Out of the Past (billed in the United Kingdom as Build My Gallows High) is a 1947 American film noir by director Jacques Tourneur and starring Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer and Kirk Douglas. The film was adapted by Geoffrey Homes (Daniel Mainwaring) from his 1946 novel Build My Gallows High (also written as Homes), with uncredited revisions by Frank Fenton and James M. Cain.

Plot

Joe Stefanos drives to the rural mountain town of Bridgeport, California, seeking Jeff Bailey, who owns a gas station there. Joe asks Jeff's deaf-mute helper where Jeff is. The kid finds Jeff fishing with his girlfriend, Ann Miller. Joe tells Jeff that Whit Sterling wants to see him in Lake Tahoe. Jeff acquiesces, and takes Ann to ride along and hear about his past.

Jeff reveals that his real surname is Markham, and three years ago he was partners with Jack Fisher in New York City as private eyes. Gambling kingpin Whit hired Markham to track down Whit's girlfriend Kathie Moffat, who shot Whit and stole $40,000 from him. Assured by Whit that she will not be harmed, Jeff tracked Kathie to Acapulco, and was struck by her seductive beauty. Surprised that Whit was alive, Kathie admitted to shooting him, but denied stealing. Jeff and Kathie quickly fell in love; when Whit and Stefanos arrived unannounced to check on Jeff's progress, Jeff lied and said he never found her, which seemed to satisfy Whit. Jeff and Kathie then escaped to San Francisco and lived there for several months before Fisher spotted Jeff and tracked them to a mountain cabin. There, Fisher and Jeff brawled before Kathie shot Fisher dead and ran away, leaving behind a bankbook revealing a $40,000 deposit.

thumb|left|Jeff and Kathie

Ann drops Jeff off at Whit's estate, where Whit inveigles Jeff into a job to clear their slate. Jeff is surprised to see Kathie there as Whit's lover again, but she later claims she had no choice but to return. She indicates that Whit knows about their time with together but nothing about Fisher's murder. Jeff scornfully rejects her.

Whit explains that San Francisco lawyer Leonard Eels has helped him dodge $1,000,000 in taxes but is now blackmailing him for $200,000. Whit orders Jeff to meet with Eels's secretary, Meta Carson, who explains the plan to recover the incriminating records. Suspecting a frame, Jeff still joins her at Eels's apartment. Jeff trails Meta, who retrieves the records from Eels' office. He returns to Eels's apartment and finds Eels dead, then hides the body.

Jeff sneaks into Meta's apartment and overhears Kathie arranging for the discovery of Eels's body. When it can't be found, she believes Eels escaped. Jeff confronts Kathie, who claims she signed an affidavit for Whit swearing that Jeff killed Fisher. She suggests rekindling their romance and he leaves. Stefanos arrives, assuring Kathie that he killed Eels. Jeff retrieves the tax records as collateral for getting the affidavit.

When Kathie and Meta arrive at Eels' office to retrieve the affidavit, the police are already there. Jeff mails the documents to himself before Whit's thugs capture him and discover he no longer has the records. Kathie phones Whit.

thumb|Kathie & Jeff at Whit's Lake Tahoe mansion

Being wanted for the murders of Fisher and Eels, Jeff seeks cover in Bridgeport. Kathie directs Stefanos to trail the kid, which leads to a gorge where Jeff is hiding. The kid spots Stefanos poised to shoot Jeff and hooks him with a fishing line, pulling him to his death. Jeff returns to Whit's mansion, informing him about Stefanos' death and Kathie's double-cross. Jeff offers to return the records if Whit destroys Kathie's affidavit and surrenders her to police for Fisher's murder. Whit accepts, threatening to kill Kathie if she does not cooperate.

Jim, Ann's childhood friend and beau displaced by Jeff, trails him to a meeting with Ann. Ann believes in Jeff but asks if he is absolutely sure of what he wants. He says he is, and she promises to wait for him.

Jeff finds Whit, murdered by Kathie, who insists Jeff run away with her or be framed for all three murders. While she packs, Jeff makes a phone call. As Jeff drives them away, Kathie sees that he has arranged a police roadblock. She guns him dead, shoots at the police, and is killed in the return fire.

In Bridgeport, Jim asks Ann to leave town with him to avoid the scandal. Ann demurs. Privately, she asks the kid if Jeff was going away with Kathie. After a pause, he nods disingenuously. Ann gets into Jim's car, and the kid waves a wistful farewell at Jeff's name on his garage sign.

Cast

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Production

Daniel Mainwaring wrote Build My Gallows High in 1946 while on retreat after writing six screenplays in one year. He had also tired of detective fiction, having written several novels featuring a sleuthing reporter named Robin Bishop. The title for the novel originated in a poem, believed by one scholar to be "Haman" from Benjamin Cutler Clark's The Past, Present, and Future (1867). The poem is about Haman's machinations and includes the line, "At length a gallows high he swung, upon which all were to be hung..."

A script reader at RKO Pictures recommended the novel as a "worthy addition to the rough, tough school of Chandler, Cain and Burnett...presents an almost perfect story for an actor like Bogart". William Dozier approved the purchase for $20,000, which included Mainwaring as screenwriter.

John Garfield and Dick Powell declined the lead role. Kirk Douglas appears in his third credited screen performance, having made his critically noted debut in 1946's The Strange Love of Martha Ivers. The next time that Mitchum and Douglas played major roles in the same picture occurred in the 1967 Western The Way West.

Reception

Out of the Past is considered one of the greatest of all films noir.

In The Nation in 1948, James Agee wrote, "Out of the Past is a medium-grade thriller... Fairly well played, and very well photographed... the action develops a routine kind of pseudo-tension... Robert Mitchum is so very sleepily self-confident with the women that when he slopes into clinches you expect him to snore in their faces."

In his 2004 assessment of the film for the Chicago Sun-Times, critic Roger Ebert noted: