Thunder in the City

Sick of gangster roles, Edward G. Robinson entered into a fight with Warners and left for the UK to make "Thunder in the City" in 1937.

The story concerns Dan Armstrong, a slick marketing promoter who loses his job in the U.S. because the company he works for thinks his methods are old-fashioned and low-class. They suggest he go to England to learn how civilized people market and advertise.

Once there, Dan gets right down to it, inflating the value of stock to beat out a businessman (Ralph Richardson) who wants to buy it from the original owners (Nigel Bruce and Constance Collier). The product being produced is called magnelite but don't ask me or anyone else what it does.

Robinson is always great, and even though this is somewhat low- budget, it comes off okay thanks to the talent. This is an early film for Ralph Richardson who is excellent as a man in competition for the product and for the hand of Lady Patricia (Lulu Deste), whom Dan has fallen for.

Enjoyable and feel-good. Sorry it didn't do better at the box office. Robinson was a great gangster, but he was delightful in this as well.

The Atlantic Film Company only released one film--"Thunder in the City". I know nothing about this British company but was surprised to see a big star from the era, Edward G. Robinson, slumming it with a small production company instead of working with familiar old Warner Brothers. Regardless of why he agreed to this, it turned out to be an enjoyable sort of movie.

The film begins with Robinson being fired from his job. It seems his way of marketing didn't sit well with the company, as they didn't like his hard sell techniques. On a whim, he decides to travel to the UK to look up some relatives and ends up coming up with a crazy scheme to market something that he knows nothing about--a mineral called magnalite. And, he actually is able to pull it off with a nationwide crazy blitz that got the Brits abuzz about this 'miracle metal'. However, the path to riches isn't all THAT easy, as he's about to discover the hard way.

Robinson turns in a rather delightful performance as a good-hearted huckster. However, he's ably supported by a nice cast that includes Ralph Richardson and Nigel Bruce (among others). Not a brilliant film by any means but enjoyable throughout. Fluff? Perhaps...but enjoyable fluff!

I'd love to know how producer Alexander Esway landed Edward G. Robinson for this low budget British feature. Robinson plays a crafty American businessman who relocates to the old country in order to pick up a few pointers--in addition to teaching the locals a few tricks about wealth creation. Nigel Bruce is delightful (and typically fuddled) as the nobleman who sells his stake in some Rhodesian mines to Robinson, Ralph Richardson is nice and chilly as the villain of the piece, and sexy Luli Deste is adequate as the film's love interest. For a low budget effort, the film is very well made, and features a few impressive sequences, most notably a brief scene in the Escher-like Challoner Hall that seems to consist primarily of staircases leading nowhere. The old Madacy Video tape leaves a lot to be desired, however: their print is worn and washed out. Thunder In the City is no classic, but it deserves to get cleaned up for DVD.

Edward G Robinson is remembered for playing snarling gangsters and other tough guys, but in real life he was a very cultured man, a collector of art and antiques. (Robinson acquired a Van Gogh before that artist was well-known.) 'Thunder in the City' is a low-budget film that Robinson made in England, playing a fairly normal person for once. I wanted to like this movie, as it brought back memories for me of the one occasion when I met Robinson (in London, when he was buying antiques in the Portobello Road). Sadly, despite the presence of an excellent cast and a good performance by Robinson, this film is not very entertaining.

Despite its low budget, 'Thunder in the City' opens with an extremely impressive montage by Ned Mann, and offers several other impressive montages throughout the movie. Those montages are the best things in this film. The single biggest problem is that 'Thunder in the City' (with its overly dramatic title) can't seem to figure out what sort of movie it wants to be. This material has the general pacing and feel of a comedy, but it isn't funny, and it's not quite engaging enough to be a drama. A previous IMDB poster has compared this movie to 'Beat the Devil'. Sorry, but 'Thunder in the City' hasn't got one percent of the wit of that film.

