starring Ida Lupino, Humphrey Bogart
directed by Raoul Walsh
Roy Earle (Humphrey Bogart) leaves prison after receiving a pardon. He quickly returns to his old ways and joins a gang that is getting ready to rob a resort hotel in California. One of the other robbers has a girlfriend, Marie (Ida Lupino) whom he recently met. She loses interest in him and gets interested in Roy once she meets him.
The robbery doesn't go so well. Earle kills a security guard and then two or three of his accomplices are killed in a car accident as they are fleeing the hotel. Roy and Marie hide out after the robbery. Big Mac, who hired Roy for the job, dies before Roy can get him the stolen jewels and collect his pay.
Roy gets identified as the missing robber. He convinces Marie to catch a bus to Las Vegas while he tries to fence the jewels. The police catch up to him before he can get anywhere with that plan. The movie ends on a mountainside with a showdown between Roy and the police.
I saw this movie as part of the 2024 edition of the Noir City DC film festival. Foster Hirsch introduced it. It was the front half of a double feature. The back half of the double feature was Rififi (1955). Both movies are built around heists but this one to a lesser degree.
There is another subplot that I didn't mention and that seemed kind of unnecessary. It involved a family Roy met between the time he was released from prison and joined the other robbers. Velma, the daughter, had a club foot. Roy was interested in her. He paid to have Velma's foot fixed but she was already engaged and not interested in him like that.
Velma was played by Joan Leslie whom I saw earlier this year in Repeat Performance (1946). Her grandfather was played by Henry Travers whom I know best from It's a Wonderful Life (1946) where he played Clarence, the angel.
This movie feels a little overstuffed. The ending was kind of melodramatic. I suppose that Roy couldn't be allowed to live or to go free considering all that he had done but there might have been better ways to handle the end of the movie. I'm glad I can say I've seen it but I wasn't wowed by it.
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