The music of chance... Strolling Players (1925), with Cyrus Gabrysch, Kennington Bioscope

 

Sex and silent film, it’s full of objectification and attitudes that today we frown upon and yet… here we find four men sizing up young Lya de Putti, whose heads transform into pig’s as they imagine our heroine with no clothes on. OK, those clothes do seem to disappear but I think Karl Grune was making a point, wasn’t he? To put this even further in context, Felix Salten, the writer of the film later went on to write Bambi; so, make of that what you will.

The sexist pig-heads was one of a number of striking visual set pieces that illustrate Grune’s story of a star being born, a tale as old as time indeed, as young actress meets successful player, Axel Swinborne (Eugen Klopfet), and we all know the rest… or do we, for this film ends in a way that, whilst I obviously can’t reveal, does leave the audience surprised.

We were watching the BFI’s 35mm print of Strolling Players (Komödianten or Comedians, certainly more Max Wall than Jimmy Tarbuck!) and this is, possibly, the only celluloid copy left in the World, yet another reminder of the rarities on view at the Kennington Bioscope and the vital role played by our national film archive. Why travel a thousand miles when you can see these treats in Lambeth? Blessed are the hobbyists, the collectors, the projectors, the historians and the programmers!

The story spins on coincidence – we are all after all merely players on the stage and there’s more than one reference to Shakespeare – starting with the arrival of a group of strolling players at makeshift theatre/public house in the village of Gotten. They’re performing Faust and it’s fair to say that the locals aren’t giving the cast the respect they might possibly deserve despite the presence of a looming Fritz Rasp looking almost cherubic in blonde curls and a striking leading lady (Lya De Putti), listed just as “The Sentimental”.

The director of the troupe (Viktor Schwanneke) knows this rejection well and as he’s always done and no doubt always will do, rouses his weary gang for a morale-boosting meal.

Miles away in the big city, we see Swinborne’s latest triumph and his determination to take a holiday on the completion of this run. He duly heads off on a train only, and what does this say about the safety of German trains at this point, to catch the train door handle on his waistcoat and fall out at high speed. Rescued by railwaymen, he’s taken to the inn where the players are staying and Lya volunteers to tend to him after he’s unceremoniously dumped on an upstairs bed.

The next morning the great actor is remarkably unscathed – what a lucky break as he remarks… and going down stairs to find out where he is, catches the players in rehearsal, in the very play he has just starred in, right at the moment for his cue to rush in and find his faithless lover and then shoot her dead. Maybe it’s the new lease of life or just the look on Lya’s face, he offers to join them for the evening’s performance and, unlike the previous evening’s Geothe, tonight is a huge hit and he raises everyone’s game.

His faithful dresser (Hermann Picha) comes to collect him the next day and just as he thanks the director for his generosity, he tells Lya that she could be a successful actress if she lets him guide her career. She’s persuaded and heads of to, of course, guaranteed success.

Lya de Putti, a World-class slinker!

In the cut and thrust of theatricality there’s always complications and, just as Swinborne comes to love his protégé so do others, including a handsome young prince (Owen Gorin) and no wonder given the stunning fashions on display for the Austro-Hungarian aristocrat de Puti. She has to choose between her loyalty to Swinborne and her primal attraction to the younger man… it’s a tough call and this emotional maze confounds our expectations in a denouement that dodges and dives in every effort to avoid the predictable.

Lya’s magnetic presence does much to elevate the film, she may be posh but she’s got a look that connects in a very earthy way and as she was to show in Variety and many more, she knows how to play the camera and to pull the watcher in with earnest, raw expression. She’s part Pola, neo-Nazimova - that hair! - with a hint of a more virtuous Valeska Gert - a Euro-pudding of the most adult-deco proportions. 

Cyrus Gabrysch underpinned this emotional commitment with improvisations that captured the emotional storms and romantic sweep of this tug of love. This was a fiercely committed approach that was buoyed by clusters of muscular chords and lilting lines; I haven’t seen Cyrus play for sometime but he was lost in music and completely plugged in to the action on screen. Stirred and shaken.

 

Ralph Lewis and Norma Talmadge

Going Straight (1916) with Colin Sell

As if this BFI gem wasn’t rare enough, we were also treated to another early Norma Talmadge film, following on from last time’s stunning 16mm copy of A Helpful Sisterhood (1914). As with that film, I’d already seen Going Straight (1916) but never like this 35mm versions, which whilst showing its age, which I like, was full of gorgeous texture and tints showing Norma in fabulous close up as the 21 year-old showed the growing confidence in her craft.

