Street of Chance (1930) User Reviews

Not A Profession He Wants For His Brother

[bkoganbing · 6/10 · 10 August 2011]

In watching the early Paramount talkies with William Powell it never ceases to amaze that Powell stage trained voice that he had apparently knew instinctively how to modulate for the new medium of talking motion pictures. It was why he was able to have three successful Philo Vance films and Street Of Chance is in the same mode.

Powell's character of 'Natural' Davis is of course modeled on the legendary Arnold Rothstein who gambled with quite a bit more than just games of chance. This is the life Powell has chosen for himself and he and wife Kay Francis are content. He's the best at what he does in a business filled with uncertainty.

But this is not a life he wants for his brother Regis Toomey who comes into town wanting to try the gambling world and be the best like 'Natural Davis. That's not what Powell wants for his kid brother, he wants Toomey to be and stay respectable. Tragedy results when Powell tries some desperate means to keep Toomey from the life.

Powell and Francis are at the top of their game and Toomey registers well as the eager younger brother. Jean Arthur is here as well, but she's really not the Jean Arthur who developed later on in those Thirties screwball comedies, she took quite a while to develop as a screen personality.

Street Of Chance shows William Powell at really good advantage in a carefully delineated role. For his fans definitely catch this one.

Playing the Percentages with William Powell

[wes-connors · 7/10 · 19 July 2010]

New York businessman William Powell (as John "Jack" B. Marsden) is really the city's notorious underworld gambler "Natural Davis" (modeled after the infamous Arnold Rothstein). While very successful at what he does (due to playing the percentages), Mr. Powell wants to get out of the racket. He has received a separation summons from model-ish posing Kay Francis (as Alma), who is tired of being the stay-at-home gambler's wife. Powell is also feeling some remorse about having a lowly compatriot (Brooks Benedict) shot dead. He prides himself on being honest, and will kill those who don't play by the rules. Nobody welches.

Powell promises Ms. Francis he will give up gambling, and they plan a second honeymoon.

Then, Powell's similarly gambling-addicted kid brother Regis Toomey (as Alan "Babe" Marsden) arrives from San Francisco. Newly married to Jean Arthur (as Judith), he is in New York to gamble Powell's cash wedding gift into bigger bucks - and he wants to do it in the company of the legendary "Natural Davis" (not knowing "Natural" is his brother). This is, of course, an eyebrow-raising plot development, since Mr. Toomey should probably be thinking he will lose his shirt in such a match-up - so, let's just call him overconfident. Well, Powell concocts a plan to quit gambling, re-gain his wife, and cure his brother's gambling itch...

"Street of Chance" is a typically spotty production for the times, but it does contain some great-looking moments, courtesy of director John Cromwell and photographer Charles Lang. Howard Estabrook received an "Academy Award" nomination for cleverly white-washing this story of a real life gambler; he uses natural dialogue - answering "Good morning" with "What's good about it?" And, quotes from popular songs (like "Button Up Your Overcoat)" certainly ticked some fancy. Powell is a commanding lead, and the incidental characters are colorful; as "Tony" the one-armed newspaper salesman, John Risso is most memorable.

******* Street of Chance (2/3/30) John Cromwell ~ William Powell, Kay Francis, Regis Toomey, Jean Arthur

Whoa! I didn't recognize anyone!

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 13 June 2021]

William Powell is on the "Street of Chance" in this 1930 film also starring Kay Francis, Jean Arthur, and Regis Toomey.

I will admit right off that I did not recognize either Arthur or Toomey in this film.

Powell plays "Natural" Davis, a character modeled on the famed gambler Arnold Rothstein. The film portrays a couple of incidents in Rothstein's life, but in my opinion, the character is very loosely based on Rothstein.

Natural Davis is a professional gambler, and as a result, his wife Alma (Kay Francis) is divorcing him. He begs her to stay with him, eventually promising her that he will not only quit gambling, but go away with her on an extended trip..

When is brother Babe (Toomey) comes to town, Natural learns that his wedding gift of $10,000 has been spent gambling. Babe is a big winner and now has $50,000. He's in New York to gamble for $100,000 more so he can buy into a partnership.

Let me pause for a minute. The amounts of money these people are talking about are unbelievable. In 1930, $100,000 was 1,611,946.11 in today's money! Usually in films people are robbing banks for $5,000 or trying to get $50 from someone.

