1931's "The Guilty Generation" was the last feature that Boris Karloff did before starring as The Monster in James Whale's "Frankenstein," here cast as vicious New York mobster Tony Ricca (future Monster Glenn Strange as a bodyguard with one line), opening the picture with his best scene against Robert Young as successful architect John Smith, secretly Ricca's estranged son, his mother having spirited him off to Europe for a proper education at the age of 10. Rebuffing his father's unexpected offer of a position of power providing he use his birth name, John sets off for Florida to begin a new project, only to be invited to a birthday party for pretty Maria Palmero (Constance Cummings), daughter of Tony Ricca's former partner Mike (Leo Carrillo), a bitter breakup that finds both men engaged in tit for tat violence that will strike closer to home before long. The young couple hit it off rapidly, until John learns the identity of the girl, a nervous laugh betraying a secret only revealed to her the following day, when he apologizes by admitting that he was her very first kiss as a child, and that his real name is Marco Ricca, son of Tony. Both are dismayed by the gang war instigated by their respective parents, choosing to hide John's true identity from Mike but not his approving mother Nina (Emma Duun), nor sassy publicist Nellie Weaver (Ruth Warren). By the time John and Maria decide to marry, Mike faces the tragedy of losing his son Joe (Leslie Fenton) to the Ricca mob, his dying testimony revealing John Smith to be an alias for Ricca's son, a fact that may doom poor Maria to become a widow even before the honeymoon in Havana. This Columbia release arrived months after the 1-2 punch of "Little Caesar" and "The Public Enemy," never glorifying but vilifying the gangsters on screen and the innocent lives claimed in their ambition for power and status. Karloff was hardly adept at playing one but acquits himself well despite the Italian name, 4 scenes resulting in 7 minutes screen time. Carrillo is the real standout, almost likable in his way yet quite ruthless overall, a stark contrast to his later comic typecasting though he did make a return to villainy opposite Lionel Atwill in PRC's 1945 "Crime, Inc." Constance Cummings is a fetching, winning presence as the long suffering daughter, but Robert Young is wildly miscast as an Italian gangster's son, not helped by an unconvincing mustache, coming off his feature debut "The Black Camel," with Bela Lugosi. Constance had previously worked with Karloff in her first film "The Criminal Code," only three months away from her third opposite Boris, "Behind the Mask," while the vastly underrated Ruth Warren deserved a higher profile career than playing uncredited maids or scrubwomen, her final role coming in a 1961 episode of Karloff's THRILLER, "Late Date" (Emma Dunn of course got to be frightened by The Monster himself in 1939's "Son of Frankenstein").
Review of The Guilty Generation
