East Side Kids

The grownups involved in East Side Kids concern three men from the slums on the lower East Side of Manhattan. Leon Ames is a cop, Dennis Moore is in the rackets, and Dave O'Brien is in the death house. In fact he's taking a rap for shooting a cop in a job that Moore did. It's the code of the streets not to squeal and O'Brien would rather get the chair than do that so Ames is going to have clear him the hard way.

In the meantime Moore is now involved in a counterfeiting racket and uses a group of kids from the old neighborhood to spread his bogus currency. One of them is Harris Berger who is O'Brien's kid brother. In the meantime O'Brien and Berger's sister Joyce Bryant is being romanced by Ames as well.

For those of us who are used to seeing the clowning antics of Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall this film is strictly on the serious side. There were no fatalities usually with the Gorcey/Hall group, but this one has a few. It's a nice B picture drama with a good pace to it.

EAST SIDE KIDS (Monogram, 1940), a Four-Bell Production directed by Bob Hill, is a social drama centering upon the lives and activities of youths in the tenement district of New York City's lower east side. Somewhat inspired by Samuel Goldwyn's screen adaptation to DEAD END (United Artists, 1937), and others like it, EAST SIDE KIDS offers nothing new nor original in this premise. Monogram's earlier contributions to this genre did produce such worthy offerings as BOY OF THE STREETS (1937), GANGSTER'S BOY (1938) and STREETS OF NEW YORK (1939), all starring Jackie Cooper. Unlike EAST SIDE KIDS, those Cooper products didn't spawn any sequels of its own, only imitations. Considering how this edition happens to be an ordinary 62 minute programmer, it's uncertain whether a sequel or series to EAST SIDE KIDS was originally intended. Aside from becoming a cut rate version to DEAD END, EAST SIDE KIDS also borrows a little from MGM's highly popular, BOYS TOWN (1938) starring Spencer Tracy, where the central character, a policeman in place of a priest, doing everything possible assisting or reforming teenagers in the neighborhood where he was once raised from following the path of an idolizing gangster.

Through its fade-in capturing New York City from across the Hudson River leading inward to the streets and tenement surroundings, the story gets underway with the introduction of the title characters rolling dice on the sidewalk before focusing on Patrick O'Day (Leon Ames), former East Side kid now police officer, wanting to help his childhood friend, "Knuckles" Dolan (Dave O'Brien) who is serving prison time for murder. Although innocent and set to face execution in the electric chair within a month, Dolan refuses to reveal the guilty party of the crime. As a favor to Knuckles, O'Day not only looks after his kid brother, Danny (Harris Berger), but prevents him from learning the truth by making him believe Knuckes to be working in South America. As O'Day tries to keep Danny and his pals from getting into further mischief, he forms the Vasser Street Junior Police Club where they gather together for various activities as boxing and a game of pool. All goes well until the arrival of a well-dressed mobster named Mileaway (Dennis Moore) returning to his old neighborhood, where his influence on the boys, especially Danny, leads them to getting arrested for unknowingly by passing out fliers containing counterfeit $5 bills. Further complications arise through O'Day's dismissal from the police force that prevents him from obtaining enough evidence to clear Knuckles' name.

Other members of the cast include Joyce Bryant as Molly, O'Day's love interest (minus any love scenes) and sister of Knuckles and Danny; Vince Barnett (Whisper, Mileaway's henchman); Richard Adams (Mr. Schmidt, the German pawnbroker); Maxine Lewis (May, Mileaway's girl); and Alden Chase (Detective Joe Forbes); along with Jack Edwards (Algernon "Algy" Wilkes); Hally Chester (Dutch Kuhn); Eric Burtis (Eric, the crippled boy on short-wave radio); Frankie Burke (Skinny) and Donald Haines (Pee-Wee) in the roles of the East Side Kids.

For what's become a series opener, anyone expecting to find "East Side Kids" regulars (Leo Gorcey, Bobby Jordan, Huntz Hall and Sunshine Sammy Morrison) will be totally disappointed or lead to believe they're viewing an entirely different movie altogether. Actually dismissed as part of the subsequent series that followed, EAST SIDE KIDS is in fact the initial entry to that series, bearing, in television terms, a "pilot" for a possible series, for which it turned out to be, leading to cast changes before the right element took place. While observing this particular entry, consisting of unfamiliar faces with a virtually unknown cast, only Dave O'Brien in the role of Knuckles went on to reprise his role in sequels, BOYS OF THE CITY and THAT GANG OF MINE, before his character was written out, as well as two additional entries in two different roles. Take notice that feature billing for EAST SIDE KIDS goes to Leon Ames, shortly before being type-casting in fatherly roles for MGM in the 1940s, 1950s, as well as on television, making both his rare lead performance and minus his mustache.