To continue - Natural does not want his brother to pursue the life of a gambler, so he's determined to make sure Babe is cleaned out. He arranges for his associates to help him, joining Babe in a game. It doesn't quite work out as he hoped. In a bind, he has to break his promise to Alma temporarily, but she doesn't buy it.

Powell is natural and very effective, and the film moves quickly, with people picking up their dialogue cues. Often in early talkies, actors were still adjusting to sound. As a result you get pauses between lines of dialogue, and, because of stage training, big gestures and loud voices. Powell has none of this. He's tough yet elegant and sympathetic yet ruthless.

Francis doesn't have much to do as Natural's suffering wife, but she's very good. The rest of the acting is fine, but you could have knocked me over with a feather when I learned that Babe was Regis Toomey and his wife was Jean Arthur! Arthur had none of the characteristics she later developed. Here, she's pure ingenue.

One of the most interesting things about these precode films is that because there is no Hayes code, the ending is not predictable as it is in many later films. The end of this kind of surprised me.

Good

[AAdaSC · 6/10 · 23 August 2009]

'Natural' Davis (William Powell) is a respected gambler who follows a ruthless code of honour with those who cheat against him. His wife Alma (Kay Francis) wants to divorce him because of his addiction and lifestyle but they agree on a reconciliation and 2nd honeymoon together and 'Natural' promises to give up gambling. However, his plans change when his brother 'Babe' (Regis Toomey) arrives in town...............

This is a well acted film with William Powell very good in the lead role and Kay Francis a little irritating at times with her facial over-emoting. However, Powell carries the film and pulls it into the "good" category. It has a slightly downbeat ending.

Unusually amazing moments for a movie from 1930

[abeachedwhale · 7/10 · 2 August 2023]

This was quite enjoyable on a few levels. The lead actors in general has good strong performances, with Kay Francis having a few bad scenes. I blame the director for choosing those because other scene with her were totally believable. At first the story seemed a little confusing but quickly was understandable. A couple favorite scenes of mine were where William Powell finishes talking to Kay Francis and then walks out. Most films of the time would have cut the moment he walked out, but the camera kept rolling and we saw Francis slump down in dispare. The other favorite was the top down card scene towards the end. Overall, I would mainly recommend this to fans of the Thin Man series or other serious "black and white fans." It's definitely a hidden gem.

Too many clichés, but good anyway

[F Gwynplaine MacIntyre · 7/10 · 6 November 2003]

The 1930 'Street of Chance' (no relation to a 1942 semi-noir with the same title) is a highly entertaining showcase for the excellent William Powell. Unfortunately, the central character (Powell's role) is one of those implausible stock characters who are encountered so frequently in movies but so seldom in real life. Powell is cast here as 'Natural' Davis, a professional gambler who is always scrupulously honest ... yet who is able to live in luxury because he consistently wins high-stakes games. Even more insufferably (and implausibly), this guy moves effortlessly through the criminal underworld (even though he's completely honest, mind you), and he has the undying respect of all the big-shot gangsters AND all the police detectives. Oh, yes. There may be a very few gamblers like this in real life, but not many ... and yet they show up in movies all the time. George M. Cohan played a similar version of this implausible role in 'Gambling', his last starring film. Powell's characterisation in 'Street of Chance' is made even more annoying (and more implausible) because he's clearly based on a real-life figure who WAS a crook: Arnold Rothstein, the playboy who made millions as a gambler precisely because he was NOT honest. Most infamously, Rothstein was the man who fixed the 1919 World Series which produced the Chicago 'Black Sox' scandal.

'Natural' Davis (Powell) is a high-roller who bets thousands on the turn of a card ... but he's such an inveterate gambler, he lays odds on every possible happenstance. When we first see him in Times Square, he's casually making book on whether the next car that stops for a traffic light will have an odd or even number plate. (He wins, of course.) Nowadays, we recognise this sort of behaviour as a pathological gambling addiction, but in this film we're meant to admire Davis for always taking chances and winning. There's some very impressive location shooting in Manhattan during these early scenes.

