The Secret Six

This crime drama features both an excellent cast and an excellent script by Frances Marion. The story could easily be filmed today and become a huge box office hit. Louie Scorpio (Wallace Beery) is an uneducated meathead from the streets with a thirst for money. He learns that bootlegging is a great way to get what he wants, so he joins up with Johnny (Ralph Bellamy) and "Newt" (Lewis Stone) who run a powerful gang in town. After bumping Johnny off, Louie becomes the leader and fixes half the town in his favor. Among the most desirable allies are the town reporters Hank (Johnny Mack Brown) and Carl (Clark Gable). He uses a beautiful dame (Jean Harlow) to keep them in line, but can't seem to shake the cops.

For an early talkie, the camera-work here is surprisingly innovative. There are scenes that feel very static and others that move fluidly through various sets. The lighting is fantastic and creates a beauty for a bleak storyline. Unfortunately, the sound quality isn't so impressive. Sometimes the dialogue is difficult to understand, so the story can become confusing in some areas. Thankfully, audiences will be able to figure things out fairly easily.

I saw this recently on TCM and was quite impressed. This film came before the better known gangster movies of that era-- "Little Caesar," "Public Enemy," and, the greatest of them all-- "Scarface." It was also made at a time when sound recording technology for motion pictures was very new and still in development. The first talkie gangster movie, which happened to be the first all-talkie movie, was "Lights of New York," made in 1928. In that film the equipment was so clunky that the actors had to speak loud and slow and stay close to the microphone. By 1931, several improvements had come along, but it was still a difficult technical achievement to make a film like this.

There is a scene towards the beginning where Ralph Belamy, who does a great job as a sinister hood, fires a tommy-gun in a night club and kills a guy. Then, he and his cohorts run out and jump in a car. The rival gang pursues them, firing their own tommy-gun. Finally, the rivals crash. But during the chase scene, we are taken through city streets, with the cars running fast and the machine guns blazing. Granted, this was done much better a year or so later in "Scarface," but this film set the precedent.

The film is also worth seeing for the Clark Gable role. He shows the charm that made him a star. Harlow is also great as the moll. For a film made that long ago-- at the very beginning of the sound era-- it is well worth viewing whenever it appears again on Turner or any other channel.

The Secret Six, produced by William Randolph Hearst's Cosmopolitan Pictures for MGM, has an interesting message about extralegal means to bring down systemic corruption. The title figures are six notable citizens who are all masked, representing all kinds of interests who come together when organized crime takes over a city. We never see The Secret Six, they only come in the last third of the film. But we do see how they operate.

The films is the story of the rise and fall of Wallace Beery who becomes an Al Capone like figure, the real brains of the outfit however is the mob's lawyer Lewis Stone. With Stone pulling the strings and polluting the justice system, Beery rises to power in a typical gangland battle. When the regular law enforcement channels don't work, The Secret Six start working with the federal government to bring Beery down. Working with them are a pair of reporters Johnny Mack Brown and Clark Gable. A key witness in the events is Jean Harlow in her first MGM film.

For those who are used to seeing Lewis Stone as the rock of integrity as Judge Hardy, Stone as a bottom feeding shyster lawyer will be quite the revelation. Maybe because he's cast against type he's so good, he just oozes sanctimony in front of a jury.

One character I wish that we'd seen a bit more of is Paul Hurst who is Beery's friend and whom the gang elects mayor of a small town. Once doing that the gang moves on to a big city where they take down top gangster boss John Miljan. The situation parallels Al Capone's takeover of Hawthorne, Illinois. I wish Hurst hadn't just disappeared from the story after his election.

The Secret Six was the first of six films that Clark Gable and Jean Harlow worked in. Next to Joan Crawford, Gable teamed with Harlow more than any other leading lady. Neither of them however are the stars here, they are billed way down in the cast list. Marjorie Rambeau also has a nice role as a good time girl who Beery uses as a doormat, but Rambeau has the last laugh on him.

Although Warner Brothers was the gangster studio with their emphasis on working class films, The Secret Six could give any of the Warner products a run in quality.

This is an odd movie on two accounts. First, the plot for this movie appears to have been stolen by Warner Brothers just four years later in SPECIAL AGENT. Both films feature a newspaper reporter who is actually a government agent. And both have these reporters gaining close access to mob leaders in order to convict them of tax fraud. I just can't believe the story parallels are just coincidental. Second, while he receives very low billing, Clark Gable is given one of his first starring roles. Despite the low billing, he is second only to Wallace Beery in the film in regard to time on screen and importance to the story.

As mentioned above, this film concerns Gable getting close to mobster Beery in order to help a secret grand jury gain enough information for an indictment. However, unlike SPECIAL AGENT, there is more emphasis on the exploits of the mob leader and the newspaper reporter's role is slightly less prominent. While the film was certainly more original that SPECIAL AGENT, the film wasn't quite as polished and seemed a bit shrill. As a result, if you only want to see one film, SPECIAL AGENT is probably a slightly better film.

This movie is a thinly veiled attempt to portray the life of Al Capone. The violent rise and fall of the gangster, portrayed by Wallace Beery, the taking over of the government of an adjacent small town, the eventual tax problem that Beery's character has...these and other subplots are mirror images of Capone's Chicago. While not as well known today as "The Public Enemy" or "Little Caesar", this movie is definitely worth watching. It also features a very young Clark Gable is a supporting good-guy role and, of all people, Ralph Bellamy as a gangster.