Underworld (1937)
** 1/2 (out of 4)
Paul Bronson (Sol Johnson) graduates from a Southern college but instead of getting a great job, he's lured to Chicago by gambler LeRoy Giles (Slick Chester). Soon Paul strikes up a relationship with Dinah (Bee Freeman) who just happens to be with the gambler and not long after a murder occurs.
UNDERWORLD is another low-budget film from director Oscar Micheaux. The director had dozens of titles under his belt by this point in his career but the budgets were certainly getting smaller and smaller. For the most part this here is an entertaining picture, although like most race films from this era, it has to deal with a very low budget as well as some technical limitations, which prevent it from being better.
I was actually surprised at how good the performances were here. Usually these types of films had to deal with bad actors but that really wasn't the case here. Yes, there are a few times where lines are messed up but this here is more of an issue with the budget and the fact that they simply couldn't re-do the scene. I thought both Johnson and Chester were good enough in their roles and I thought Freeman made for a good love interest. Again, none of the three were Oscar-worthy but they were good enough to hold your attention and keep you into the picture.
At just 63-minutes the film goes by extremely quick. I'm not sure if the available prints are missing any footage or if the IMDb just has the wrong running time listed. It seemed pretty complete from what I could tell. Either way, this isn't a masterpiece or even a good film for that matter but if you're a fan of the director then it's certainly worth watching.
