The Killers (1946)'s activity

If you've read Ernest Hemingway's "The Killers", it may be hard to fathom how this short story could be turned into a feature film. It's just not long enough. 1946's Clifford Siodmak adaptation therefore chooses to EXPLAIN how the "Swede" got himself into the kind of trouble that would bring a couple of hit men to the tiny town where he's been living the simple life of a gas station attendant for years. And while it's strong Noir (well scripted, well shot, with a strong performance by Burt Lancaster as the doomed man), it's also chock full of Noir CLICHÉS. You have the boxer turned criminal, the femme fatale, the insurance investigator, the convoluted scheme... Something of a greatest hits album, which I didn't feel respected Hemingway's written dissection of masculinity - that a man might just face the music because it's the "manly" thing to do. I'm not making a judgment on Hemingway's masculine ideal, only that it doesn't really figure in The Killers' "solution". But those first couple scenes, straight outta the story, are really good, with real menace coming off the title characters... who sadly then disappear from the narrative for most of its length. Proposes a good mystery, but leaves me a little ambivalent about its conclusions.