Homicide Bureau

Homicide Bureau is a modest B crime movie with Rita Hayworth as a forensic expert in a small part and Bruce Cabot as a violent cop (see his scene where he beats Marc Lawrence). The best scenes are those showing the police methods, some violent and some scientific, which is unexpected in a 1939 movie. Director Charles Coleman directed a few movies in the 30's and became after an assistant director on some strong classics. Script writer Earl Snell wrote more than a hundred titles, all B movies that have no reputation, maybe there might be some surprises.

Homicide Bureau casts Rita Hayworth in a rather colorless role of a police forensic scientist. She's an efficient worker and when all's said and done proves rather valuable in stopping a smuggling gang headed by Norman Willis.

Willis is a clever guy and makes a monkey out of Detetive Bruce Cabot when he arrests henchman Marc Lawrence for murder. Cabot is a detective of the old school and would have been a role model for Dirty Harry.

The story has a lot of holes in it and I suspect the cutting room floor got a lot of shot and destroyed footage. Rita is given so little to do here and she really has no chemistry with Cabot.

This one is for fans of the leads.

With all the criminal forensics displayed on television these days it's a surprise to see a late version thirties version of it. Avoiding the autopsy part, RIta Hayworth playing a forensic expert examines murder weapons and other physical evidence. Nobody makes a big deal about her gender except at first. I was expecting to see her quit and get married by the end of the film but surprisingly she never even comes close to thinking about it. While a major part of the movie, the forensics is second to the main topic of the movie, police brutality.

The police force is under new rules passed by the city council preventing the police from roughing up the suspects. The officers chafe under the restrictions just hoping for a chance to torment the apparent villains into a confession. The brutality isn't shown, just alluded to, except in a scene where the hero cop breaks into a crook's apartment and throws him around until an accident nearly kills the crook. There's also a scene where the city politicians react to a dragnet that the police do in a desperate attempt to solve a murder.

It actually interesting until the point where the standard B movie plot dynamics take over and the film reverts to typical matinée cops and robbers complete with a kidnapping, a silly shootout and eventual redemption for the tough guy hero. The police brutality topic is, unfortunately, dropped.

Pretty good except for the standard ending.

Political ironies abound as hopelessly right wing L.A.P.D. investigator Bruce Cabot bridles under foolish legal restraints conflicting with his tried and true police state methods such as breaking and entering, unlawful searches and seizures, and beating up suspects.

Particularly frustrating are naïve wealthy liberal matrons who misguidedly protest violations of evildoers' constitutional guarantees.

The pre-Patriot Act bad guys are colluding with warring foreign powers (read 1930s Japan and Germany) wanting American scrap metal for munitions.

Youthful lab chemist Rita Hayworth (modernly called a forensic investigator) does precise scientific sleuthing with her amazing Spectrograph, a wondrous device that tells all, even resulting in a marriage proposal from callous cop Cabot whose police brutality contributes to the gang's downfall.

A laughably bad film, concluding with the police commissioner apologizing for hampering his "coppers" with "too many kid gloves." Clearly illegal police procedures win the day keeping America's junkyards safe from hostile foreign dictatorships.

Demonstrating versatility, actor Marc Lawrence, later blacklisted in the anti-Communist 1950s, plays a fascist thug.

Homicide Bureau (1939)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Fun and fast paced Columbia 'B' film has Bruce Cabot playing a homicide detective who wants to use force to get confessions from some gangsters trying to take the city over. If you're a fan of 'B' films then you should get a kick out of this one since there's never a dull moment within its 57-minute running time. There's plenty of fast action as well as a nice shoot out at the end that makes this one a tad bit better than most in its field. Cabot is always worth watching and he does a nice job here. Rita Hayworth has a small supporting role as a forensic expert.