Friday

BUNCO SQUAD (1950)




Bunco, n.: The use of dishonest methods to acquire something of value; a swindle.

They oughtta teach Bunco Squad in film school, it’s that good. A 1950 product of the famed RKO B unit, it’s a first-rate example of narrative economy and efficient picture-making. Now I’m no knucklehead, Bunco Squad isn’t The Narrow Margin. I’m not out to compare those two pictures, because beyond their B status and shared studio they have little in common. The Narrow Margin is an exemplary noir thriller with an iconic tough-guy actor in his greatest part. Bunco Squad doesn’t rate as a film noir and has a far less prestigious or able cast than Margin — the actors in Bunco Squad even mispronounce words, tough ones like occult and Los Angeles. Still, this is a little movie that crackles. It’s contrived, heavy on coincidence, and might even be a bit campy, but in spite of all this it still begs to be watched and doesn’t disappoint those who do. It’s a gem of a mid-century crime picture, and although it’s not a film noir, it’s one that certainly rates a few days in the spotlight on this blog.

I included the definition above because “bunco” is hardly a household word. It never registered with me until I read James Ellroy—even though Jack Webb devoted a section of his cop manifesto The Badge to the LAPD bunco squad way back in 1958. That same unit is the subject of our movie, which beyond a rare television airing was nigh on impossible to see until it recently became available through the Warner Archive. The picture opens fast, at only 67 minutes it has to, with star Robert Sterling lecturing a citizens’ group about all the ways that flimflam crews get over on the squares. He’s even got a home-movie screen with 8mm visual aids. Movies such as Southside 1-1000, Code Two, Appointment with Danger and The Street with No Name (to name a very few) sport openings with a narrator speaking over some montage of stock footage, telling us about how the treasury boys, the motorbike unit, the postal cops, or even the g-men are putting their asses on the line for the sake of law, order, and Wonder Bread.

Bunco Squad does the same thing: we get the footage, we get the narrator, we get the same results. But in this case the speaker happens to be our star, and by introducing him in this way it trims some fat from the running time. And by making the montage sequence a movie-within-the-movie, it allows us to watch how the on-screen audience reacts. When Sterling’s Detective Steve Johnson mentions how the palm readers and tarot card shams contribute to the $200 million per year bunco haul, a old man in the crowd looks down his nose at his wife, who turns away, red in the face. Yet when Johnson adds the wheel of fortune and roulette to the list, it’s the wife who gets to glower. As Johnson wraps up his speech his partner rushes in—the captain needs them downtown—a hot tip on a new racket. The scene runs just over two minutes, but it’s one of the many frugal but effective moments that sets Bunco Squad apart. It packs a wallop of important information: we meet our star and his partner; get a fix on the bad guys, what they do, how they do it, and who they do it to.

The cops here are one-dimensional, pure cardboard; their moral certainty is absolute. At 67 minutes, time can’t be wasted agonizing over ethical ambiguities or on character development — in fact there’s no character development at all, which is the most damning evidence against Bunco Squad as a film noir; it has none of the alienation, obsession, and desperate choices that make a noir a noir. We have to take for granted why the police are compelled to uphold order and why the crooks would choose to do ill. Fate never takes a hand and irony must have been busy elsewhere. These points aren’t offered to disparage Bunco Squad, but to differentiate it from the film noir and show that such a picture can nevertheless succeed by other means. What Bunco Squad does well is show us, exposé style, how the con artists organize and carry out their scams. The notion makes sense: audiences generally have a sense of how cops do business, but in a movie that deals with crooks who use brains instead of bullets, there’s big upside in showing how they pull the rabbit out of the hat — particularly when it’s a spooky séance scam.

Here are the details: con man Tony Weldon (Ricardo Cortez, Bunco’s lone name star) rolls into L.A. on the heels of Mrs. Royce’s secretary, knowing that if he can get close enough to the old bird he might pry loose her 2.5 million dollar nest egg. When Weldon learns that Mrs. Royce’s boy was killed at Normandy he knows exactly how to work her. He builds a crew of professional swindlers, including ex-con crystal ball gazer Princess Liane (Bernadene Hayes, not bad in a role tailor-made for Marie Windsor), professional shill Mrs. Cobb (Vivien Oakland), restaurant swami Drake (Bob Bice), and the smooth-talking Fred Reed (John Kellogg). They develop an elaborate shell game in order to convince Mrs. Royce to bequeath her money to the “Rama Society.” There’s a fine sequence that depicts each of them uncovering seemingly banal pieces of information about the dead son’s schoolboy days, that when sewn together and dressed up in an otherworldly séance, take on the look and feel true mysticism. The plan works, and Mrs. Royce amends her will. When the secretary gets suspicious of Weldon her car plummets into a canyon—no brakes! (Weldon cuts so many brake lines in the movie that if were a mob picture they’d call him “Snips.”)

