A Rhumba in Waltz Time

Depression-era Hollywood forms the backdrop for this sharp-edged noir from Levinson (The Traitor in Us All). In 1933, Chris Blanchard's career as an LAPD detective comes to an abrupt end after he refuses to look the other way when his colleagues victimize a prostitute. Five years later, Blanchard undertakes "special problems" for the MGM studio. One such problem involves actress Marie MacDaniels, who comes to his apartment drunk late one night, distraught over having shot her actor husband, Day Covington, and hands over the murder weapon. When Blanchard visits the scene of the crime, he quickly finds evidence clearing MacDaniels and sends her into hiding while he looks into the matter. That crime proves to be but the tip of a very violent iceberg. Photographer to the stars Otto Rothman also ends up dead, and mobster Bugsy Siegel and some American Nazi sympathizers appear to be behind some of the untimely deaths. Blanchard, a character Chandler would recognize, deserves a series of his own. (Aug.)