Desperate

... in this "B" crime drama from RKO and director Anthony Mann. A hapless truck driver named Steve (Steve Brodie) gets unwittingly caught up in a robbery that leads to a cop's death and the arrest of the little brother of chief crook Walt Radak (Raymond Burr). Radak wants revenge on Steve for his brother's situation, and the gangster threatens Steve's pregnant wife Anne (Audrey Long). Steve and Anne hit the road to try and escape, and their circumstances continue to get worse.

There are a lot of rough edges on this crime picture, but I liked it anyway. The first half of the story could have been subtitled "A series of increasingly poor decision making" on the part of Steve. Things settle down for the second half, where things become a bit more brooding and almost nihilistic before snapping out of it.

Brodie and Long are both likable leads, even if they aren't the most gifted actors. Burr is terrific as the menacing brute Radak, even before he packed on the pounds as Perry Mason. And this may be the best role that I've seen Jason Robards Sr in. After a career stretching way back into the silents. He plays the cold-blooded, cynical police detective on the case with just the right angle to his smirk. There are a lot of reprehensible characters filling out the background, from Douglas Fowley as an oily P. I., to Cy Kendall as a loathsome used car salesman.

Hot on the heels of RKO's beeping radio tower astride the globe, `Desperate' flashes on the screen, ragged letters smeared along a rising diagonal. In 1947, that was all audiences needed to alert them that one of the short, swift and stylish products of a new division of the film industry (not yet termed film noir) was about to unspool.

Teamster Steve Brodie takes a call to do a night hauling job; since it's his four-month anniversary, he demurs at first, but the pay is too good to pass up. He should have, for the indispensably creepy Raymond Burr and his gang are using him and his truck in a warehouse heist. When Brodie catches on, his attempts to thwart the burglary result in the capture of Burr's kid brother, who has just shot a policeman. Roughed up by Burr, Brodie must convince the police that he's the killer – or his bride (Audrey Long) will suffer Burr's wrath; Burr brandishes a jagged bottle to cinch the threat. But Brodie makes a break for it.

What follows is a protracted cat-and-mouse game played out from Chicago to Minnesota farm country, with Burr in pursuit of the newlyweds. It's the classic story of just plain folks caught up in a sinister web of circumstances, and its director is Anthony Mann, working up to his legendary collaboration with John Alton (his able cinematographer here is George Diskant).

In the basement where Burr works Brodie over, a wildly swinging ceiling lamp floods the action with a harsh glare then plunges it into darkness, adding immeasurably to the dread. Near the end, when Burr plans to kill Brodie at the stroke of midnight – the precise moment when his own brother will die in the electric chair – a montage of faces and eyes ratchets up the tension as the seconds tick by. Mann shows his native talent for the film medium in every frame, and he's abetted by Brodie, Burr and that old pro Jason Robards (Sr.) as a police detective. There are flashier and more resonant films in the noir cycle, but for rough, bare-bones entertainment, Desperate is hard to beat.

Raymond Burr is the main feature as the crime boss desperately trying to save his younger brother from a date with the electric chair. Directed by Anthony Mann, the pace picks up as the hour approaches for the execution, and the final minutes of the film are quite exciting, with Burr, the clock ticking down to midnight, and the police closing in. The implausible ending may have given the film more appeal but watered down the impact it was building up. Before Burr went into television, he made a believable impression as a criminal, as here, and the film loses momentum whenever he's not in it. Steve Brodie, as an unwitting small time trucker with a new wife, doesn't really convey the dramatic impact to counter Burr.

Steve Randall is a truck driver looking forward to a romantic night in with his new wife after four months of marriage. However when he gets a call for a last minute transit job for the fee of $50 he can't say no. When he gets to the job he finds that he is working for Walt Radak and the cargo is actually goods being stolen from a warehouse. Alerting a passing police officer sees the officer get shot and Radak's younger brother caught by the cops; to get him out Radak tells Steve to go to the police and confess that he forced the kid to do the job for him, either that or Radak's boys will pay a visit to Steve's wife. Instead of going to the cops though, Randall alerts his wife and flees the city with both the criminals (helped by ex-PI Lavitch) and the police (in the shape of Det Lt Ferrari).

This film opens with a light tone that does little to prepare you for how quickly it all goes wrong for Steve and it is not long before he is fleeing the mob and the police. However, although it never settles back into that light tone, it does take the foot off the gas several times and produces a film that is a series of good moments rather than being a constantly taut thriller. Having said that though, the strong moments more than make up for the dips where the film develops the story and plays on the emotions of the characters – when this is tough, it is excellent and very much captures what made the "more is less" spirit of 40's/50's crime noirs so enjoyable. Steve's initial beating is played out in a dark room with a swinging lampshade; the final standoff takes place in a stairwell that is all shadows and banister; while the ambivalence of the cops and criminals make for an interesting set up.

Although the characters are not taken as deep as noir would normally require (Steve is too clean cut and not enough is made of the police using Steve as bait) the characters are still tough. Brodie is not great but does well enough despite being rather too nice for the lead role. Long is OK and luckily the film gives her limited time and concentrates on the dark rather than the dame. Burr is tremendously menacing – not a crime lord but a tough hood who remains sane throughout and is all the more menacing for being out of the picture until the end. Robards is a bit too whimsical where I would have preferred him to be cynical and uncaring, but he was still good. Support is also good from Fowley, Challee and others.

Overall this would have been a bit better if it had been a bit darker in terms of action and character as well as being more consistent in its tension but, despite what could have been, it is still enjoyably tense and tough and features good performances and some typically noir use of darkness and light in the cinematography.

This film, and others like it from that era, has something which has long been missing from suspense/crime movies of today: a slow-to-build menace. Things develop almost leisurely, and then--Burr, that menace personified, pounces like a rabid dog hounding Steve Brodie. The pay-off is so much more effective when a director takes the time to build the foundation of suspense. The characters are well-developed, Detective Ferrari in particular. He starts out as an antagonist and ends up, reluctantly, on the side of truth and justice. Brodie's backstory hints at a checkered past. The ending, as Steve faces death at midnight, the clock ticking away, is played out in what seems to be real-time. It was truly a nail-biter. Satisfying and captivating all the way.