Não Há Crime Sem Castigo

Before J. Edgar Hoover stopped fogging mirrors in 1972 you would not see a film that did not show the Federal Bureau Of Investigation as less than dedicated and perfect. Stripping the man's paranoia away from him, Hoover did bring a certain order and professionalism to the FBI and when they stuck to crime and criminals as opposed to just amassing files on the world they did a good job. Like any other law enforcement agency when one of their own is killed in the line of duty everything stops until the perpetrator is caught.

Down These Dark Streets is one of the few films you'll see where someone who is a detective will be shown having more than one case. Indeed that is the crux of this plot. Which one of three cases did agent Kenneth Tobey get killed over by a sniper's bullet?

His supervisor Broderick Crawford takes over and the three cases are a case of an organized car theft ring where young Gene Reynolds is about to take a fall in federal prison because he won't rat out the leaders. Maybe it's notorious fugitive Joe Bassett who is armed and dangerous and who already killed a gas station attendant who rather stupidly called the FBI before Bassett was clear from his station. Or there's Ruth Roman who is being extorted for an insurance settlement by a stranger threatening her child on the phone.

Crawford takes on all three cases and systematically solves them and eliminates a lot of suspects. He's as thorough a professional as all big screen FBI men were at the time.

Take note of Martha Hyer who plays Joe Bassett's kept moll. Martha was one of the most beautiful women ever to grace the screen and here she shows some real acting chops in her scenes with Crawford.

Down Three Dark Streets is a crisp and competent police drama with a great ensemble cast. Definitely a must for noir fans.

Down Three Dark Streets (1954)

An FBI man has been killed, and the suspects are related to the three cases the agent was working one when he died. So all three cases become priorities, thinking that by solving them all, the cop killer will come to light.

The title of the movie is a cue that this is in some ways a three part movie, with three basically distinct, if intertwined plots. But what holds it together is a single character, an FBI agent played by Broderick Crawford. And it's Crawford who holds it together beautifully. He plays his part with cool, somber, and weary reserve (and if you know Crawford in his more famous roles, such as "All the King's Men" or even more in "Born Yesterday").

Each of the three stories is layered up as you go, which makes it interestingly complex, and in each there is one leading woman connected to a suspect. Ruth Roman is the most powerful of these three, though the other two are bit weak. Luckily, the weakest of these, Ruth Hyer, loses relevance so that Roman and Marisa Pavan (playing a blind woman fairly well) carry their shares. And in a way you never quite notice the uneven acting because the events tumble one after another, through lots of changes of location, and from one plot to the next. It's filmed with economy but good drama. And the story, which might lose some viewers because of its complexity, also has the beauty of not being obvious, with lots of good dialog.

Why isn't it quite a classic? There's something awkward about the many parts that have to be connected, and an occasional odd aspect, like the unlikely ruse of a blanket carried as Roman's child into her car (it looks very much like a blanket). Still, there is a lot of suspense throughout, dark alleys, drives at night, phones that ring and aren't answered, all along waiting for something and not knowing what. An intense example is when Roman takes a senselessness lonely walk in a cemetery and a car pulls up.

"I'm waiting for a friend." "Maybe I'm that friend you're waiting for."

This is good movie-making, and it makes for a good movie. Then, to cap it off, it has what is maybe the best vintage use of the famous Hollywood letters on the hill overlooking movieland. Odd to say, but I think the movie is worth watching for that alone. This is exactly when the industry was falling apart (legally and literally), and the letters were no accident. There is also a nice use of that trope of money blowing away in the wind (made more archetypal in "The Killing" in 1958). The last line? "Sometimes you meet some nice people in this business." Perfect.

Moderately interesting programmer made at a time when police procedure was popular on both the big and little screens. The influence of TV's Dragnet is apparent in the stentorian voice-over and the rather feeble attempts at quirky citizen humor. An FBI agent is killed in the line of duty. His chief Broderick Crawford determines that the killer is tied into one of three cases he's investigating. But which one. The narrative follows his sorting through the cases, all the while both he and we wonder which one will lead to the culprit. It's a good premise, but director Laven does little to develop the potential.

