This film is included as part of the "Forgotten Noir" DVD series, which really means B-movie bottom billed Robert Lippert movies. Be warned! No wonder they are forgotten. The best Lippert Picture, however, now in a new fantastic DVD version, is 'Rocketship X-M' (1950) with uncredited script by Dalton Trumbo!
This one is a fair time passer. It's clearly built as a vehicle for George Raft, (who is in almost every scene) and his screen persona as a "tough guy." He walks like he has a coat hanger stuck in his back (a walk 'copied' by Jimmy Carter and Al Gore): this is the kind of walk you practice with a book on your head to improve your posture. It doesn't seem right these days for a tough guy, but Raft's look and famous staccato monotone compensate greatly for his stiff walk.
It's not really a noir film. Noir films have nice guys being caught up in a corrupt world-- they had titles like 'Undercurrent,' 'Whirlpool,' 'Quicksand,' 'Detour,' 'Roadblock,' 'Criss Cross,' etc. and often were shot in extremely low light and shadows like the amazing 'Out of the Past'(1947). This one is actually 'the good guy goes undercover to trap the Big Boss.'
Anyway, George Raft carries the film. For fans of George Raft, this is a must see. He's in his 'element' here with loan sharks, thugs and criminals, not hanging out in Morocco in the Foreign Legion. When he's on screen, we watch him. We also get great bad guy from Paul Stewart, the butler from 'Citizan Kane' (1941). With those eyes and eyebrows he's so good as a heavy! A young John Hoyt is also nicely bad. Dorothy Hart, a former fashion model, as Raft's 30 year younger love interest (!) has eyes that put you on Cloud 9. She quit movies and mostly did work for the UN, since she "hated Hollywood." This movie may be one reason why.
This is also for fans like me who enjoy seeing Los Angeles in the early fifties. Hey, when I was growing up in the fifties in the boondocks of Northern California (Petaluma), seeing black and white films of crime in LA, added to the thrill of my first visit to Los Angeles. Best of all, of course, is 'Kiss Me Deadly' (1955) where we get to see the apartments next to Angel's Flight on Bunker Hill before they were razed, and the super noir 'D.O.A.' (1951) which takes us inside the Bradbury Building in downtown LA.
Not an Oscar contender. I give it a four.
This one is a fair time passer. It's clearly built as a vehicle for George Raft, (who is in almost every scene) and his screen persona as a "tough guy." He walks like he has a coat hanger stuck in his back (a walk 'copied' by Jimmy Carter and Al Gore): this is the kind of walk you practice with a book on your head to improve your posture. It doesn't seem right these days for a tough guy, but Raft's look and famous staccato monotone compensate greatly for his stiff walk.
It's not really a noir film. Noir films have nice guys being caught up in a corrupt world-- they had titles like 'Undercurrent,' 'Whirlpool,' 'Quicksand,' 'Detour,' 'Roadblock,' 'Criss Cross,' etc. and often were shot in extremely low light and shadows like the amazing 'Out of the Past'(1947). This one is actually 'the good guy goes undercover to trap the Big Boss.'
Anyway, George Raft carries the film. For fans of George Raft, this is a must see. He's in his 'element' here with loan sharks, thugs and criminals, not hanging out in Morocco in the Foreign Legion. When he's on screen, we watch him. We also get great bad guy from Paul Stewart, the butler from 'Citizan Kane' (1941). With those eyes and eyebrows he's so good as a heavy! A young John Hoyt is also nicely bad. Dorothy Hart, a former fashion model, as Raft's 30 year younger love interest (!) has eyes that put you on Cloud 9. She quit movies and mostly did work for the UN, since she "hated Hollywood." This movie may be one reason why.
This is also for fans like me who enjoy seeing Los Angeles in the early fifties. Hey, when I was growing up in the fifties in the boondocks of Northern California (Petaluma), seeing black and white films of crime in LA, added to the thrill of my first visit to Los Angeles. Best of all, of course, is 'Kiss Me Deadly' (1955) where we get to see the apartments next to Angel's Flight on Bunker Hill before they were razed, and the super noir 'D.O.A.' (1951) which takes us inside the Bradbury Building in downtown LA.
Not an Oscar contender. I give it a four.