La isla del infierno

This is a decent film noir production. It stars John Payne in the latter portion of his career--when he was no longer a pretty-boy or light-weight singer. He was good as an angry noir hero and I certainly thought that he was up to the task. However, the plot is another story. While it's not bad, it's VERY, VERY familiar--like the writer was simply regurgitating portions of other movies he'd recently seen. In MANY ways, it's a reworking of "The Maltese Falcon" that is set in Mexico--and even has a similar sort of dame and a fat guy doing a Sidney Greenstreet imitation! It is also like several other B-movies I've seen over the years. Nothing particularly original about this one. It's got a few weaknesses (the woman is so OBVIOUSLY evil yet our hero doesn't recognize this for the longest time--even though he's a well-educated guy!) and about all you'd expect from a film of this sort--double-crosses, murders and the like. A decent time-passer but no more.