Two Dollar Bettor

The only gambling I've ever enjoyed in my life is the $2.00 window at the racetrack. I've always liked to see where my $2.00 is being spent. I remember one time going to Finger Lakes racetrack and coming home with four winners out of eight races. Wow, I'm some sort of genius. Needless to say like John Litel in Two Dollar Bettor I learned soon I wasn't.

But I never graduated beyond the $2.00 window and that certainly wasn't John Litel. A friend brings him to a racetrack where he's never been and he places a bet and wins. He has some more winners including a big longshot. After that he's placing bets with a bookie whose collector is the seductive Marie Windsor. Litel is good and hooked as only Marie can hook them.

But Windsor has her own agenda involving her recently released from prison husband Steve Brodie. Litel's already embezzling from his company and as comptroller he has the access to do it. Let's say it ends badly all around.

This independent production from an outfit called Realart Studios looks and feels like an expanded version of one of MGM's Crime Does Not Pay series. The performances are sincere and Marie Windsor is evil as Marie Windsor can only be. Still it's a shoddy production and can't get too high a rating from me.

Or..."Post Time for Topper". You won't see Ward, Wally or The Beaver. But you DO get to see Barbara Billingsly (June) as the fall guy's secretary. AND Carl (Alfalfa) Switzer as his younger daughter's dizzy boyfriend. This is the story of an honest, widowed family man and bank officer who becomes addicted to off track horse betting, loses large sums of money, and is lured deeper into the abyss by his bookie's vampish courier, played by Marie Windsor-----Filmland's best, sexiest, and probably most prolific villainess.

The rare contrast of authentic noir and sappy "back at the homestead" scenes provides for some unintentional humor, giving the movie the flavor of a high school dope-scare film from the 60s. However, this film isn't in the "so bad it's good" category. The performances and scripting are top notch, even though some of the melodramatic plot elements are quite implausible and even a bit ridiculous. Nevertheless, the film is effectively paced and truly suspenseful. Plenty of thrills....and a few giggles.

Highly entertaining

John Litel was adept at playing both good guys and bad guys. Here he is a bit of a gray character as John Hewitt, a bank employee who joins his brother-in-law (his late wife's brother) at the races one day. John does not gamble and is shy to get started, but he is persuaded to place a two dollar bet and wins ten dollars. Then he bets that ten dollars and winds up with two hundred. He uses the money to buy his two teen daughters a second-hand car and wonders - why not keep gambling as long as he's winning to get his girls the things they want. He starts betting with a bookmaker, and at first he is winning big, but then his luck turns and he owes the bookmaker money. He steals a thousand dollars from the bank's safe to pay him. He bets more, trying to dig himself out of a hole, until he's stolen fourteen thousand dollars of the bank's money and lost all of it gambling. And believe it or not, things go downhill from there.

Like I said in the title, John Litel makes this film. I could actually see this happening to someone, and he's very authentic and sympathetic as a middle-class widower who gets over his head trying to get his daughters a better life and ultimately ends up risking the entire family's reputation with his misdeeds. Not to mention, Marie Windsor plays someone who John thinks is a friend when - after all - this is Marie Windsor we're talking about! As far as I know she never played a nun in her career!

What's bad about it are the scenes at Hewitt's home where his two teen daughters seem to be holding constant dance parties with some of the most cornball dialogue in the history of cinema. Fortunately these scenes don't last that long. If they did I'd subtract a star for them. The best thing about them is getting to see Carl Switzer (Alfalfa of Our Gang) all grown up. Oddly he's playing a football player which, at his size, I just don't buy at all.

John Litel is the comptroller of a bank who meets up with some friends at a racetrack. He's never bet on the ponies in his life, but he's badgered in a friendly way into a $2 bet, which he wins. He wins the next one, and gets to enjoy the extra money.... until he starts to lose and embezzles money, hoping to get even.

We're in B movie territory, with director Edward L. Cahn handling it like an extended version of CRIME DOES NOT PAY; he had directed a few of those in his early days at MGM. Although he was never a great director, he was a competent one who let everyone in his cast and crew do their jobs, and with John Litel in the lead, and with Marie Windsor playing one of her shady girl characters, the movie is pretty good.

Watching a mediocre print of this movie was like seeing "Detour" for the first time. The movie has a terrible, pedestrian title. The stars don't promise much. Well, of course Marie Windsor is always good and Steve Brodie is a noir staple. But John Litel, as the central figure -- which he is? It's the very suspenseful story of a decent guy getting dragged down into a whirlpool of crime and deceit.

Litel is what today would be called a middle-manager. He has an OK job and works hard. He has two daughters in their late teens, whom he adores. He lavishes everything he can afford on them. And, it turns out, more than he can afford.

Urged to bet a horse to show at the races, he slowly gets bitten by the gambling bug. From small bets he moves on to a bookie. And who does the bookie send to collect his money but -- Marie Windsor.

Far be it from me to say exactly what role her character plays in the story. She looks great, as always. This is all I'm saying. But the Litel character is very likable. The money he wants to win is truly only to continue pampering his daughters. And seeing his decline is painful. (And its shocking.)

Though the film seems to have been made on a very low budget, its plot and character development are nuanced. I'm eager to see it again.