Tirando a matar

I expected little from William Berke's 1947 Shoot To Kill. In fact, my expectations were so low, I left the DVD until late at night. I was just about to retire, but thought I'd take a quick look at the opening sequence. The movie hooked me straight away. Not only was Berke's direction way more polished than his norm, the movie was most atmospherically photographed by Benjamin Kline. Deft writing by Edwin V. Westrate also helped, and the actors were great too, especially Edmund MacDonald (who reminded me of a young Citizen Kane), heroine Luana Walters, reporter Russell Wade, gangster Robert Kent, the boogie-woogie piano player Gene Rodgers, and is-he-honest-or-is-he district attorney Charles Trowbridge (in noirish close-ups, giving the best performance of his lengthy career).

Edmund MacDonald wants to be the district attorney. It's not for love of the city or the law, but an opportunity to squeeze people for money. He sends mobster Robert Kent to prison, but Kent escapes and vanishes, and a crime wave begins. MacDonald's wife and secretary, Luana Walters gains information on what is going on. She cannot act overtly, because a wife cannot testify against her husband, but she can pass the word onto Robert Wade and let him investigate.

It's an intriguing idea for a film noir, but the script isn't up to it: it's confusingly written, with twists pulled seemingly out of nowhere to explain why someone is suddenly acting differently.

What director William Berke can do about it is to give cinematographer Benjamin Kline his head, and Kline produces a heck of a visual feast, lots of dark streets and low-lit actors that lend a beautiful gloss to the movie. It's not enough to save it. However, it makes it worth watching.

"Shoot to Kill" is a somewhat routine but fast-paced crime story. It begins with a car chase, and then flashes back to explain who is involved and what led up to the chase.

The plot is relatively complicated and involves a crooked politician, a gangster looking for revenge, a loyal wife trying to clear her husband in any way possible, and a crusading reporter who is trying to figure out what everyone else is up to. The characters are mostly stereotypes, and most are also unsympathetic, but the emphasis is on the action. A great deal happens in just over an hour's worth of running time, and there are a couple of surprises along the way.

Though mostly a routine crime drama, "Shoot to Kill" is fast-paced enough to keep your attention, and most film-noir or crime film fans should find it a decent way to pass the time.

Better than most of the low budget thrillers, this is fun because it involves a series of flashbacks which explain why a woman has been badly injured due to her connection with a corrupt district attorney. The story is pretty well put forward with a minimum of stereotyping. The woman is really a fireball, putting herself in harm's way over and over. It's odd she survived as long as she did. Most of the characters are bad guys with their own agendas. There is some double crossing and an effort to expose a frame-up. I felt the ending was pretty well done, which isn't always the case in this genre. The acting is quite good because the bad guys are presented as human beings, with human failings and emotions. Not that they aren't pretty evil and pretty cold. It's worth a look.

This cheapie noir thriller about crooked district attorneys and gangster chiefs is surprisingly good, considered it was made on a zero budget with no reason to aim high. Of course, it is completely corny, but there are a lot of expressionistic camera angles, and the many dollying shots of men walking at night are surprisingly effective with a single bright spotlight on the face and everything else pitch black. As is usual with these over the top late forties cheapies, the impact depends largely upon an excessive, almost parodic, use of 'mood music'. When things begin to get dangerous, don't worry about looking for clues on the screen, as the orchestra will tell us instead. One wonders if the script actually said: 'At this point, the musical score will become hysterical, so that the audience knows someone is about to get killed.' The chief reason for watching this film is to see and hear the spectacular performance on the piano of Gene Rodgers, a black boogie player who was one of the best. It is jaw-dropping stuff. Fats Waller, eat your heart out! Rodgers plays two of his own compositions, 'Ballad of the Bayou' and 'Rajah's Blues'. His fingers move faster than the speed of light, and he isn't even looking. If only the whole thing had been Rodgers, we could have done without the film. The film's script is surprising in its ingenuity in places, and has some snappy dialogue, showing that somebody tried. The most innovative scene is where an assistant district attorney dictates a letter to his secretary. It is a passionate love letter proposing marriage, and she wonders to whom he intends to send it. He asks her if she thinks it is OK, and she says she thinks it is beautiful. Then he tells her it is for her! Great scene! If only the romance had been genuine, however, as both turn out to be crooks in their own way. This film contains serious contradictions, as it oscillates between making some characters appear sympathetic and then suddenly exposing them as baddies. The story must have started out as a tough crime thriller and then some frustrated sentimentalist wrote the script and could not help himself, he just had to have some love scenes, and the fact that the characters were all wrong for this could not and would not deter him. The producer clearly didn't notice. Well, if you like brilliant boogie, you really can't afford to miss this. And there will be people who will also enjoy the film. It is all a matter of what you expect, and if you start out expecting a corny mini-budgeted noir thriller with some unexpected good points, you will be happy.