The Four Just Men

I really enjoyed this film, it took me back to another era.... during the first part of the film I found myself hoping that the 'nosey journalist' wouldn't spoil the action by becoming a romantic lead with one of the four..... just in the same way I used to as a youngster. When you knew that the romance was going to spoil the adventure. But to be fair, I don't think there any many films of this time that don't. But I think my point is that this film took me back to the 'adventure fantasy' every young child feels watching this type of film, where a female romantic character only slows down or stops the adventure or even worse causes the good guys plans to fail because of that romantic lead.

It was all great fun and humorous, a typical adventure film of the time and a rousing of patriotism, I assume for the trouble that would shortly arrive to everyone in England and so there are some touches of propaganda in a subtle way but not overtly so. Indeed, watching any films of this era even well before the war were what some would call propaganda but was more jingoistic, which most of these films of that day were.

Of course, to compare it to anything to come later is missing the point of the film, that is to entertain and I'm sure the film did just that for many people at the time and it did for me! It's a great school boy adventure romp even now, just remember to really get the enjoyment from this film just switch off and layback. It's a great way to spend 90 minutes of your time especially if you enjoy these old British films, as I do. I would also be careful of the copy you choose to watch as I have seen a few very poor quality copies, when first looking for this film but was fortunate to find a good quality and unedited, from the original version, copy. Overall great fun in the spirit of Bulldog Drummond or The Saint, which were all popular films of the time. I am sure anyone reading here will enjoy this film.

Edgar Wallace's thrillers usually tended to be tricky with a lot of confusing details, the intrigues were generally overburdened with both active people and amassed complications, and this is no exception, but it is as well written and contrived as any thriller by Hitchcock, as "The Foreign Correspondent" is bound to enter the mind. This is a pre-war thriller, but the war is more than impending, and the author impressingly anticipates the dangers ahead. Nothing is mentioned about Germany, not even the beginning of the film in a foreign prison reveals anything of any foreign nation, but instead the thriller is altogether thoroughly British and couldn't be more so. Edgar Wallace was a Fleet Street man, and there is a lot of journalism here, and every time he includes his expertise in that field, the matter beomes interesting and successful. All the actors here are forgotten today, except possibly Francis L. Sullivan, well known from many later classics, but they all act well enough and especially Anna Lee as the journalist getting mixed up in the intriguing mess but actually helping it to get through in the end. It is great entertainment, great action, constantly on a tremendous move, and the suspense of the intrigue prevents it from becoming disturbing for its superficiality, which usually is a trait in Edgar Wallace's more than prolific output. So it is a fascinating study in the awareness in certain circles of what was ahead in the immediate coming decade.

This is a fast-moving thriller with a lot of merit. Anna Lee shines in her role as a young woman reporter in London, who's eager to get on a crime beat, and in particular to investigate the "Four Just Men," a secret quartet of vigilantes who dispense their own justice, up to and including the coup de grace, to baddies. Her scenes in the newsroom with an editor and another reporter are fun to watch.

The film benefits from the presence of other fine British actors. Francis L. Sullivan, an A-1 performer who appeared in the 1940s classics "Oliver Twist and "Great Expectations," has a big part here. The film has good banter between Anna and Griffith Jones; they were also paired in "Young Man's Fancy," that same year. You can tell money was spent on this production: the scenes in Parliament look very authentic, and the exterior of Parliament too. All the sets are very good with a nice 1930's feel. There is a great print of this film on Ealing Studios Rarities Collection, vol. 2. It's pal format, so you'll need a region free DVD player if you're in the USA, like me.

Four men - Hugh Sinclair, Griffith Jones, Francis L. Sullivan and Frank Lawton - begin a program of sabotage and assassination around London. Newspaperwoman Anna Lee is on their trail. What do these four very English gentlemen hope to accomplish? Are they spies for a foreign government? Or are they patriots, hoping to cleanse Britain of traitors before the inevitable war?

Walter Forde's bizarre and violent movie is derived from a Edgar Wallace story. Although it looks like a shocker, there were lots of movies in the era that supported the idea of vigilante justice. In the US, the Production Code ended most of those- with the occasional exception of a Gower Gulch producer urging people to rise up and shoot down gangsters. You would think that Britain, with its own censorship,would not permit the production of a movie like this, but the writing was on the wall, and people clearly saw World War Two coming. Even so, it was a near thing. Although there were showings of this in London in June, it didn't go into general release until November, and didn't show in the US until April of 1940, with an epilogue showing goose-stepping Nazi troops and,an appeal to US involvement.

There's an air of constant frustration rather than suspense about the movie, with the four men uncertain of their faltering plans, and Anna Lee's baffled investigation contributing. I think it was a deliberate choice by the film makers, but it makes it more difficult to watch the film.

"The Four Just Men" is a film which has two versions. Apparently, shortly after its first release WWII began and a new epilogue was stuck onto the end of the movie. There, it's shows the Nazis--the enemies of the British Empire. In the original version, the filmmakers never mentioned Germany and the enemy was of an unnamed nation. In fact, even in this newer version, the characters never talk about this either...just the epilogue.

The Four Just Men is an organization which works to preserve the British Empire against enemy nations. So, instead of letting the British government take care of this or getting its hands dirty, these four do it on behalf of the nation! In essence, these are private spies working for the nation's good. In the course of the film, they get their hands dirty often....and were not above killing enemy agents or politicians who are working against the UK.

This is mildly exciting stuff....not the best of spy films but a solid and enjoyable one. If you do want to see it, you can currently find it on YouTube.