 

Norma featured in hundreds of short films for the Vitagraph Company from 1910 to 1915. Then, having joined Triangle Pictures, she made longer form films of which Going Straight, was one of the first. Directed by Chester M. Franklin and Sidney Franklin the picture clearly shows the guiding influence of DW Griffith who oversaw a lot of the production at Triangle. There are expert intercuts and parallel scenes, close ups reminiscent of Pig Alley and the action is tightly marshalled throughout.

Talmadge is superb, acting naturalistically and given ample close ups to demonstrate her restrained playing which has more in common with Gish and Pickford than some of the more dramatic queens of the era. She plays Grace the wife of successful businessman, John Remington, played by Ralph Lewis. The two live in wedded bliss with their young family in one of those sizable wooden properties we brick-bound Brits envy. However, despite this apparent normality, both Grace and John were once part of a group of professional criminals known as the Higgins gang. Grace finds a clipping about their trial and a flashback explains their violent past.

Eugene menaces

Higgins/Remington’s second in command was Jimmy Briggs, played by the excellent Eugene Pallette, full of violent menace, who, after doing his time spots John, who offers to help him on the straight and narrow. Unwilling to change his greasy spots, Briggs threatens to reveal Grace’s criminal past and John has little option but to join him on one last robbery. He goes to commit the crime with Briggs whilst Grace stays over at a well-healed friend’s house after a card party. As it turns out – in a coincidence not too uncommon at the time – Briggs and John are burgling the same house.

What could possibly go wrong?

It is undeniably melodramatic but Talmadge is believable and understated even in the most fraught moments. She has a number of close ups that allow her to illustrate the emotional shifts in the story and her facial transitions are quite the special effect and as viewed on this wonderful 35mm copy, stunning. She’s another whose looks appear to be almost “out of time” and could have made her successful in any period of screen acting. It’s a face you enjoy reading on many levels and has a fascination and a depth that would grow to place her in the upper echelons by the early Twenties.

Colin Sell’s fingers danced along creating a sprightly symphony to accompany the players’ hard work and as with all good accompaniment the sound and vision blurred into a deliciously satisfying whole – sorry, the new range of home-made catering at the Bioscope naturally encourages such comparisons!

Another special occasion in Kennington, introduced majestically and expertly by Michelle Facey as we have come to expect!

 

 

 

Dirty rats… Outside the Law (1920), Eureka Masters of Cinema Blu-ray, Out Now!

What I was going to say is… we weren’t born crooks, were we?

It’s only right and proper that Tod Browning should be included as a Master of Cinema given his contribution to the horror genre and also, as here, the development of the gangster picture. Here in 1920, we have something of the flavour of the late twenties with the likes of Underworld or The Racket, following on from the prohibition-induced black market. Tod Browning directs with pace and that swaggering mix of suspense with cocky comedy that defines the bravado of the settled genre. There’s a moll, a truly vicious hoodlum and grandiose betrayal for love all against a rather over-egged moral thread that mixes Confucius with Californian Christianity. The clincher perhaps is when Lon Chaney’s gangster calls a faithless fellow criminal, “…you dirty rat!”. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I rest my case.

Outside the Law is dynamic, emotive, soppy, violent, fun and this new 4k restoration from a 35mm print looks crisp and clear, apart from a few short passages showing deterioration, really bringing the action and some very fine performances to life, The film is considerably enlivened by a sparkling new orchestral score from noted film composer Anton Sanko, which gives the film a modern but respectful “volume”. 

Lon Chaney

It was Tod Browning’s second collaboration with Lon Chaney after The Wicked Darling (1919) and, as if to make up time, he has two roles, one as Black Mike Sylva, a gangster with his face twisted by malice, and the other as Ah Wing, loyal servant to the sagacious Chang Lo (E. Alyn Warren), who possibly had a larger role in the original cut with what we have now being based on a 1926 re-release. Both these characters are played in “yellowface” as was the practice at the time and distasteful though this now is, Chaney does his usual trick of completely losing himself in make-up, false teeth and costume.

Whilst it’s the Man of a Thousand Faces we remember the undoubted star here is Priscilla Dean as Molly Madden (Silky Moll), who plays the Moll (ha!) to perfection, quick-witted and every bit as ready with a gun as the men. As she proved in Browning’s The Virgin of Stamboul (1920) as well as Wicked Darling, Dean was an actor of presence, range and natural warmth. She is top billed for a reason and you can see why she was such a star and how she earned the epithet, The Queen of Crookdom, in her run of nine flicks with Browning. She’s snappy, sassy, and self-determined in a way we don’t normally see.

