Reportage fatal

In Shakedown, Howard Duff plays his specialty, a winsome crumb. As a down-at-the-heels shutterbug desperate for a job, he sells lurid pictures -- drownings, defenestrations -- without any thought to the peril his subjects face. Once he lands the job by buttering up his editor's assistant (Peggy Dow), he realizes that compromising photos of crime figures pay better as blackmail than as journalism. He doesn't scruple to double-cross his prey if the profits can underwrite his taste for the high life, including the widow of a mobster he set up for a hit. When he just happens to be on hand to snap that murder, he causes a sensation but raises suspicions. Of course, his duplicity and greed prove his undoing.... With such familiar tough guys as Brian Donleavy and Lawrence Tierney, the movie clicks right along apace with Duff's camera. A nice irony shades the ending, not unlike the denouement of Taxi Driver: the heel gets turned into something like a hero.

A rising star photographer starts using his journalistic influence for personal profit... and sets two gangsters against each other. Ruthless and cynical, with one of the most despicable protagonists this side of Mike Hammer. This guy is a real piece of work, a sleazy manipulator who doesn't care who suffers for his gain. Howard Duff (probably best known to noir aficionados for THE NAKED CITY) plays it completely unsympathetic, delivering his lines with barely concealed contempt and ambition. The supporting performances are all pretty good, too, with special mention for the always intimidating Lawrence Tierney. The story is lean and mean, like the production. It's a decidedly low-budget affair, a little more polish might have amped up the tension (though I should note I watched a very rough copy). The film doesn't pack much of an emotional punch, but it is a down and dirty good time.

Talk about hoist by your own petard! "Jack" (Howard Duff) is an aspiring photo-journalist who manages to get newspaper editor "David" (Bruce Bennett) to take him on for a week. His next task is to stay employed, and to that end he manages to convince "Nick" (Brian Donlevy) - a local "businessman", to pose for a front page photo. This latter man takes a bit of a shine to "Jack" and gives him an opportunity to put away one of his criminal competitors "Colton" (Lawrence Tierney). There's a few grand in it for him, but he gets greedy - he keeps the negative of a shot he takes after a robbery, and submits a less definitive photo to his boss. Next he blackmails "Colton" for $25,000 else the real negative will end up with his paper and the police! What now ensues sees him try to play both men off each other whilst irritating his loved-up editor all as he rather cruelly plays with the affections of his sponsor at the newspaper "Ellen" (Peggy Dow) and tries the same with the wife of "Nick" - the considerably more savvy "Nita" (Anne Vernon) before his house of cards starts to look distinctly shaky! This benefits from a tightly knit cast with a solid story and some decent dialogue - and from guy that it's fairly easy to dislike! It's well paced and ends with an appropriate wise-crack that rather sums up "Jack" nicely.

The film opens with Jack Early (Howard Duff) in a railroad yard running from what appears to be a group of mobsters, with his camera in hand. He hides the camera before the mobsters can catch up to him. When they get to him they beat him up and throw him on the train tracks, assuming he will be run over. But he gets off of the tracks in time, reclaims his camera, and goes to a local newspaper office to sell his photo of mob activity. He manages to parlay his photo into a job there taking pictures of lost dogs. At this point you like this guy. He seems grateful for the job and looks at it as an opportunity to prove himself and maybe get an even better job there. He begins to romance the assistant editor (Peggy Dow as Ellen), although she has a dentist fiance in Portland whom she doesn't seem to be all that passionate about.

But Early's likeability factor changes, and it becomes clear this guy is and probably always has been a creep. He ingratiates himself with a semi legit mobster (Brian Donlevy), only to end up playing him against still another more violent mobster. He is in love at first sight with the semi legit mobster's wife, although she is completely loyal to her husband. And yet he is still - simultaneously - courting Ellen the assistant editor. Why is he doing all of this? Is he just a bottomless pit of ambition or does he like outsmarting everybody else or is he addicted to danger? I'll tell you now that the answer is never clear.

That's what makes this a very good noir - Jack Early is a complete conundrum. He is not your normal middle class noir protagonist who is a victim of circumstances. He could have easily succeeded in life on the straight path had he so chosen to do so.

This is a treat for Lawrence Tierney fans as he portrays the more homicidal of the two mobsters Jack Early is conning and gets a good amount of screen time. Tierney's intense delivery and perpetual scowl is effective as always, and this is probably the last of his good screen roles after RKO let him go because of his constant brawling ways and before he descended into poverty row films.

It was said of Joseph Pevney by a colleague that 'some former actors become good directors and some become hack directors. Pevney is no hack and is more than good.'

Although this marks Pevney's directorial debut his undeniable flair and precision are already in evidence, aided immeasurably by one of Universal's most respected editors Milton Carruth.

This is minor Noir to be sure but grips throughout its eighty minutes and reflects not just post War cynicism but the Fourth Estate's questionable ethics when catering to the public's desire for sensationalism.

Pevney is excellent with his actors and the casting is spot on. Not exactly renowned for his sympathetic persona, Howard Duff has arguably his best role as a narcissistic sociopath, a type that the female of the species finds impossible to resist and the troublesome Lawrence Tierney again convinces as a nasty piece of work. On the distaff side there is lovely Peggy Dow who quit filming to raise a family whilst classy Anne Vernon in her only Hollywood appearance provides the Gallic 'Je ne sais quoi'. Solid Bruce Bennett plays a newspaper editor whose conscience is mollified by increased circulation figures. Brian Donlevy has star quality in spades and steals all of his scenes. The eagle-eyed might spot an uncredited Rock Hudson as a doorman. They all have to start somewhere.

The old Hollywood Rule Book requires Duff's loathsome character to get his just desserts but the climax in which he finds redemption has been aptly described by one critic as 'ingeniously ironic'.