As in most cases pertaining to Monogram programmers, production values for EAST SIDE KIDS are limited and tight editing a bit clumsy. The only benefit of creativity to take place comes from its opening sequence as camera captures the East Side Kids from an upward position as they look downward shooting dice onto the sidewalk, the sidewalk being the camera. While this method has been done before, it's still quite impressive filmmaking.

Formerly shown on commercial television prior to the 1980s during the weekend morning or early afternoon broadcasts of such named presentations as "East Side Comedy" (New York City edition) EAST SIDE KIDS, distributed to video cassette and later DVD, premiered September 13, 2004, on Turner Classic Movies as part of its own "East Side Kids" series marathon. Sequel: BOYS OF THE CITY (1940) featuring soon to be series regulars (namely Bobby Jordan, Leo Gorcey and Sunshine Sammy Morrison). While there are those who still feel this not part of the "East Side Kids" series (1940-1945), this is where it all began before being revamped to the longer running film series of "The Bowery Boys" (1946-1958) (**)

The first "East Side Kids" feature reaches back to the original "Dead End" formula, as another movie studio decides to cash in on the kids. "Monogram" couldn't obtain any of the six original young scene stealers, so they built their team around second stringers. The leader role, usually assigned to Billy Halop, went to Harris Berger (as Danny Dolan). Mr. Berger had joined the original stage play, and was already appearing in Universal's "Dead End" features.

The Bobby Jordan-type role is played by Hal E. "Hally" Chester (as Fred "Dutch" Kuhn), who was featured most prominently (of this cast) in previous "Dead End" films. Leo Gorcey and the others are replaced by: Frankie Burke (as Skinny), Donald Haines (as PeeWee), Edwin "Eddie" Brian (as Mike), and Sam Edwards (as Pete). And, for one film only, Jack Edwards (as Algernon "The Mouse" Wilkes) joins the group, playing the well-heeled "sissy" who wants to be "tough".

The "Dead End" plot variation involves grown-up juvenile delinquent Leon Ames (as Pat O'Day) trying to help out some young "Angels with Dirty Faces". Now a policeman, Mr. Ames decides to open a club for "Danny's Gang", to keep them out of trouble. Ames recalls his youth as a young gangster, with Dennis Moore (as "Mile-Away" Harris) and Dave O'Brien (as "Knuckles" Dolan). Although they are still friendly, Mr. Moore is on the wrong side of the law. Mr. O'Brien, Danny's big brother, is falsely imprisoned.

The film is rushed and rough - which, on one level, helps. With re-takes, Mr. Burke's background "scratch and sniff" scene would be "corrected", but it fits the "Dead End" kid atmosphere perfectly. The film, with some additional work, would be on par with the "Warner Brothers" features. The real Bobby Jordan took over the role of "Danny Dolan" for this film's sequel, "Boys of the City"; and, early in this "Monogram" series, some continuity between films in attempted.

****** East Side Kids (2/10/40) Robert F. Hill ~ Harris Berger, Hal E. Chester, Frankie Burke, Leon Ames

This gloriously no budget Monogram 'masterpiece' is a surprisingly effective z grade street-gang drama that benefits inadvertently from its genuine cheapness. The acting boys are all in their mid teens and have screen presence originally seen in the stage show of the late 30s. This was the first in a series of films for Monogram that became The Bowery Boys with Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall. In all honesty, this is the better cast and as played as a little tough guys melodrama allows for real audience interest. I expected this to be terrible in both acting and production, but like the neo realist Italian pix of the immediate post war, this has the same look and grimy realism simply by being cheap and genuinely poor. As a result, with strong lead acting by Leon Ames (Father in "Meet Me In St Louis") EAST SIDE KIDS becomes a teen crime pic with good looking and interesting youth actors, strong support adults and a fantastic genuineness in its crummy look. The music is awful though, the one part marring what is actually one of Monogram's best teen films...whether they meant it or not.

I'm glad I decided to ignore Leonard Maltin's really bad review and buy this video. Not that it's really good, but it has much that I like. True, it has none of the original Dead End Kids and very little humor. But it's my first time to see Harris Berger, the actor who replaced Huntz Hall in the Broadway version of Dead End when Huntz went to Hollywood to be in the movie version, and Hally Chester. Frankie Burke is good, too--that kid from Angels With Dirty Faces who looks so much like James Cagney.