Western Pacific Agent

Another in the Lippert Films series, this is a typical B-movie with a no-name cast, save character actors Dick O'Neil and Sid Melton, wooden acting and directing and a simple plot/story. Still, it is an entertaining film, albeit cheesy by today's standards. The script is also sophomoric but somehow engrossing. Western Pacific Agent involves detectives who work for the railroad solving crimes and other dilemmas, in this case the murder of a railroad payroll carrier and another victim. This is included in Forgotten Noir Vol. 4, a set of B-movies that are, if nothing else, good fun to watch. They have a style reminiscent of 1950s television dramas. You won't find any 'method acting' here.

An intriguing detective story, thanks largely to two actors, Mickey Knox and Morris Carnovsky, whose careers were threatened by their politics during the witch hunts of the late 1940s. Knox steals the film as a sociopath who heists a payroll, then discovers there's no way to pass the marked money. Carnovsky isn't far behind as his father, a small town grocer who can't bring himself to turn in his psycho son. Kent Taylor as a railroad detective and Sheila Ryan as the sister of a murder victim are nominally the stars. But it's the first-rate character acting, coupled with effective location camera-work (like a shoot-out on a rising drawbridge,)that make this a grade B thriller worth watching.

Western Pacific Agent with Kent Taylor in that title role is the story of a railroad cop investigating the on the job murders of two employees. This particular Lippert Production rises a notch or two above the usual Lippert film with a pair of guys with blacklist troubles.

Morris Carnovsky and Mickey Knox who were having trouble getting work at the larger studios play father and son. Knox commits a payroll robbery and kills two employees of the Western Pacific to do it. The nature of the crime suggests some familiarity with the town and the railroad operation. The Western Pacific's top cop Kent Taylor gets the case.

This film really belongs to Knox who gives a great performance as a stone cold killer. Before the climax Knox kills a fence who was holding him up in a deal.

Carnovsky suspects right away that it could be his son, but he dare not say anything and hopes his suspicions are wrong. He's a very good friend of Sheila Ryan whose brother Robert Lowery was one of the first pair of victims. Carnovsky will bring a tear or two to your eye as a father who desperately hopes his son is not a killer.

Lippert films went quite a bit beyond their normal quality in bringing Western Pacific Agent to the movie-going public in 1950.

Evil bindlestiff Mickey Knox kills the station agent who is sitting on tens of thousand of dollars and takes the cash. In comes railroad agent Kent Taylor, who myopic witness Sid Melton, to track him down. The trouble is that some one can identify the murder; it's Morris Carnovsky, who's Knox's father.

It's a well directed movie by Sam Newfield, who was actually a pretty good director when given more than the $100 that PRC had been willing to spend on a movie. There are some nice setting shots of railroad bridges, a good portion is handsomely photographed in interiors of Western Pacific's observation cars. Where this movie falls apart is in the dialogue, which I blame on hack screenwriter Fred Myton, who never met a cliche he didn't steal. But allow the basic competence of the performers, who include Sheila Ryan and Dick Elliott to charm you, and it's watchable.

This is amazingly good for being a B-feature without any stars. The interesting thing is that the two leads, father and son, Morris Carnovsky and Mickey Knox, were blacklisted in the McCarthy persecution days, so they had to resort to second hand roles in second hand features, but this is a jewel in the mud. There are many memorable scenes, but most striking are the genuine insights into the life and camps of the outcasts, trams and bums living at camp fires in the forest and hiking on freight trains, there is a startling scene on such a train when one bum throws the other out, and thus the whole character of the film becomes that of genuine realism from the underworld. There can be no sympathy with Mickey Knox, while the sympathy with his father Morris Carnovsky must be infinite, and their relationship is particularly poignant in its desperate humanity. This is no trifle of a film despite its very basic B-character, but it will leave you with very much to think of.