Last night we may have had a first, unless you can think of another crime film involving the Bureau of Weights and Measures. In the generically (and strangely) titled "Great Guy"(1936), James Cagney stars as "Johnny Cave", an inspector for the BWM who becomes chief deputy after the sitting chief is injured in an auto accident. Evidence suggests his brakes were fixed, so from his hospital bed he instructs Johnny to go after the perpetrators, likely a group of price gougers. "But don't arrest the first guy you find. Let him lead you to the top man". "Will do, boss", replies Johnny.
Now, you might be wondering : who would stage an accident involving the Chief of Weights and Measures? Cagney explains the situation to his men (and us), and it's a lot more obvious than it first might seem.
Apparently, the Mob has quite a profitable racket in skimming small amounts of money by misrepresenting the weight of various groceries and other consumer products. They do this by decalibrating meat scales, or by stuffing a chicken with a metal tube, which is greased to make it slip out unnoticed into a drawer after the bird has been weighed. Sugar is bagged to less than it's full weight, and at the gas station, pumps are rigged to run up the price faster than the tank is being filled.
It seems like just a few pennies here and there, but according to Johnny it all adds up to "cost the housewives of America more than the last war". The picture was made in 1936, so he's talking about World War 1, which according to Google cost the United States 32 billion. I think in the movie he says four or five billion (adjusted for inflation), but my goodness, who knew the Mob had such a money maker in screwing folks on their groceries?
Johnny's as honest as the day is long, and he expects his men to be the same way. "One of the ways these crooks stay in business is by offering bribes. They've got half the politicians in their pocket, and some of the police force too. But don't let me catch any of you taking a kickback or you'll end up in handcuffs, got it"? They do. Johnny heads out with a newspaper reporter in tow, to demonstrate how the scam works by exposing a few of the rip-offs at a neighborhood market. This angers the local city councilman, who's on the take and overseeing the operation for the Mob. He offers Johnny a bribe to back off, and of course he won't accept it. So, Johnny is set up like his boss, in a traffic accident, except instead of trying to kill him, the bad guys rig it so it looks like a DUI. Johnny's arrested for drunk driving, then bailed out by the councilman, who proves by this tactic that he's the power in town. "You see, Johnny boy, I can make or break you, so how 'bout you just simmer down and let us go about our business". When Johnny still refuses, the councilman sends in the Mayor to offer Johnny a top job at City Hall. "Nothing doing", Johnny tells him. Hey, it's Jimmy Cagney. No one pushes him around.
But then there's his fiancee, "Janet" (Mae Clarke), a secretary for the hospital administrator. While Johnny is in jail for the DUI, she begs him to give up his crusade. "Please Johnny, stop before they kill you". "If I do", he replies, "who'll stand up for Mr. and Mrs. America"? "But what about me, what about us"?, she asks him. "Doesn't our life together count for anything"? Johnny considers this, for a while. But then he finds out that Janet's boss, "Mr. Canning" (Henry Kolker) is in on the racket too! Using his position as head of the hospital, he's actually scamming an orphanage by sending them half shipments of food but charging full price. What a lowlife. This sends Johnny over the edge. "You're working for a crook"!, he tells Janet, who's now between a rock and a hard place. If she quits her job, she'll be in danger for siding with Johnny. So she threatens to leave him instead, breaking off their engagement until he comes to his senses.
And will he? What do you think? For the first half of it's 66 minute running time, "Great Guy" hums along like a well-oiled crime flick. We all know and love James Cagney for his bad guy roles, but it's nice to see him on the right side of the law for a change, and here, he's kickin' major league bootation and takin' names as the incorruptible Chief Deputy. But then, somewhere around the half hour mark, the very interesting plot gets turned into a 1930s stylised "entertainment pic", where snappy dialogue takes over, rom-com and "buddy buddy" scenes are inserted, and the tough crime investigation we began with loses tension. The plot is still followed, but loosely, where before it was super tight. It's as if the director gave up after the first half of the film and decided to turn in a contract picture. "Hey, I at least made it entertaining", he may have thought. Or maybe the producers told him to.
That's always a risk with mid-30s Depression-era cinema, when the name of the game was cheering folks up. Cagney made a boatload of crime and law enforcement flicks for Warners during this period. Some are classics, most are at least good, this one - for me - was disappointing, just because it started out so strongly but then devolved. An extraneous and very violent punchout is tacked on at the end, just so Cagney can "get even" with the councilman before he goes to jail. There's no reason to add this scene, it contributes nothing dramatically (it's also brutal), and when you already have other non-essential scenes earlier, delivered as light comedy, it's distracting to what looked like it was gonna be a hard boiled crime film.
Redeeming the situation somewhat is the presence of the beautiful and classy Mae Clarke (she of grapefruit-in-face fame). Clarke is one of those early actresses whose look and manner make her seem ahead of her time. Just the way she speaks and carries herself, she looks like a woman of today.
