Routine Warners espionage story, directed with no nonsense by Raoul Walsh. The director was responsible a few years earlier for the unexpectedly humane "High Sierra." There's a car chase here, too, but not nearly as effective as the one in which Bogart leads a horde of law-enforcement officers on a frantic and dusty pursuit into the mountains.
Peter Lorre, as a Russian agent, and the pachydermal Sidney Greenstreet as the resident Nazi chief, seem left over from "The Maltese Falcon," with little of the inventiveness of the original. Brenda Marshall, a virago who was married to William Holden, has little to do. George Raft describes her as "good looking" and he's right. Raft himself is as ligneous as ever. He never relaxes. His expression is always one of vigilance. He doesn't move much, and when he does he strides, but his eyes are always alert, darting from one character to another, as if forever waiting to be betrayed. He's rarely disappointed. Turhan Bey, sleekly handsome, gets to speak Turkish, an ignoble tongue, if you ask me. The dialog runs along the lines of, "Oh, a tough guy, hey?"
The MacGuffin is a set of phony plans that Russia (our ally in 1943) is supposed to have drawn up to immediately invade Turkey, the setting of the movie. The plans will be made public, arousing the nation's paranoia, and Hitler will move in and "protect" Turkey from the commies, using the nation's oil for its war effort. The plans are first in one person's hands, then another's. Finally the entire conspiracy gets the deep six.
The pace never flags. Raoul Walsh knows how to keep things moving, but the narrative is pedestrian and the story and characters have little dash.
Peter Lorre, as a Russian agent, and the pachydermal Sidney Greenstreet as the resident Nazi chief, seem left over from "The Maltese Falcon," with little of the inventiveness of the original. Brenda Marshall, a virago who was married to William Holden, has little to do. George Raft describes her as "good looking" and he's right. Raft himself is as ligneous as ever. He never relaxes. His expression is always one of vigilance. He doesn't move much, and when he does he strides, but his eyes are always alert, darting from one character to another, as if forever waiting to be betrayed. He's rarely disappointed. Turhan Bey, sleekly handsome, gets to speak Turkish, an ignoble tongue, if you ask me. The dialog runs along the lines of, "Oh, a tough guy, hey?"
The MacGuffin is a set of phony plans that Russia (our ally in 1943) is supposed to have drawn up to immediately invade Turkey, the setting of the movie. The plans will be made public, arousing the nation's paranoia, and Hitler will move in and "protect" Turkey from the commies, using the nation's oil for its war effort. The plans are first in one person's hands, then another's. Finally the entire conspiracy gets the deep six.
The pace never flags. Raoul Walsh knows how to keep things moving, but the narrative is pedestrian and the story and characters have little dash.