Priscilla Dean lookin' mean

As film writer Eddie Muller has said, Priscilla “…was a feminist icon before such a label ever existed” and whilst Kim Newman rather dismisses her lasting cultural impact in his video essay on this release, she was undoubtedly a phenomenon at the time and therefore worth study. In Muller’s notes from the San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017, he sums up the contemporary appeal: “the public loved the power she wielded on screen; especially the sceptical sneer that became the actresses’ trademark, alerting audiences that there would soon be hell to pay and Miss Dean would be cashing the cheques.”

Dean plays Molly – aka Moll - the daughter of “businessman” Silent Madden (the most excellent, Ralph Lewis) who is determined to step away from his life of crime – ironically, Lewis was in an even earlier crime film called Going Straight with Norma Talmadge. They take advice from the sagacious Chang Lo and plan their exit.

Wheeler Oakman and Edward Alyn Warren not looking himself...

Unfortunately, Black Mike has other ideas and, planning revenge on people he really, really hates, he hatches a plan with Dapper Bill Ballard (the always-charming Wheeler Oakman who was also married to Dean at the time and the two have great rapport) to frame Silent for the shooting of a cop and force Molly into working with them. Silent is duly sent down for a couple of years, not found guilty exactly, just “in the general location” when the killing went down and leaving his daughter without a “protector”.

Molly, pained at her father’s injustice, happily goes along with a plan to rob jewels from a society party, little suspecting that it’s another of Black Mike’s traps and that he will leave her in the lurch for the cops to grab as he makes off with the loot. But, crime, as the title card says, can’t hold sway over the human heart and Dapper Bill confesses all to Molly with whom, naturally, he has fallen in love…

Priscilla and Ralph Lewis

The two collude as the deal goes down and they avoid even a triple cross before hiding out and going stir crazy waiting for the noise to die down. Is there still time to get back on the straight and narrow, will Bill penetrate Moll’s tough exterior with his puppy-dog eyes and the repeated intrusions of the cute kid from across the hall (Stanley Goethals) and will Black Mike discover them?

I’m not spoiling anything by revealing that there’s a huge bloody punch up at the end, much the same as in The Virgin of Stamboul and one heck of a gun fight in which Miss Dean plays a full part. The violent confrontation between Black Mike and Bill is bloody and set destroying… you wonder how they were able to choreograph such a scrap and it reminds me of other encounters, especially the bare-knuckled viciousness of Hobert Bosworth’s fight in the early part of Behind the Door (1919).

"Why, you..."

Clearly viewers knew a good fight well enough for these performers to take the punishment necessary to show them one on screen. It also feels very much part of Browning’s approach to filmmaking, drawn to the darker side of humanity and, even in the midst of genre entertainment, revealing a lot of emotional truth. In this world, the goodie couldn’t just expect superior technique to win the battle, they needed to fight for their lives. So, yes, there is some narrative artifice in the film but it’s unsettling enough to keep you gripped. Not a pure “classic” but certainly masterful.

On the subject of yellowface, whilst the likes of Sessue Hayakawa were big stars at the time, here there’s a fascinating cameo from an uncredited fifteen-year-old Anna May Wong, whose time would come certainly in terms of impact if not deserved career success.

Young Anna May Wong

Extras on this set include a new video interview with author / critic Kim Newman as well as an alternate ending from a 16mm print of the film, created in 1926 for a re-release – it’s not as good as the high-octane thrills of the main version but is still interesting. There’s also a lovely collector’s booklet featuring an essay by film historian Richard Combs.

No silent home should be without a copy and you can pre-order direct from Eureka by clicking on this link!

Three’s a charm… Early Universal Vol 1, Eureka Blu-ray

More seasonal lolling about watching my presents, this time a box set of three Universal films, fully restored and issued on Blu-ray at a very reasonable price and with essays and commentary on what could be regarded as lesser works in the silent film "cannon". All three are, however, very well made and feature noteworthy participants, they represent popular films from Hollywood's golden age and act as fine examples of the type of film that made up most of Universals output and which were enjoyed by large portions of the film-going audience.  In historical terms, there’s no such thing as “standard fare” and these films may well have had a wider audience than many an arthouse classic. So play on...

