East Side Kids

The grownups involved in East Side Kids concern three men from the slums on the lower East Side of Manhattan. Leon Ames is a cop, Dennis Moore is in the rackets, and Dave O'Brien is in the death house. In fact he's taking a rap for shooting a cop in a job that Moore did. It's the code of the streets not to squeal and O'Brien would rather get the chair than do that so Ames is going to have clear him the hard way.

In the meantime Moore is now involved in a counterfeiting racket and uses a group of kids from the old neighborhood to spread his bogus currency. One of them is Harris Berger who is O'Brien's kid brother. In the meantime O'Brien and Berger's sister Joyce Bryant is being romanced by Ames as well.

For those of us who are used to seeing the clowning antics of Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall this film is strictly on the serious side. There were no fatalities usually with the Gorcey/Hall group, but this one has a few. It's a nice B picture drama with a good pace to it.

First film in Monogram's East Side Kids series, although you wouldn't know it at first glance. None of the more recognizable Dead End Kids who would later make up the ESK during the series and the later Bowery Boys series are present here. No Leo Gorcey, no Huntz Hall, no Bobby Jordan, no Gabriel Dell even. We do get former Little Tough Guys Harris Berger and Hally Chester. Whoop-de-doo.

The plot to this one has a mustacheless Leon Ames playing a cop trying to nab some gangsters and prove tough guy Knuckles (Dave O'Brien) is innocent of murder. Knuckles' younger brother is one of the street yutes that makes up our title gang. They help Ames prove Knuckles is innocent by nabbing the real killer, gangster Mileaway Harris (great name), played by Dennis Moore. Cheap-looking B movie that is surprisingly better than some of the later East Side Kids pictures, although that's nothing to brag about. Worth a look as a time-killer I suppose.

A lot of folks don't have much great to say about this or any of the East Side Kids films, but this was the first entry into the series and it wasn't as bad as its touted to be. Plenty of action and intrigue, though quite dated. No Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall or even Bobby Jordan...this was the adjustment period for those coming fresh from being the Dead End Kids and cast wasn't settled. Though you do have a familiar face...Frankie Burke, from "Angels with dirty faces" and other Dead End Kids films. He mugs it up heavily for this film and has some decent lines, which he didn't often receive. This is a film definitely worth watching! If for nothing else, simply for the mere fact that this is the first entry into the East Side Kids serial. If you are a fan of the Dead End Kids, this is a must see.

This is worth seeing as the forerunner of the popular East Side Kids/ Bowery Boys comedies that used a very similar format with a different cast and characters. Despite the completely different cast, there are many obvious similarities. In itself, this feature is just fair, largely because the camaraderie and spontaneity is not nearly as strong as it would be in the main series. But of course this cast did not have the advantage of having worked together beforehand.

The story setup is much like those used for many of the later features. Leon Ames plays a police officer who takes an interest in a gang of youths, one of whom has a brother who is facing a murder charge. The main plot has the gang working with Ames to try to break up a counterfeiting ring, with numerous confrontations, frame-ups, and action sequences along the way. Most of it works all right in itself, but because the characters never quite come together, some of the scenes aren't quite as effective as they could have been.

Another interesting aspect, in comparison with the later series, is that once Leo Gorcey, Bobby Jordan, and the others started their run together, the characters were simply presented for who they were, with few apologies or lengthy explanations. But here, perhaps out of uncertainty that audiences would accept these kinds of roughnecks as sympathetic characters, the movie has several of its characters repeatedly discuss how 'these are good boys who just need something constructive to do with their time, to keep them out of trouble'.

Overall, there should be enough to make this worth seeing for anyone who liked the series that followed, or if you simply enjoy the B-movies of the era. In itself, it's OK as very light viewing.

This gloriously no budget Monogram 'masterpiece' is a surprisingly effective z grade street-gang drama that benefits inadvertently from its genuine cheapness. The acting boys are all in their mid teens and have screen presence originally seen in the stage show of the late 30s. This was the first in a series of films for Monogram that became The Bowery Boys with Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall. In all honesty, this is the better cast and as played as a little tough guys melodrama allows for real audience interest. I expected this to be terrible in both acting and production, but like the neo realist Italian pix of the immediate post war, this has the same look and grimy realism simply by being cheap and genuinely poor. As a result, with strong lead acting by Leon Ames (Father in "Meet Me In St Louis") EAST SIDE KIDS becomes a teen crime pic with good looking and interesting youth actors, strong support adults and a fantastic genuineness in its crummy look. The music is awful though, the one part marring what is actually one of Monogram's best teen films...whether they meant it or not.