Movie gains a lot from location photography in and around a burgeoning LA. The final scene makes effective use of that city's landmark "Hollywood" sign, the only film I know to do that. There's a fine performance from Ruth Roman as a beleaguered mother whose child is under threat of kidnap, along with an unusually restrained Crawford as the head agent, a role I suspect recommended him for for the lead in the following year's hit series Highway Patrol. Note the rather gratuitous cheesecake scenes from Roman and the bosomy Martha Hyer. After all, the movies had to do something to get people away from the novelty of their television sets. Nothing special here. Just an easy way to pass a spare 90 or so minutes.

When FBI Agent Zack Stewart is killed, Agent John Ripley takes over the three cases he was working on, hoping one will lead to his killer. The first involves gangster Joe Walpo and Ripley finds his hideout through Joe's girl friend, Connie Anderson. Joe is killed but it is established he was 400 miles away when Stewart was murdered. The next involves a car-theft gang which Ripley breaks up by using one of the gang, Vince Angelino and his wife Julie. The last case involves Kate Martell, the victim of an extortionist who threatens to kidnap her child unless she pays him $10,000.

This certainly is an interesting look at FBI cases and procedures, with them using bulky equipment to spy on neighbors, intercept phone calls and make identifications. But this was the 1950s, when such things were primitive and relatively innocent. (The FBI surveillance went too far in the 1960s and was shut down by the courts.) Very interesting film, well worth being better known. And the film quality seems to have held up very nicely over the years. The one on Netflix looks great.

...that shows how the FBI handles cases in addition to profiling three particular cases. In the process, it also shows some of the technology used by the FBI at the time.

Agent Zach Stewart (Kenneth Tobey) is assigned to these three cases. One case has to do with a known hijacker, robber and murderer named Joe Walpo who may be headed for Los Angeles. Another is the case of a young man who got caught stealing cars but refuses to give up the guys he works for because of a misplaced sense of loyalty plus the guys are scary and he's rightfully afraid of them. The third case has to do with a widow (Ruth Roman) who is being extorted for the ten thousand dollars in insurance money she got for her husband's death in a traffic accident. The unknown person who calls using a disguised voice is threatening her daughter's life if she doesn't cough up the cash.

When a woman calls saying she has information about one of Stewart's cases, Stewart and agent John Ripley (Broderick Crawford) show up to talk to the woman. When someone disappears out the back door, Stewart gives chase and is shot and killed by that person. The woman refuses to talk further. So now Ripley must solve Stewart's three cases - the titular "three dark streets" - to solve his colleague's murder.

Broderick Crawford plays the FBI agent in his usual TV style of acting, but he's fine for the role and the film is quite engaging. Highlights include Martha Hyer as Joe Walpo's girlfriend who isn't shy and isn't talking. She seems to be doing her best Shelley Winters imitation, but just lacks that "all of the brashness and va va voom that heaven and the production code allows" quality that Winters had.

Then there is Claude Akins as a big galoot who pushes around the spunky blind wife of the car thief and Jay Adler looking almost unrecognizable as the creepy uncle of the widowed extortion victim. William Schallert is a gas station attendant in Barstow who, for some reason that turns out to be a fatal mistake, does not wait until Joe Walpo pulls away from the gas station to try and notify the police in the opening sequence.

And just one more thing - In the extortion segment, Crawford's character tells Ruth Roman that extortionists say things to panic and isolate the victim and make them feel alone and that nobody can help them because that is how they make the victim more compliant with their demands. That's actually good advice when dealing with today's extortionists - otherwise known as internet scammers. Never do anything in a panic. Always think things through and ask yourself if what is being said to you makes sense. Would the sheriff's department REALLY call ahead and let you know they are coming to arrest you and then tell you that the whole thing could be cleared up with 1000 dollars worth of Apple gift cards?