'Natural' Davis is made even more insufferable by yet another cliché: this guy is worth millions, but -- to show us that he's a 'regular' guy -- there's a scene in which Davis takes time for friendly banter with Tony, the local crippled newsboy. Tony is played by a young man with no right arm and no acting ability, yet he still fits all the crippled-newsboy stereotypes: he wears a flat cap, and every edition of the newspaper prompts him to yell 'Extree! Extree!' (Did any real-life newsboy ever actually say 'Extree'?) Davis is always honest, but he knows all the angles: he gives a bankroll to a guy with a hard-luck story, but carefully plants his own thumbprint on the banknotes ... so that later he can catch the guy out, when the money is misspent.

Davis's wife Alma is played by Kay Francis, a very mannered actress who has always annoyed me with her speech impediment and her raccoonish eye makeup. She had an arch habit of frequently planting one hand akimbo, very high up on her waist (not her hip), and she repeats that here. Davis and Alma were in love once, but now they've come to a tough patch.

SPOILERS COMING. Along comes a Midwestern yokel named 'Babe' Marsden, a newlywed with a nice wife named Judith (Jean Arthur, wasted in a small bland role). Babe's older brother John gave him $10,000 as a wedding present; instead of banking that money, Babe went gambling in California and parlayed the money into $50,000. Babe is determined to be a high-rolling gambler. He's heard about the great 'Natural' Davis ... and now Babe has come to Manhattan, intending to beat Davis at the card tables. Surprise, surprise! 'Natural' Davis is actually Babe's older brother John, conducting his gambling activities under a false name. (We're constantly hearing dialogue about how scrupulously honest this Davis geezer is, so why does he use an alias?)

John/"Natural" doesn't want Babe to become a gambler like himself, apparently feeling that Babe isn't cut out for it. To teach Babe a lesson, he agrees to play against him in a high-stakes poker game, clearly intending to win Babe's money and send him home skint. John gives Babe fair warning: 'I don't want to hear any "brother" stuff.'

MORE SPOILERS NOW. 'Natural' Davis invites some gangsters to sit in on the poker game, and he stakes them to some of his own bankroll, telling them in advance that his intention is to clean out Babe. (All in a good cause, of course.) But the game goes Babe's way, with Babe taking the pot. In desperation, Davis deals cards from the bottom of the deck ... cheating so that Babe will lose. (We keep hearing dialogue about how totally honest Davis is ... so how come he just happens to be skillful at crooked card deals?) Babe learns his lesson and goes home with his wife, remarking on the train to Hickburg about what a wonderful guy his brother John is ... not realising that John is dead, because the gangsters caught him out cheating and they took him 'for a ride'.

I found this ending utterly implausible. We keep hearing thick-ear dialogue about how all the gangsters respect Davis, and how he has an impeccable reputation for honesty. Why didn't he warn the crooks in advance that he was planning to beat Babe by fair means or foul, and promise to reimburse the crooks for any stakes they lost in the process?

Despite its faults and its very many clichés, 'Street of Chance' is extremely well directed by the underrated John Cromwell (who also plays a small role as a plainclothes officer), and the editing and photography are splendid. I'll rate this movie 7 out of 10.

Kay Francis proved she was not only ravishing but a natural talent as well

[kidboots · 8/10 · 28 March 2009]

"The Street of Chance" was one of the best crime dramas of the early sound era.

Even though she had appeared on stage, Kay Francis was discovered at "Tonys" by a group of Paramount executives who were completely fascinated by her vivid, aristocratic beauty. She was cast in any film that came along because from the first she was noticed by both the critics and the movie going public. In 1930 she appeared in 9 films and in "The Street of Chance" she was given her first opportunity to portray a sympathetic character. This was the second of her many screen teamings with William Powell.

Powell plays "Natural" Davis, a famous gambler, who is trying to quit and save his marriage to Alma (Kay Francis). He is renowned for his code of honour - he doesn't cheat, frame or doublecross, and he will not allow people to do it to him. He helps people out when they are in trouble - the newsman is eager to thank him for helping his sick wife. His brother "Babe" (Regis Toomey) comes to town, with new wife Judy (Jean Arthur) in tow. He has mysteriously turned "Natural's" $10,000 wedding present into $50,000 - he is a gambler too!!!!

After a heartfelt scene with Alma, Davis determines to leave gambling. He runs into his brother, who is excited to meet "Natural" (Powell has always told his brother he is a stockbroker). After giving him a lecture about the evils of gambling, he sets him up with 3 of the toughest gamblers around, hoping he will lose all his money and go back to his old life. However, Babe wins big and "Natural's" buddies think Babe and "Natural" have concocted a "sting" between them. For the first time in his gambling career Davis cheats - so his brother will be disgusted and leave - which he does!! "Natural" is now a "welcher" - a person he has always despised - and the big gamblers are now after him.

