Million Dollar Pursuit (1951)

Republic Pictures was one of the most prolific and long-lasting of the so-called Poverty Row studios. Westerns and serials were its bread and butter, but it also made a surprising number of films noirs and noir-ish crime movies. A couple have already been reviewed on here, 'Federal Agent At Large' (1950) and 'Post Office Investigator' (1949), but there are literally dozens more... The quality varies a lot, but you don't watch these movies expecting 'The Maltese Falcon', hah... I'll say one thing tho for Republic, their movie posters were always well-made and nice to look at. Today's movie, 'Million Dollar Pursuit', doesn't have the prettiest one, but take a look at the posters for the movie linked above. It's a style I really like a lot!

That money's so hot it's blistering your fingers

One day small-time crook Monte Norris (Norman Budd) sees a key chain fall out of a man's pocket. He's been looking for a big score and once he realizes the keys belong to the head cashier of a department store, a plan for a bold robbery starts to brew in his mind. A team is assembled, and the robbery goes off without a hitch. The gang hides out in a remote farm, waiting for things to cool down. They realize the money's too hot to handle, and Norris asks his former business partner nightclub owner Carlo Petrov (Grant Withers) to launder the money for him. Meanwhile police lieutenant Matt Whitcomb (Michael St. Angel) is put on the robbery case, but tensions are already brewing between the gang members, with deadly consequences...

...and it is here that I should mention the woman in the middle, who is in this case quite literally in the middle. Night club singer Ronnie LaVerne (Penny Edwards) is Norris's ex-gf and he's hoping a big score will drive her back into his arms. She's also however currently dating, and working for, Petrov. Who may or may not be the one who framed her some time before which landed her in prison. Whitcomb was also a police officer at the time and still carries a torch for LaVerne, and he warns her not to get into trouble. But as she explains to him, she wants to find out who framed her...

So yes, this is a basic heist movie at its core, but the many ways in which Ronnie LaVerne is intertwined into the lives of the various men, good and bad, adds a whole layer of complexity to the movie. It isn't exactly a work of Chandler-ian levels, and the truth behind LaVerne's frame job is never really resolved, but the script by Albert DeMond ('Federal Agent At Large') and Bradbury Foote ('The Madonna's Secret') does make it rise above what you'd expect from the plot of a Poverty Row crime movie. Funnily enough the robbers get away with close to half a million dollars, not the full million dollars as promised by the movie's title. 'Close To Half A Million Dollar Pursuit' doesn't sound nearly as exciting tho, does it?

Performance-wise this is what you'd expect from a low-budget B-movie like this one... Nothing great, but service-able enough. Penny Edwards, who starred mostly in B-westerns but also the B-noir 'Missing Women', impresses the most here, while Norman Budd ('The Red Menace', 'Unmasked') has enough of a tough screen presence to carry this type of movie. It's surprising neither did more crime movies than they did.

Per usual the direction and cinematography is workmanlike, but nothing exceptional. Director R.G. Springsteen ('Secret Service Investigator', 'When Gangland Strikes') proves himself to be a capable Republic director, making the most of what he has to work with. There are some pretty neat scenes in this movie however, including a shoot out inside a garage, as well as a tense climax inside a warehouse. Both at night and with some decent cinematography courtesy of Walter Strenge ('Cry Terror!', 'Appointment With Murder'). It's not a hidden gem, but if you have an hour to spare (the movie is exactly one hour long!), you could do a lot worse than watch this one.

6+/10

The Sun Sets At Dawn (1950)

Plenty of movies have been made about prisoners on death row, including a couple of films noirs. The 1958 noir 'I Want To Live!' about a free-spirited woman sentenced to death even earned Susan Hayward an Oscar. Other such noirs were never really meant to be Oscar-contenders, but rather quickly made B-features for the lower bill, sold in package deals. 1950's 'The Sun Sets At Dawn' is one such movie, even if it tries to add some different, more poetic, ingredients to the mix.

Always on the grim gray dawn of an execution, it seems instead of rising, the sun sets...

The movie starts off in an intriguing manner... It's 4.30am and an old man drags a mailbag outside of a roadside cafe, when a bus arrives. A girl exits, in a seemingly comatose state. They share some looks and he helps her into a waiting car, which drives off into the night... It's a small scene, but the way it plays out without any dialogue and a lot of melancholy, the tone is set. This is not going to be a cheery movie...

The Girl (Sally Parr) is on her way to the execution of her boyfriend The Boy (Patrick Waltz), who has been sentenced to death for the murder of a politician. He always claimed innocence, but after 2 reprieves the governor has denied another one. There is also another reason to deny the reprieve, it will be the first execution by a new electric chair in the state. A group of newspaper reporters have gathered inside the roadside cafe, waiting to be driven to the prison, to the execution.

The story of the murder is explained in 2 ways, by The Boy as he has one final talk with The Chaplain (Walter Reed), and at the same time, by the reporters as they recount the details of the case and the trial to a young new reporter (Sam Edwards). It's a decent way to explain the backstory, as well as drop a few clues for the murder case... This is not a flashy crime or mystery movie however even if it does have those elements to it. It's really more of a solemn, doom-laden movie with a dark feeling of despair and dread throughout. The movie does not use names for most of its characters, which adds to the bleak mood. It's a small touch, but it does work.

The movie does suffer from some pretty wooden acting from the lead actors however. This was Patrick Waltz's first movie, billed as Philip Shawn, and it shows, he's clearly out of his depth with the heavy and deep emotions he's supposed to emote. He would move on to bit parts on TV after this movie. Sally Parr does a bit better, but she left the business after this movie and a TV appearance. It seems she was more comfortable on the theater stage than in front of the camera. Thankfully there are several well-known character actors here with decent performances, such as Percy Helton ('The Set-Up') and Charles Arnt ('Hollow Triumph') as a couple of reporters, Housely Stevenson ('Dark Passage') as the owner of the roadside cafe and Howard St. John ('Strangers On A Train') as the prison warden.

This was one of director Paul Sloane's last movies, after leaving the business for over a decade. He does a solid job here, together with DoP Lionel Lindon ('Alias Nick Beal')... There are several interesting scenes and shots, that are a notch above what you'd expect from a low-budget movie like this one. It's a shame that the movie's script, written by the director, required a couple of contrived coincidences to reach its conclusion, but overall I've seen far worse.

'The Sun Sets At Dawn' is not exactly a hidden gem, but its downbeat and bleak mood do set it apart from other movies. Despite its issues I enjoyed this movie, it's different.

7/10