High Explosive

That's how I imagine the trailers sold this movie. Chester Morris washes out as a car racer, so it's back to trucking nitroglycerin for old pal Barry Sullivan. Morris makes a play for office manager Jean Parker, but Sullivan has the inside track, and she's more concerned about her brother, Rand Brooks, who gets a job trucking nitro for the big bucks.

It's a Pine-Thomas production, so you know that the story has whiskers on it, the stars are very competent but cheap, and the direction is by someone who won't waste film. In this case, the direction is by Frank MacDonald, usually a competent director for Republic Pictures' horse operas, comedies and occasional musicals. Not only does MacDonald not waste film in multiple takes, he's pretty stingy about running time. This comes in at just over an hour, but it moves along at a good clip, just like all the Dollar Bills' productions.

There wasn't one plot element in High Explosives that you couldn't have predicted, but it still managed to be pretty good.

The story concerns a washed-out race car driver, played by Chester Morris, who goes back to work as a nitrogen driver for his old boss, Barry Sullivan. He becomes immediately interested in Sullivan's secretary, played by Jean Parker. Rand Books plays Parker's brother, who gets a job moving nitrogen as well.

One interesting thing is that the Morris character scoffs at the idea of America entering the war. This film was made in 1943 but the time is set in 1941. The opinions about getting into the war were very divided, but when I looked at old newspapers with the dreadful headlines coming from Europe, it was amazing to me that we stayed out of it as long as we did.

The acting was good. I especially enjoyed Jean Parker, who reminded me of Jean Arthur. The film quality was terrible, which made it hard to watch. The end of the film was exciting if predictable.