technical nous, such as snaps of child Klan members or the symbolic falling of a burning cross. He also marshals his cast very well. Don't believe any review that says Rogers is miscast, she simply isn't, she's feisty, sexy and strong, yet vulnerable as well, she's perfect for the role that was originally intended for Bacall who bailed out. And with Day exuding a confused innocence that hits the right notes, Heisler's reputation as a great director of actresses holds weight here. Reagan and Cochran are fine, with Cochran veering away from his normal cool, calculated persona to offer up a characterisation we rarely saw from him. It misses a trick to really strike a dagger in the KKK scheme of things, and yes some of it feels like lower grade Tennessee Williams. However, the makers turn this Southern town into a diseased noir landscape, where the story is paced and performed with skill, and it all builds moodily to a truly great finale. Well worth seeking out. 8/10

Robert J. Maxwell Model Ginger Rogers arrives in the small Sothrin town of Rockpoint from New York on a bus. She's going to visit her sister for the first time in years. The bus departs and Rogers finds herself alone in an unfriendly, night-time town that's filled with ominous shadows. She witnesses a brawl a block away. A dozen men in white pointed hoods are beating a man. She scurries into a dark nook and watches the man get shot twice. Some of the killers remove their hoods and she sees their faces, although they don't know she's there.She arrives shaken at his sister's house, Doris Day, and describes what she saw. Then Day's husband, Steve Cochran, walks in and she recognizes him as one of the men standing around the dead body. The beans are soon spilled.So here's the situation. A sophisticated woman visits her younger sister in a Southern town and is confronted by the brutal husband in a shabby flat. It's A Streetcar Named Desire, transfigured into a melodrama with overtones of social messaging.The social message is that the Ku Klux Klan isn't an admirable outfit. No blacks ever show up on screen but the murdered man is repeatedly described as a reporter from a Northern newspaper, down here just to cause trouble, and why don't they leave us folks alone? Ronald Reagan is stuck in the stock part of the upright District Attorney who can't get the local people to cooperate in the prosecution of these periodic murders. The natives agree with the Klan, are afraid to get involved, or don't care.It may be hard for younger viewers to see this as anything other than a fantasy, unless they've lived during the Civil Rights era when such things happened. (They happened for the next twenty years.) A lot of powerful symbols are flickering away on the screen but, lamentably, it's not a very good movie. The writing is clumsy and full of speeches. The behavior of some of the principles is idiotic. Why would Ginger Rogers, knowing that Cochran is a vicious murderer, shout at him so provocatively and tell him she's on her way to the DA to squeal on him? The photography is poor. The story isn't noir but the photography certainly is. There are about ten minutes of daylight. The direction by Stuart Heisler is pedestrian but there is an occasional nice touch, as when one of the Klansmen at a burning cross hoists his white-hooded child to his shoulder so he can see the ritual more clearly. The script preaches, and I've never liked being preached at because sermons seem to me to say, "You are stupid and I am trying to instruct you." I had all the scolding I could take during my marriage.