The Shakedown (1929), 4K Restoration

 

Directed by some fella name of William Wyler, this fast-paced morality tale features The Crowd’s remarkable James Murray in only the second film I’ve seen him in and he’s good, very good, making his life-struggle with addiction all the more tragic, as if anything could. He was so bright and not only soul full of light and shade but also physically brave, seen here rising high onto an oil rig and in the ring going toe to toe with boxer and professional wrestler George Kotsonaros. The latter appeared in Beggars of Life (1928) and others, but his life ended tragically too in a 1933 car accident.

James Murray

By contrast, Barbara Kent made it to 2011 and 103 years of age although her career petered out in the mid thirties while she was only in her twenties. So it goes and the other star of this film Jack Hanlon, would have further grounds for complaint, with a film career that ended he was just 16… a smashing child actor who became simply too old for the job.

 

Everyone acts well in this film with Wyler moving things at a pace and incorporating comedy, love, criminality and some excellent late silent period dolly shots following the cast along streets and in the boxing ring. In the excellent booklet with this set, Richards Comb talks of Wyler’s later acknowledged “deep-focus look” and “the ability to hold many actors, in different planes of action, across the screen…”. Combs startling evidence of this in The Shakedown starting with the early set up of the scam at the heart of the story.

 

James Murray and Barbara Kent at the fun fair

It’s the way the director and his cinematographers Charles Stumar and Jerome Ash, show the action in the bar where Murray’s character Dave is showing his boxing skills. He’s challenged by a rough-looking type, boxer Battling Roff (Kotsonaros) and as the bruiser tries to hit Dave, the action is seen from behind him at the bar and the street outside is fully visible. Then the camera view shifts to the reverse as Dave talks to a young woman at the doorway, back inside as Roff spots her, then outside tracking her walking away and being followed by Roff, back to Dave who moves to intervene and rush to the damsel’s distress.

 

Dave knocks down Roff and the latter’s manager (Wheeler Oakman) steps in saying the two should settle things in the ring where Dave could win $1,000 if he lasts three rounds. The contest agreed, the manager starts taking bets from the gathered crowd… we’re sucked in, and the next shot shows a hotel room with Dave, Roff, the girl and even the two guys arguing about who would win, all in on the scam. It’s quality filmmaking and I’m not surprised that Wyler spent months planning the project.

The excitement is in tents.

The rest of the film shows Dave setting up another scam in a new town only this time he gets too involved helping a young boy called Clem – tough and lonely as he once was – and falling for the girl he works with at the oil company, Marjorie (Barbara Kent). Will the outcome be different this time? Wyler packs a lot into a relatively short film and the climax is intense; you really care about Murray’s characters! A very proficient Hollywood film and a delight for rainy seasonal afternoons and any time really.

 

The film comes with a new score by Michael Gatt and commentary by film writer Nick Pinkerton.

 

The Shield of Honor (1927), 2K Restoration

 

Directed by Emory Johnson a one-time actor whose career faltered after the silent era and who directed the superb news-based action thriller The Last Edition (1925), this is another exciting feature even though it starts off like a promotional film for the LAPD.

Ralph Lewis and Neil Hamilton

The LAPD has a new weapon in the fight against crime, an airplane that is going to be piloted by one Jack MacDowell (Neil Hamilton, later Adam West’s Commissioner Gordon, a fact I love). Jack is the son of long-termer Dan played by Ralph Lewis who was so good in The Last Edition who although only 55 is tasked with playing a man ten years older and on the point of forced retirement. Dan is a natural cop and is still fit and raring to carry on. Naturally events conspire to give both father and son the chance to prove themselves and in the most heart-warming fashion.

 

A jewellers run by police supporter, Matthew O'Day (Fred Esmelton) has been infiltrated by a bad sort, Robert Chandler (Nigel Barrie) who is working with gangster A.E. Blair (Harry Northrup) on an elaborate plan to defraud the company by making it pay to get by diamonds already stolen from its vaults. Chandler is assisted by a woman working as a secretary for O’Day, Flora (a young and feisty Thelma Todd), and even an odd-job man; this caper is well organised.

The gang with Thelma Todd on typewriter

But even the best laid plans can go awry and when they do O’Day’s daughter Gwen (Dorothy Gulliver) – Jack’s sweetheart – gets caught up as does Dan who is retired but working as a guard at O’Day’s. Chandler plans to fly his ill-gotten gains away but his is not the only plane in town… the finale is dynamic and multi-channelled – planes crash and burn, a woman gets locked in a safe in a burning building, the tough very much get going, men fight and a dog barks! It’s breathless and the likeable cast make it work very well.

