An unsophisticated young lady leaves her elm trees and rides the rails to the big city, and immediately gets involved in a murder plot. Legendary Production Designer William Cameron Menzies helms this rather mundane potboiler, transposing American gangster tropes to pre-WWII London (sans firearms). DP Mutz Greenbaum (later knows as Max Greene, who photographed Jules Dassin’s NIGHT AND THE CITY, uses low angle shots and key lighting conjoined with some location shooting in a derelict, condemned apartment building to create a filthy underworld reality. Miklos Rozsa underscores the narrative and fills much of the quiet parts with his orchestration which obscures much of the tension. The music is humdrum and, like the plot and characterizations, derivative of better Hollywood films.
Wide-eyed Eileen (Rene Ray) is on her way to London from her rural town and is forewarned by an Obi Wan Kenobi-like philosopher who practically describes the city as a hive of scum and villainy. She’s naive enough to even call Scotland Yard to help find living accommodations! Within a matter of minutes, she’s involved in a murder and accused of the crime. Panicked, she runs from the witnesses and police and makes her way to The Green Cockatoo and a man named Connor, information muttered by the dying man’s last breath.
Some observations. Since the UK isn’t burdened with a Second Amendment we don’t have gangsters with guns. Instead, we get fisticuffs and knife-fights which is much more brutal as the violence is up close and personal. John Mills plays the male protagonist Jim Connor, and we get to see him sing and tap-dance, then throw fists like Jimmy Cagney! He makes his character a decent enough chap even though he doesn’t like the five-o, and he doesn’t take advantage of the lost and confused naif. Rene Ray utilizes her biggest asset, her large eyes! She plays this immature young lady in a believable fashion, though it still strains credulity that someone would be this unprepared and trusting of total strangers. But it’s the Butler Protheroe (Frank Atkinson) who steals every scene he’s in, dominating the frame with his disheveled hair, rumpled wardrobe and droll humor.
After some punching, stabbing, kidnapping, and misunderstandings our two protagonists are reunited on the train back to her copse of elm trees and roses around her doorway.
Final Grade: C
