Born Reckless

John Ford continues to be flummoxed by early sound while Edmund Lowe is a sorry case for an Italian in this hackneyed mobster pic. Spitting one tough guy cliche after the next it fails to even approach the onslaught of classic gangster films (Little Caeser, Public Enemy, Scarface) with more convincing leads that would follow over the next year.

Louis Berretti (Lowe) is about to get sent up the river when a judge gives him an option to go to war instead, which he accepts. Upon return he goes straight and opens a club but his loyalty to his old pals remains and a spat between factions threatens to ruin his future.

As in his previous Black Watch, Ford seems confounded at getting anything but stilted performances out of his actors. The wooden Lowe is dreadfully miscast, looking more upscale financier than slum grown with the rest of the characters outside of a buoyant Lee Tracy not worth mentioning for their own good.

There are some tense moments and limp attempts at humor but Ford's ham fisted direction squanders them in this flaccid gangster pic devoid of the violent passion that would infuse the aforementioned films waiting in the wings.

It's a gangster movie with a comic twist set from World War I to ca. 1922. It's one of Ford's earliest sound films.

Louis Beretti (Edmund Lowe) is a hoodlum in a gang run by Big Shot (Warren Hymer), an old friend of Louis's. The movie starts with Louis in a failed jewelry robbery. Then we meet his buddies and his family. Ma Beretti (Ferike Boros) and Pa Beretti (Paul Porcasi) are stereotypical Italians who ignore the reality of what Louis and his friends do. When Louis is caught, the police chief, a candidate for a judgeship, lets Louis go into the army instead.

Frank Sheldon (Frank Albertson) is an army buddy from a wealthy family. Louis is attracted to Frank's sister, Joan (Catherine Dale Owen), but she is already engaged to someone else. Frank dies in the war, but Louis maintains a friendship with Joan.

After the war, Louis operates a speakeasy that sells a lot of smuggled booze (Prohibition began in 1920). Many of Big Shot's gang hang out there, as does an old newspaper friend, Good News Brophy (William Harrigan).

When Joan's baby is kidnapped, she turns to Louis for help, and he must decide how to confront the men he believes carried out the crime.

This is not a terribly sophisticated movie, but it was rather fun to watch. The humor and wordplay in the film's first half were uncommon for this kind of movie. Also, the ending is appropriately ambiguous. Apparently, one of the soldiers in the army sequences was an uncredited John Wayne, but I didn't notice him.

With such fluid epics as "The Iron Horse" (1924), "Lightnin'" (1925), "Hangman's House" and "Four Sons" (both 1928) in his resume, it is surprising that Fox would encumber Ford with a dialogue director over and over, but Fox did. In '29's "The Black Watch" it was Lumsden Hare. Andrew Bennison is credited with the stage direction of "Men Without Women" released January 1930. Judging from the result Bennison achieved in "Born Reckless" (released in May 1930), I'm astonished anyone would have given him a second chance.

The photoplay opens with a traveling camera shot of a parade. The camera prowls into a jewelry store where a heist is in progress. Outside, the cops "get wise" when a stolen truck is discovered. An exiting shootout and chase ensues, with our hero, Louis Berretti, gaining refuge at his parents' apartment. Then Bennison's stuff takes over. Well, molasses in Anchorage moves better and the pace of the film congeals. Berretti faces justice (eventually) and is "sentenced" to join the war effort overseas. John Ford stages some excellent sequences here, with Berretti's approbatory service delivering him home a hero. He opens a nightclub which, unfortunately, keeps Berretti rubbing elbows with his old mob and allows plenty scenes filled with Bennison-helmed hubris. The dialogue is not only awkward with head-shaking gaps, but has characters with names like Big Shot putting people "on the spot" [murdered].