 

The film comes with a new score by Alex Kovacs and audio commentary by professor and film scholar Jason A. Ney.

Skinner’s Dress Suit (1926) 4K Restoration

 

I once saw Kevin Brownlow introduced this film at the Kennington Bioscope and he described how he’d met its star, Reginald Denny, in 1964, many years after the British actor’s silent heyday and after decades of playing stock English characters in the talkies. Brownlow projected the film for Denny and his family and, despite the actor’s fears that the film might “creak” he was rewarded with an emphatically amused response.

 

Skinner's Dress Suit is that rare thing, a genuinely charming comedy featuring two vibrant leads – Denny and the lovely Laura La Plante who cut a rug almost as sharp as her platinum bob. In thrilling style, the two dance the Savannah Shuffle, a variation on the Charleston, before leading a host of society types in trying to learn the steps.

 

Laura and Reg fret

Directed by William A. Seiter a keen golfer and close buddy of Denny’s, the film never strains and the relaxed humour is testament to the compatible temperaments of both men: “we never had an argument, never a cross word, “he told Brownlow, “…and we always brought the picture in within budget...” Seiter was clearly a very able manager of time and people.

 

Skinner (Denny) is an over-reaching and under-achieving office worker whose wife, Honey (Laura La P), keeps egging him on to get a raise. But Skinner not only doesn’t have the nerve he doesn’t really have the edge being walked all over by both his juniors and his superiors. Unable to tell Honey he’s been passed over yet again, he pretends that he’s had a $10 a week raise and the two start extending their credit starting with a party dress for her and a dress suit for him.

Reginald Denny in said suit

Both prove very useful after Skinner is taught the new dance craze, the Savannah, by fellow wage slave Miss Smith (a peppy Betty Morrissey) and simply everyone at the party they attend wants to learn it. Social mobility awaits but in keeping up appearances their credit gets stretched to the limit. But gradually they are accepted by their snooty neighbours, The McLaughlin’s and are invited into higher society.

 

All comes crashing down when a major contract is lost, and Skinner is the man to be let go… he hasn’t the heart to tell Honey as she entertains but has to fight off the repo men gathering for their furniture and the tailor who wants his fine dinner suit back. There’s just one last chance… an invitation to the party of the season held by the Colby’s (Hedda Hopper and Henry Barrows) if they can make an impression Skinner could still save his social standing. Cue Mr Jackson (Lionel Braham) the man who withdrew his contract with Skinners firm and his wife (Lucille Ward) both eager themselves to get introduced to society… You can work out the rest, but the story is so well pitched the resolution works as smoothly and reassuringly as you’d hope.

 

Denny and La Plante

It's a thoroughly enjoyable slice of mainstream silent Hollywood and just edges The Shakedown as the most entertaining of these three. 

The film comes with a new score by Leo Birenberg and audio commentary by film historian and writer David Kalat.  There’s also an excellent collector’s booklet featuring insightful new writing by critic Richard Combs and film writer Andrew Graves.

 

This is great set, and I can’t wait for more as the Universal restoration project proceeds. We’re lucky to be at a point where such a broad range of material is being considered for release and we need to support this as much as we can. The second volume is already available, and you can find further details and order both, from the Eureka website.

 

Fleet streets… The Last Edition (1925) with Stephen Horne, SFSFF Streaming

“(It) has the merit, uncommon in most newspaper pictures, of being accurate in every detail. It is the best picture he has made and may be called a box-office success.” New York Morning Telegraph

 

This is the latest film to be streamed on the San Francisco Silent Film Festival website and features a suitably frantic accompaniment from Stephen Horne originally recorded at the screening of the restored film in 2013. The Last Edition is a thrill ride, from the hot metal drama on the huge printing presses of the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper to break-neck car chases, fire engines and criminal doings with powerful, well-acted simple human stories, it’s a very solid late-period Hollywood silent.

 

The film was considered lost until a discovery of a 35mm nitrate print in the EYE Museum in 2012 led to a reconstruction, with Dutch intertitles translated back to American English and tints fully restored under the management of Rob Byrne’s team at the San Francisco Festival. The full story is fascinating and told here on the film’s restoration site.

 

Off-set litho printing presses... the smell of ink!!