Robinson takes centre stage as Dan Armstrong, a high-pressure publicity agent in charge of the New York campaign for a motorcar called the Straight 8. (He doesn't seem to be bothered that the car has an illegible logo.) When the ad campaign fizzles, Armstrong's bosses pressure him into resigning because they haven't the bottle to sack him outright. One of Armstrong's bosses tells him that he could learn from the example of the English, who were so efficient in acquiring Suez. (No comment.) This prompts Armstrong to recall his prankster grandfather, an Englishman who fled to America in disgrace after he stole a mummy out of the British Museum and smuggled it into the front bench in the House of Lords. Now, Armstrong conveniently recalls that he still has relatives in England, and even though he's never met them he assumes they'll be delighted if he pops round for a visit. (Frankly, Edward G Robinson doesn't look as if his ancestors came from the sceptred isle.)

Armstrong's relations are the Duke and Duchess of Glenarvon, lounging about in Challoner Hall, which has been the family home for 20 generations. They've got titles and bloodlines but no money. (This is the most plausible part of the movie.) When they learn that Armstrong is coming to visit, they assume he's wealthy and that he plans to buy Challoner Hall. Young relative Dolly eagerly hopes that she'll be able to land a rich husband. (Dolly is played by Elizabeth Inglis, who would soon land a very rich husband indeed; in real life, she married the president of NBC television and became the mother of Sigourney Weaver.)

When Armstrong shows up on their doorstep, we get the usual hackneyed 'Our American Cousin' situations, contrasting a brash Yank with some buttoned-up British bluebloods. When the Glenarvons inquire into the fate of Armstrong's grandfather, Robinson has the only funny line in this movie: "It was his ambition to be an inmate in every state in the Union. But he died before he got to South Dakota."

Armstrong has a 'meet cute' scene with Lady Patricia: nice work by her stunt double here, as Lady Pat falls off her horse. Lady Patricia is supposed to be an English blueblood, but she's played by untalented Austrian actress Luli Deste with an accent full of wienerschnitzel. There's a line of dialogue to explain that Lady Pat has spent a lot of time in Vienna. Luli Deste's scenes are so painful to watch (and listen to) that she ruins the few merits this film possesses. The movie would have made more sense if Elizabeth Inglis and Luli Deste had swapped roles during rehearsal.

Learning that the Glenarvons' investments are all tied up in Rhodesian mines, Armstrong whips up a publicity campaign for a 'miracle metal' called Magnalite (it might as well be McGuffinite) that these mines allegedly produce. Soon, he has a veritable South Seas Bubble on his hands, as English working-class folk (with bad Cockney accents) queue up to invest their savings in this sure-fire deal. (When you see Sid, tell him not to bother.)

Speaking of bad accents, the English actors who play Americans in this film (mostly in the early scenes) aren't very believable. Veteran film composer Miklos Rozsa has never impressed me, yet here he surpasses himself by bringing in every possible musical cliche. When Robinson arrives in England, the soundtrack plays 'Land of Hope and Glory'. When he visits a funfair, the soundtrack plays 'The Loveliest Time of the Year' ... the same waltz music that shows up in almost *every* movie featuring a scene at the circus or carnival.

The ending of the film manages to be very sudden and extremely muddled. There are good things in 'Thunder in the City', but they're few and far between. Nigel Bruce gives a good performance as the Duke of Glenarvon; I wish I could say as much for the annoying Constance Collier as his wife. I've savoured Ralph Richardson's distinctive performances elsewhere, but here he merely takes up space. Fans of Edward G Robinson who want to see this movie should be forewarned that Robinson does nothing here that he didn't do much more skilfully in almost any of his Hollywood films. I'll rate 'Thunder in the City' only 3 out of 10, mostly for those delicious montages - which belong in a better movie - and for that one impressive stunt-doubling when Lady Patricia comes a cropper.

Advertising man Dan Armstrong (Edward G. Robinson) is fired because his ideas are seen as out-of-date and undignified by his bosses, who cite the English as having a respectable approach to business. He decides to go to England to visit relatives. While there he falls for pretty Lady Patricia (Luli Deste), who is considering marrying stuffy jerk Manningdale (Ralph Richardson) just for his money. Dan cooks up a scheme to help his financially struggling family as well as make himself enough money he could provide Patricia with more security than Manningdale.

Pretty much any film with Eddie G. is worth watching and this is no exception. It's a fish-out-of-water story with the colorful American teaching and learning from the staid Brits. The funniest scene to me was when Robinson gets lost in the family manor. It's all genial enough and the cast is certainly a quality one. Robinson is great. Richardson is always good. Nigel Bruce and Constance Collier are fun. Interesting look at British/American relations and attitudes at the time.