Though it wasn't as tight as expected, I'm still gonna give "Great Guy" Two Regular Thumbs Up. It should be mentioned that the fans at IMDB love it. You might too, so don't listen to me, give it a shot. After all, how many weights and measures flicks have you got? ////
The previous night we watched a British Suspense Thriller with a twist : a poltergeist! In "The House in Marsh Road"(1960), "David" and "Jean Linton" (Tony Wright, Patricia Dainton) are a couple whose marriage is on the rocks. As the movie opens, they're broke, living week to week in motels and skipping out when it's time to pay. David's a writer, he promises Jean that once he finishes his book, everything will be fine. "It's gonna get picked up, and it'll sell, trust me". The thing is, Jean does trust his writing skills. It's his drinking that has her at wit's end. "If you'd spend half as much time on your book as you do at the pub, it'd be finished by now", she tells him. David feels she's henpecking. "Oh c'mon........not that again"!
They bicker and fight, and while David is earning a token amount from writing theater reviews, it's not enough to placate Jean. It looks like their marriage is gonna tank.
Just then (and right before they're about to run from another motel manager), Jean receives a telegram from the estate of her late Aunt. She's just inherited her mansion, and 1000 pounds to go with it. Holy John Corabi and Gedde Watanabi! ("What about me"? - Paul Shortino) ohmyGodI'mlosingmyfreakinmarbles. "David, it's wonderful", Jean enthuses. "We can stop fighting now, the pressure's off. We've no more bills, you can finish your book in peace, and....".
Her unspoken expectation is that David will stop drinking, or at least cut way back, to let his talent shine. She knows he's got a bestseller in the works if only he can get a grip. Now that they own a home and have a stipend, surely there's no more problem.
But the inheritance fixes nothing. At first, David tries working on his book, but goes down to the local pub in equal measure. In an effort to please Jean, and show her that he's accomplishing something, he mentions his need to hire a typist, to transcribe what he's written so far. "I can get sample chapters out to publishers, darling". At times, his promises to do better seem genuine, and Jean relaxes somewhat.
When they moved in to her late Aunt's mansion, both Jean and David were unnerved to see what appeared to be supernatural activity. A mirror broke when David looked at it; an easy chair slid around by itself. "Oh, don't worry", said the Irish maid who worked for Jean's Aunt. "That's just Patrick - he sort of comes with the house. You'll get used to him, he's not so bad.......as long as you don't do anything to displease him. If you do, he'll pick on you".
David was flabbergasted by this. "Are you telling us there's a poltergeist in this house"?
"Yes sir, that's the case".
"How're we supposed to know what upsets him"?
"Oh don't worry, he'll let you know".
"Why do you call him Patrick"?, asked Jean.
"Because he reminds me of my husband", said the maid. And onward they went from there. At first, "Patrick" doesn't pose a problem for the couple, but once they've settled in, and David continues his wayward behavior, he begins to act up.
"Patrick" doesn't like dishonesty, so when David hires a typist and she's a blonde bombshell, the stage is set for disaster. Each supposed "work meeting" turns into his attempt to seduce her, and because she's aware of his wife's inheritance, it finally works.
The bombshell becomes his partner in crime and they form a plan to do away with Jean. Conveniently, there's an elevator in the house that doesn't work. The cab sits in the basement, leaving the shaft open from the third floor. One night, David calls Jean up there. "Dear, I want to read you something". Actually, he's hiding across the hallway, waiting to push Jean down the shaft when she gets to the top of the stairs. Lucky for her, "Patrick" is on her side. The wrought iron elevator gate slams shut just before David intercepts her. He acts nonplussed. "Hmmm, that's strange......must've been a gust of wind".
Jean is unaware he was planning to kill her, so he has another chance. This time he tries poisoning her bedtime glass of milk. Just before she can drink it, "Patrick" sets off the mansion's burglar alarm. The loud noise startles Jean; she puts down the milk, runs downstairs to see what's wrong, and - finding nothing - begins to see a common thread between the recent events.
Finally, suspecting her husband's affair (and that he may be trying to kill her), she contacts her lawyer to see about getting a divorce. But when the lawyer hears her story about being "warned" by a poltergiest, he declines to pursue the case. "I'm sorry Jean, but that would never hold water in court". Meanwhile, David is trying to gaslight her : "It's all in your mind, darling. I'm not trying to kill you - my goodness I would never hurt a hair on your head - nor am I seeing Miss Stockley (Sandra Dorne). She's merely typing up my book, that's all. Darling, maybe you need a vacation. Ever since we moved here you're all worked up". Jean decides he might be right, and goes off to London for a few days. While she's away, David invites Miss Stockley over to the house to spend the weekend with him. Now they can party it up and concoct another scheme to get rid of Janet. But "Patrick" has other plans......
Although the movie is slow to develop, and the mystery is somewhat telegraphed because we know of "Patrick's"' allegiance to Janet, these shortcomings are more than made up for by the truly horrific ending, of which I'll speak no more. I'll just say that if you ever move in with "Patrick", whatever you do don't piss him off. Really bad idea!
"The House in Marsh Road" could've been tighter with a cut of ten minutes off it's 70 minute running time, but it's still highly watchable with it's multiple plot threads and Patricia Dainton in the lead role as Janet. You might remember her from "The Third Alibi", the excellent thriller that we saw about a month ago, in which she also played a wronged wife whose husband was out to kill her. She's really good in those parts!
Overall, I'm gonna give the movie Two Solid Thumbs Up instead of the Two Bigs I've been routinely dishing out, but with a strong recommendation to see it, just because it's different. Give it a shot, it's a good 'un.
That's all for tonight. I hope you're enjoying the start of Labor Day weekend. I send you tons and tons of love, as always. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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