Meanwhile, the cops are pounding the pavement trying to make a case—they know who’s involved, but can’t prove a crime has been committed. In a spectacular B-movie coincidence, Steve shows up at Rama society headquarters just in time to see Mrs. Royce. When the cops brace her she scoffs and tells them to buzz off—which Detective Johnson does, and how: straight over a cliff with cut brake lines! He lives, barely, and enjoys one moviedom’s briefest convalescent periods. Finally, the cops contrive to beat Weldon at his own game, with the assistance of famous magician Dante (playing himself) and Johnson’s actress girlfriend, posing as a rival medium. When their scheme gains traction with Mrs. Royce, Weldon resorts to violence, setting the stage for Bunco’s finale—and another brakeless car careening through the hills above Malibu.

The fixation on murder by cutting brake lines jeopardizes the movie’s credibility, but it’s also another one of those expeditious touches that allow a whole lot of story to be crammed into a few reels. The first time it happens we get plenty of detailed information: the killer approaches and climbs under the car; we hear him cut the lines; we see him resurface and stow the cutters. This takes a modest thirty seconds; the final time it takes just six. The cinematic value of this method of attempted murder is significant. Bullets are difficult to dodge, but the brake line technique generates suspense—and a special sort of suspense at that, considering that the amount of time between the cutting of the lines and the car ride itself can be shortened or lengthened to suit the plot. 

Most B pictures rely on contrivances stacked on top of one another and outrageous coincidences too. Bunco Squad is no different, yet it’s all done so smoothly you’ll hardly notice and surely won’t care. It borrows one of the quintessential devices of the caper picture to great effect: that of the criminal who builds a crew and executes a clever plan; except in this case it’s not a heist but a swindle the crooks have in mind. There’s nothing spectacular about the story or the cast, and its noir credentials are tepid. But Bunco Squad is a crackerjack crime movie anyway. It’s polished, well constructed, features a ton of on-location L.A. exteriors and surprising special effects. It goes a long way towards reminding us that not all mid-century crimes movies were filmed in the noir style, and that such films shouldn’t be dismissed—or forgotten.

Bunco Squad (1950)
Directed by Herbert Leeds
Produced by Louis Rachmil
Cinematography by Henry Freulich
Screenplay by George Callahan, based on a novel by Reginald Taviner
Starring Robert Sterling, Joan Dixon, and Ricardo Cortez
Released by RKO Studios
Running time: 67 minutes

Tuesday

THE LAST MILE (1959)


Mickey Rooney plays John “Killer” Mears in 1959’s The Last Mile, a remake of the 1932 Preston Foster film of the same name. Both are based on a stage play by John Wexley, who should be quite well known to crime film buffs as the screenwriter of such classics as Angels with Dirty Faces, Confessions of a Nazi Spy, City for Conquest, Cornered, and The Long Night.


The Last Mile is one of those “ripped from the headlines” prison pictures with a no-so-subtle social agenda, set in the death house at an unnamed prison in an unnamed state — the idea being that the events of the film could happen anywhere at any time, so long as we embrace a system of capital punishment. All of the film’s action unfolds along a single row of eight cells, fronted by a bare wooden table for the screw charged with babysitting the inmates. All of the cells are located on one side of the row, facing outward (at the audience), so it’s easy to see how this would have played out in live theater, and the film is marred by its inability to break free from its roots.


Seton Miller’s adaptation of Wexley’s play is solidly crafted. The story here divides nicely into halves: the first provides an exposé of life on the cell block: what the prisoners are thinking, how they pass their days, their relationships with the guards, and so forth. The second follows what happens when Rooney’s character is able to break out of his cell and take over the death house for a short time.


