Dance Hall Racket

Timothy Farrell runs a waterfront clip joint, using half-witted hoods and b-girls to take the fuddled customers. Meanwhile, he has a few other rackets on the side. Lenny Bruce (who also wrote the script) is his enforcer. He also kills a diamond smuggler whom Farrell is having one of his girls roll to recover the money he just paid him. The sucker is outraged at the unethical behavior, and Bruce has to clumsily shove a knife into him.

It's a very bad movie where Farrell is the best actor. Certainly the awful dialogue, filled with non sequiturs and dully offered observations of the obvious don't help. Given the script, Phil Tucker runs a surprisingly competent visual work, but the only reason to watch this is because of Bruce. And even that offers no particular pleasure.

As a devoted fan of Lenny Bruce, I've wanted to see this film for years and if, like me, you're prepared to experience a level of filmmaking that makes Ed Wood look like Orson Wells, you will not be disappointed.

This jaw dropping bit of cinematic excrement features Lenny's stripper wife, Honey Bruce (whose over-the-top make up suggests that she was preparing to audition for Susan Cabot's role in "The Wasp Woman") as a B-Girl and Lenny as the tough guy enforcer for the gangster bar owner. Watch for the scene where Lenny "kills" a guy who pulls Honey's hair by delivering the lamest looking judo chop in cinema history. Watch Lenny hitch up his collar and snap his fingers like a juvenile delinquent in a Jerry Lewis movie.

Timothy Farrel recreates his role as Umberto Scalli from the infamous "Pin-Down Girls" (aka "Racket Girls") and the scene where he and Bruce (who gets the blame/credit for the screenplay, as well) "rough up" a B-girl who's stealing from them will split your sides.

Among the great psychotronic films of all time. Every bit as bad/good as "Robot Monster".

This is a no budget film noir and while alot of film noir can pull off being cheap and good (like Detour and Highway Dragnet), this can't. Timothy Farrell is an actor who is like a watermark in these types of movies. Racket Girls, Jail Bait, The Violent Years, this movie. A departure for him was playing a psychiatrist in Ed Wood's Glen or Glenda.

Most I imagine by now saw this because of Lenny Bruce who stars in it, with his wife and wrote the original story and perhaps the script too. Proving it is more fun to play the bad guy, Lenny played the heavy's violent hit man. Really, the only highlight in this movie is toward the end when Lenny Bruce, in character, inexplicably takes his suit jacket off during a gun fight. Lenny couldn't afford to damage his suit since he was going to be performing his comedy act in it later that night.

This was made before Bruce hit it big by the mid to late 50s with his TV appearances on shows like Steve Allen's, so it is a nice curiosity. If you dont know who I'm talking about then the only people who will find anything to like about this movie are connoisseurs of low budget movies and study them like others study movies released as part of the Criterion Collection. Afterall, this is from the same director of Robot Holocaust. ROBOT HOLOCAUST!

Dance Hall Racket (1953)

* (out of 4)

Before turning to stand up comedy, legendary Lenny Bruce wrote and starred in this film from director Phil Tucker who is best known for the infamous Robot Monster. Vic (Bruce) tries to rise from a small town racket to a higher up gangster but there's a price to pay. The viewer pays a price as well because this is quite dreadful but thankfully it's bad enough to where you can laugh at it. The acting, including Bruce, is beyond awful. Bruce is so bad killing people that this gets the biggest laughs but the death scenes are also hilarious. Timothy Farrell of Glen or Glenda? fame co-stars.

Only reason to catch this soft-core sleaze is Lenny Bruce in a tough guy role. No effort here for the controversial comedian to be funny. Instead, he's sort of a third-rate George Raft. The dreadful effort at laughs comes instead from a guy mugging it up like Jerry Lewis's brain dead brother. I expect this barrel bottom showed in a grind house or two on the coasts, and may have made back it's dollar-seventy budget. It's like three unadorned sets and a dirty alley are there to confine viewers, along with the bare backs of well-fed "dance hall" girls. Just as skimpy is a plot having something to do with diamond smuggling run by the dance hall owner. But don't expect anything like suspense or even interest. No need to keep beating a dead horse. People don't watch such a title for artistic excellence. Apparently, this is what passed for skid-row titillation, 1953 style. So where was Ed Wood when we needed him.