Last night's movie was "Lady Gangster"(1942), a crime flick with a plot so convoluted that it's hard to describe in bite-sized pieces, but I'll give it a try. Faye Emerson stars as "Dot Burton", a down-on-her-luck actress who's been relegated to performing in nightclubs. She's got talent, as we shall see, but she's from a small town and has no connections in the big city. She's just another gal with a dream. So, she ends up living in a rooming house owned by an older lady, a former actress herself, who knows how hard it is to make a living in showbiz. "Ma" (Vera Lewis), as she's known, isn't above an illegal buck. She's got three men renting a room who are obvious hoodlums. We learn all of the above as we proceed, because as the movie opens, the three men and Dot are in a car, about to commit a bank robbery. Dot is to be the decoy/distraction. The lead hood has brought a dog for her to use as a prop. While the hoods wait in the car, she knocks on the door of the bank.
"Whataya want?" asks the security guard. Dot asks to enter the bank. "But we ain't open for another half hour." "Oh, I know, and I'm sorry, but I've just got to deposit some money to cover a check so it doesn't bounce." We don't know she's an actress yet; we only learn that when the robbery is over, but she's already putting on a good act for the guard. No bank in the world would let a customer in early (except possibly Deutsche Bank for Trump, or maybe the Nugan Hand Bank, remember them?), but the guard buys Dot's story, and her dog serves it's purpose too. "Here, could you hold him for me while I fill out the deposit slip?" Now that the guard's hands are full, in come the hoodlums, guns drawn. They rob the bank to the tune of 40,000 clamatos.
Then they flee, and Dot deliberately faints, another distraction to cause an obstacle. The gang figured she'd draw no suspicion because - after all - she was just an early morning customer. But the detective who answers the bank robbery call is too shrewd to fall for such nonsense. He traps Dot by asking the name of her dog, which she doesn't know. She never considered it might be on his collar, and she gets it wrong. The cop arrests her, and pretty soon, she's off to The Slam. Now the movie turns into a Women's Prison Flick. But before Dot starts serving her sentence, she gets bailed out by a broadcasting executive she knew as a child.
I told you this was convoluted. It's also what they call "high concept," as in "oh, sure! Dot and the big shot radio station owner just so happen to be from the same neighborhood in the same small town. Whatta concept!" The radio station guy also conveniently hates the D.A., thinks he's soft on crime, but when the D.A. tells him, "we've caught the gal who started the bank robbery", and he finds out it's his old childhood friend Dot, he asks for a chance to question her himself, because he can't believe she would ever do such a thing. This is the point where we find out she's an out of work actress in need of money. The radio station owner then rats her out to the DA, even though he doesn't like the guy, because he's a stickler for law and order and he's doing it for Dot's own good. "Crime is not the life for you, Dot. They'll go easy on you if you turn your cohorts in, but you've got to pay your debt to society."
This is where is turns into a Women's Prison Flick, but before Dot gets sent away, she pays one last visit to the rooming house, to get her cut of the bank money. When she hears the gang leader saying he's gonna cut her out, she steals the money out from under him and gives it to Ma to hold onto while she's doing her stint in prison.
In the Joint, there's a jailhouse snitch named "Lucy" (Ruth Ford), who earns perks by ratting out the secrets of other inmates. Lucy works in cahoots with a deaf gal who can read lips, which comes in handy because the inmates hold most of their conversations in whispers. But the deaf gal can translate, and she tells the snitch that Dot knows where the bank robbery money is stashed and plans to recover it once she's paroled. The radio guy is gonna ask for her parole, and he's wealthy enough to have it granted. But when the snitch tattletales to the prison matron, Dot's parole is called off.
Ultimately, to free herself from prison and the clutches of the gang, Dot has to break out of The Slam by clocking the warden on the head, donning her clothes, and walking out unnoticed in the middle of the night, with alarms going off everywhere.
It's well directed, it flows right along, and it's a lot easier to watch than to write about, but man is it ludicrous in places.