Audiences of 1930 could not fast forward but you can and should. Edmund Lowe's performance is nothing like the smooth "Chandu" of a year later and probably should be skipped over to view Ford's impressive set pieces. The swamp at the picture's conclusion cribs Fox's "Sunrise" but remains impressive for an early talkie. I gave it a 7 for Ford's contributions. On the whole, though, this is the kind of film that gave early TV viewers a bad taste for early talkies. Viewers beware.

It's a gangster film! It's a war picture! It's a family drama! It's a story of unrequited love! It's a musical! It's a complete mess! It's not sci-fi or horror, but then Lon Chaney had just died and Fox didn't have Bela Lugosi under contract! But I digress.

Louie Beretti (Edmund Lowe) is working a safe cracking job with his gang in the middle of a parade (at night???), when a cop gets suspicious about the car waiting for them, and they have to abort the robbery. They manage to get away, but later Beretti and two of his partners in the job are nabbed by the police and given the choice of either going to war (WWI is in progress) or going to trial. They choose the former. Only Beretti returns alive, and opens a successful and classy speak-easy, which the police obviously know about because they bring it up to him as something positive that he has going on in his life (???). However, he gets not even one prohibition era raid. But you can take the man out of the mob, but it's not so easy to take the mob out of the man.

This was an early sound effort for John Ford, and, like I said, what a mess! John Ford gets better with sound, and quickly, so this is just Exhibit A of how good directors, in the face of the new technology, seemed to forget everything they knew about the art of motion picture making.

Edmund Lowe makes a brave effort, and I really like most of the films I've seen him in, but his bravery is not enough. For one, he's got a sister and parents who speak with an obvious Italian accent, but he sounds like he's from Brooklyn. When he's in the army in France everybody in his company sounds like they are from Brooklyn. Did nobody outside of New York City enlist in WWI?

As for the criminal gang he runs with, they all are so anonymous. They are all so non-descript looking and sounding I really couldn't tell one from another and that muddles the plot. Catherine Dale Owen, as the sister of one of Beretti's friends in the army who doesn't come home, is given very little to do. I guess it's a tribute to Lowe's acting that I can figure out that she's the classy girl who got away - She married someone else. Because I for sure couldn't figure it out from the dialogue or the situations.

What's good about it? For once, Fox made good use of contract player Warren Hymer as "Big Shot", head of the gang. Also, there's Lee Tracy in only his second credited role as a reporter - his go-to persona. He's there to make wry commentary on the various situations, and he does a good job of it.

If you are a Fox completist, or a student of early sound, or you just like Lee Tracy this might be worth your time.

How much of this film was directed by Andrew Bennison and how much by John Ford is your guess. All I know is that with Ford at the helm, I sure expected more from this very flat film.

"Born Reckless" is a gangster film with rather odd casting. Edmund Lowe stars in this film and frankly he didn't seem at all the gangster type. Part of this might be because I've only seen Lowe in about a dozen films (and he made over a hundred) and none of them ha him playing anything even closely resembling a criminal. Usually, he played very sophisticated and cultured sorts of men and with his lovely diction it just felt odd to have him hanging out with the sorts of Warren Hymer in the film--Hymer usually playing idiots or thugs. So, from the onset I had trouble accepting Lowe in the film--although I like him as an actor.

The other problem I noticed is that the film didn't seem sure whether or not to make Lowe a bad guy or a good guy. At the beginning he seemed kind of bad--after all, he was involved in an armed robbery. then, however, only minutes later he seemed like a swell fella when he met his sister's new boyfriend. And, when the police brought him in because of the robbery, he agreed to serve in WWI in order to avoid prison--and he served with distinction. Later, after he got out, he was not the most law-abiding of citizens (opening a speakeasy), but he also had a very, very moral code--one you'd certainly not expect from the owner of a speakeasy!! As a result, the film was muddled despite having some very interesting elements and a dandy violent finale.

With all the great gangster films of the early 30s, my attitude is that you should see all of them first! With wonderful films like "Scarface", "Littel Caesar" and "Public Enemy" (among others), why mess with this mediocre and poorly written film?