Director Emory Johnson, an actor turned director and writer, made films that focused on the working man and this is, as the above quote indicates, a very accurate portrayal of the publishing business, especially in the scenes showing the newspaper being typeset, plated and printed – yes, I am old enough to have worked with hot metal presses! The process is important as it not only shows the working reality of our hero Tom McDonald (the excellent Ralph Lewis) It also becomes one of the key “races” in a film full of urgency and tight spots. Johnson’s due diligence and determination to anchor his film in the authentic production process of the newspaper business, makes it both believable as well as historically interesting. We forget how many hands moved so swiftly and in unison to bring news to the world and most films focus on the journalism and not the setters and printers, machine minders and delivery men who brought the ink and paper over the final stages.

 

To this extent the film reminded me of The Day the Earth Caught Fire (1961), if not in fantastical subject matter then just in the process of newspapers, and how it plays a part in the narrative of both films. Juts as the Day used the Daily Express offices and plant, Johnson’s film was located at the actual Chronicle building in San Francisco, shortly before they moved to new premises.

 

Louis Payne and Ralph Lewis

Tom is an experienced pressman at the Chronicle and the times they are a changing, circulation is down and Publisher Jerome T Hamilton (Louis Payne), is looking for a fresh approach as he shouts at his useless yes men in the board room, feeling his margins dilute with every issue. Thus, it is that Tom’s departing boss’ recommendation is ignored as he is just another “old hand” with twenty years’ at the paper.

 

Tom’s disappointment is amplified as he finds “Bull” Collins (Tom O’Brien) moving into his old Forman’s office; a younger man but one who has been a “complete failure” as a printer and yet who clearly mangers upwards well and has now been appointed to his position of maximum inefficiency.

 

My boy, never forget the story I told you about the three generals… Truth, Love and Duty…

 

Frances Teague telephonist

Tom takes it on the chin, he is proud of his job and providing leadership and encouragement to his team, including young apprentice, “Ink” Donovan (Billy Bakewell). He also has a happy home with wife Mary (Lila Leslie), son Ray (Ray Hallor) who has just been offered work at the District Attorney’s office, and Polly (Frances Teague) a telephonist who is romancing one of the paper’s young reporters, Clarence Walker (Rex Lease) – all three will play a major part as the drama unfolds.

 

Meanwhile, back in the print palace, Jerome takes a walk past banks of typographers, and the huge rolls of paper on the lithographic printer. He’s looking for anything that can help him improve his paper’s performance and he overhears Tom counselling young Ink with his motto about Truth, Love and Duty… Jerome summons Tom to his office, offers him a cigar and begins what will become a regular series of chats, all of which end with his calling a ditzy stenographer (Ada Mae Vaughn, giving it extra!) into the office and we see her taking his thoughts down using shorthand; the start of the journalistic process even now.

Ray Hallor and Rex Lease

Walker, it looks like Blotz is now part of high society, give it your best shot boy and put a stop to his operation…

 

Talking of which, action picks up elsewhere as courthouse reporter Harry Owens (C Hollister Walker) get’s the word on infamous bootlegger Blotz and phones in for the file of the man who has so far evaded press and police alike. Here we see the backroom researchers as every mention of the gangster is pulled from the Chronicle’s extensive files. Clarence goes off to investigate and tracks down Blotz (Will Frank) and his right-hand man, Red Moran (David Kirby), climbing up outside their building to overhear them sending a payment in to a contact in the DA’s office…

 

The bad penny is Gerald Fuller (Cuyler Supplee) but, after Clarence follows Red in, Fuller fingers none other than young Ray to take the rap. Ray is arrested and in the face of rather flimsy circumstantial evidence, assumed as guilty even if Clarence suspects not. He must phone in his story, which sets up a breath-taking finale, as the Chronicle tries to publish, Red tries to destroy all of the paper’s evidence by setting fire to the building, and Tom is faced with having to print a story that he cannot believe as he sees the headline on the final edition announcing his son’s arrest: Young attorney in $50,000 bribe!

 

Come on boys! All hands on deck, we still have eighteen minutes until press time.

All action!

Spoilers: Journalism works hand in hand with the police as Clarence joins the dots and persuades the cops to listen for calls to Fuller’s office and Polly plays her part in not only connecting the calls but keeping the perps talking…

 

It’s a rousing finale with some great location shots captured by cinematographer Gilbert Warrenton and greatly enhanced by some power playing from Mr Horne who paces his musical sentiment as perfectly as you’d expect. Johnson’s direction is very disciplined and allows Stephen to weave dynamically between the cross-cutting action and emotion, especially as buildings burn, bootleggers are pursued and Tom’s family face their greatest challenge!

 

The Final Edition is still available to view on the SFSFF site, you just need to register as a member and enjoy!