But that's why were giving it Two Huge Thumbs Up! The filmmakers have the audacity to attempt all of this, and they pull it off. By the end, its completely ridiculous, because there's no recrimination for Dot's prison break and her clobbering of the warden. You're suppose to understand that Dot now understands that Crime Doesn't Pay, so the message is really a variation of "little woman manipulated by hardened criminal men." In other words, if she'd never met them she'd have been just fine. Male domination is the cause (according to the unspoken message of the script), but Dot seems a pretty hard case at times herself. Or, is she just a really good actress? The script is also a paean to acting, and on that note, the movie is also the debut of Jackie Gleason, playing one of the bank robbers.
"Lady Gangster" is highly recommended and the picture is very good. ////
The previous night, we had Chester Morris in a whodunit called "Tomorrow at Seven"(1933). He plays mystery novelist "Neil Broderick", whose books are so boring even he admits they put readers to sleep. This happens to the lady sharing his train compartment on a trip to Boston to research his latest novel. They joke about his books, and it just so happens she's the daughter of the one of men Chester is going to visit. Thank goodness for screenwriters' coincidences! The book he's planning is about a serial killer who calls himself The Black Ace, because he sends an Ace of Spades card to each of his victims as a warning: "You're next". He's one of those killers who like to show off and taunt folks, later played out in real life by the Zodiac and Son of Sam. so we actually know whodunit in advance. The question then becomes "who is The Black Ace?" Chester aims to find out, and he sets up an interview with the Boston millionaire "Thornton Drake" (Henry Stephenson), whose secretary is his train companion's father.
The lady on the train is "Martha Winters" (Vivienne Osborne). Her father (Drake's secretary) doesn't want Chester there. He seems to know a secret and is worried about something. He makes a phone call that we can't hear (i.e he drops a dime), then later that night, as Chester is talking to Mr. Drake, the lights in the house go out, and when they go back on, Mr. Winters is dead with an Ace of Spades on his body. Chester immediately suspects Drake, but there are other possibilities, and at this point - 15 minutes in - Chester kind of gets hijacked and it's not his movie anymore. What happens is that two "detectives" knock on the door, and it's the same two schmoes from "Sh! The Octopus!" if you remember that crazy movie from last Summer. These guys (Frank McHugh and Allen Jenkins) are complete nitwits who speak in Extreme 1930s Cop Slang and are so inept and screw things up so bad that they become the focus of the rest of the movie. At this point, for the director it's about making the best of what he's got in the script, and Chester Morris - who has impeccable comic timing and we love him as Boston Blackie - is reduced to reacting to the dumbells, who actually are quite funny.
The going is slow in places, mostly due to a lack of plot development, and there are no production values to speak of, no location shots or car chases. The whole schmear takes place in a house, and it's held up mainly by the knucklehead detectives. But it still gets Two Bigs because they are funny, and there are a few characters that are offbeat enough to keep things interesting and to keep you guessing who The Black Ace is. There's also a pre-Code line, when the cop is talking his slang gibberish, about a "dame" (probably a hooker) who he "leaned on" (gave the third degree to), and when he learned she was a "snow angel" (a coke addict), he "gave her a coupla jolts" (gave her some cocaine) and "she yakked" (named names). Super pre-Code Alert! Cops using cocaine as an interrogation tool! I'm tellin' ya, they snuck some sneaky lines into these films. You've gotta pay attention cause they talk fast and it'll go right by ya. You go: "Wow! Did they just say what I think they said?" and then you replay it, and sure enough, you heard it correctly.
Anyhow, the murder plot ain't the most clever, but the humor makes the movie worth watching, thus it gets Two Big Thumbs Up. It was an early role for Chester Morris, which is perhaps why, even though he's top billed, he plays second fiddle to the Crazy Coppers. It's recommended and the picture is razor sharp. ////
That's all I know for this evening. I hope your week is off to a good start. My blogging music is "Everyone Is Everybody Else" by Barclay James Harvest, my late night is Bruckner's 9th by Karajan, and I send you Tons of Love as always. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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