The film opens when a new man, Walters (Clifford David), is escorted onto the block for what is supposed to amount to a two-week stay. There’s a protocol to everything here, both officially and in the culture of the other residents, who all introduce themselves to the scared kid and inform him that they prefer to be called by their cell numbers instead of their real names. Walters has arrived just in time: it’s the big night for the man in cell number two, so the new inmate gets to witness the execution ritual straight away. We see the inevitable visit from the priest, the last meal, and the dramatic walk out of the cell and through the “green door.” Despite the tendency of low budget films to reach for melodramatic heights, all of this stuff is presented in a straightforward fashion. The only real cliché comes when the lights flicker on and off as the big moment comes, but even this is forgivable: we never actually see the chair (outside the opening credits), and hey — people say the lights really do flicker.


The following day a new man replaces the inmate “evicted” the previous evening, and life continues as usual in the death house. Inmates trade smokes, play some checkers, banter with the guards, and talk about their girls on the outside. You’ll grimace at this, but the lone black inmate paces his cell shirtless, and prays for the other cons. When bullets start flying later in the second half of the film, he’s naturally the first one killed. I love the Edward G. Robinson film Black Tuesday, so I have to add that on the other hand, at least the character here doesn’t pass the day singing spirituals.


The guards aren’t treated very fairly, but the film claims to have been based on a true story and features an opening title card that cautions viewers that prison protocol — hiring practices in particular — have been greatly improved since the incidents portrayed first occurred. At any rate, most of the prison employees come across like the last kid picked at the playground — unhappy people with an axe to grind, taking their frustrations out on the prisoners whenever they get the chance. They constantly taunt and jab, particularly about pending executions. The hits keep coming, even during those last fateful walks.


Things progress along these lines until it becomes Walters’ time to go through the green door. Circumstances place on the guards too close to Mears’ cell, and he take the opportunity to choke the guy out and grab his keys. Mears runs about like a tiny little whirlwhind, freeing prisoners and seizing guns and ammo from the guard station. The film’s second half ceases to be an ensemble affair and becomes a snarling Mickey Rooney picture — note the poster above, you get the idea. It also adheres much more closely to the typical prison picture story arc: standoffs, gun battles, hostages, demands, tough decisions, guys get killed and stuff blows up — you’ve seen it before. Despite the familiarity this remains entertaining — don’t let me scare you off.


What’s to like here? The film doesn’t waste time on that biggest of prison movie clichés: going from con to con and hearing him talk about whether he’s guilty or not, or if he got framed and railroaded into the chair. It’s actually refreshing to watch a movie that takes as a given that all of the inmates did it, and then just gets on with the story. Considering how The Last Mile wants to generate some sympathy for the guys on the inside, it’s surprising that it doesn’t try to pawn off at least one innocent man on us — after all, it’s not like we haven’t executed a few here in the real world. Furthermore (and this is a bit more understandable), the movie doesn’t paint the prisoners as cowards either. In that early scene when one of the men is taken away the actor plays it well: the guards have to physically remove him from his cell, but by the time he makes it to the door his bravado has returned and he’s able to walk through on his won two feet.


Mickey Rooney is also pretty good. We all like the guy, but he was never a top-drawer talent as a dramatic actor. He spent much of his young life as arguably the most famous and beloved actor in America; but when Andy Hardy and the Babes movies went away, things got tough for Mickey. Even as a person who did not live through Hollywood’s golden age and has experienced these films in restrospect, I find Mickey a little hard to swallow in tough guy parts. Rooney made a number of noirs, but he was typically cast — in pictures like Quicksand or Drive a Crooked Road — as a kid who gets in way over his head. In The Last Mile he plays a tough-as-nails killer, and if you can get past any hang-ups you might have about Rooney, you’ll be surprised at how good he is. Make no mistake, somebody else could have played the part better, just as Mickey would have been better if the budget had allowed for a few retakes, but all in all he (and a cast of unknowns) do pretty well here. What’s not to like? A jazzy score that feels far out of place and almost ruins the whole thing.


Some viewers might find The Last Mile a bit campy, and maybe it is, but on the whole it’s well worth your time. It’s streaming for free on Netflix these days, and those interested in the 1932 version can download and watch for free at the internet archive — accessible from the movie’s IMDb page.







The Last Mile (1959)
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Directed by Howard Koch
Cinematography by Joseph Brun and Saul Mitwall

Screenplay by Seton Miller and Milton Subotsky, based on a play by John Wexley

Starring Mickey Rooney
Released by United Artists
Running time: 82 minutes