This is an excellent movie, directed by John Cromwell and based on the life of Arnold Rothstein. In the few scenes that she had, Kay Francis showed that not only was she very beautiful but a natural actress as well. William Powell looked as if he had been acting in "talkies" his whole life. It was also nice to see Jean Arthur, if only in the thankless role of Judy, "Babes" wife. Regis Toomey, although he never became a huge star, had a very long and full career playing character parts.

The stars gave this film a very natural and real look.

Highly Recommended.

Good Story, But Powell Isn't Up To It

[boblipton · 6/10 · 3 August 2023]

William Powell is 'Natural' Davis, an honest gambler on the Great White Way. Wife Kay Francis has just had him served with separation papers and he's trying to get her to take him back, promising to give up gambling. She agrees, and he goes to collect his remaining I. O. U.s, only to discover that kid brother Regis Toomey is in town, trying to run up his $10,000 wedding gift, now $50,0000, from Powell into one hundred fifty grand. To cure him from gambling fever, Powell sets him up in the toughest game he knows, but the kid keeps winning. So Powell steps into the game.

It's a morality play, and Powell is not very good with the longer speeches in this one. Director John Cromwell offers some nice shots, and the visuals are quite good -- the mayoral race is on, with Walker against LaGuardia in the process shots. While the cast is always interesting, this doesn't show anyone off to advantage. With Jean Arthur and Stanley Fields.

NEGLECTED EARLY-TALKIE GEM

[rgcabana · 8/10 · 18 September 2022]

When, many moons ago, I interviewed director John Cromwell for an article I was preparing on the first big gangster-film star of the late Twenties/early Thirties, George Bancroft, I mentioned STREET OF CHANCE (Paramount; 1930) to him as an aside, it not containing Bancroft. His initial response was to confuse its genesis with gambler Nicky Arnstein, who, if I recall correctly, was married to Fannie Brice; but upon my putting forth Arnold Rothstein as the more likely source, he agreed. Arnstein was a gambler and apparent scoundrel; Rothstein also a gambler albeit far more notorious, infamously credited with having fixed a baseball World Series; his shooting death in 1928 was never solved. In STREET OF CHANCE, the shooting of the William Powell gambler is implied without being shown; his dying words, given in an ambulance rushing him to a hospital in response to an attendant's bet that he'll live, signals the film's final fadeout, these being, "You lose." When I complimented the director on this powerful, yet understated finale, he modestly responded something like, "Well, that's the kind of thing we were trying to do then." If, as John implied, such creativity was the order of the day, I've seen scant examples worthy of this one! Paramount remade the film in 1937 as HER HUSBAND LIES, starring Ricardo Cortez as the ill-fated gambler. A good little film, but lacking the tour-de-force quality engendered by the original which, sad to say, is a virtually forgotten motion picture.

Regards, Ray Cabana, Jr.

Worth seeing for its stars

[gbill-74877 · 6/10 · 20 September 2023]

In this film, the always debonair William Powell plays a businessman leading a double life as "Natural" Davis, an elite gambler with a penchant for winning because he "knows the percentages." He deals with gangsters and can summon up toughness when he needs to, but he also has personal integrity and treats people with fairness, at least, per his world's code. He's thus another example the common (and rather dubious) film trope of a guy who's operating outside the law, but lives by a moral code and is established as virtuous anyway. Here that's somehow true even when we see him order another gambler to be murdered because he's caught him stealing from him. Naturally, the violence isn't depicted.

Trouble comes to Natural Davis in two forms: (1) his wife (Kay Francis) is fed up with his late nights and threatens to call it quits, and (2) his little brother (Regis Toomey) comes to town looking to gamble himself, not knowing that the legendary Natural Davis is his own brother. Natural tries to do the right thing on both fronts, that is, to make drastic changes to preserve his marriage, and to attempt to dissuade his brother from the sordid life of gambling. His idea is a little trickery to do the latter, leading to a pretty fine scene of the brothers in a high stakes poker game together.

The film is certainly stronger towards the end, but it's a little mechanical getting there, stretching its simplistic plot out to fill the runtime. It's not clear how this nominated for a Best Writing Oscar, but 1930 was not a particularly strong year for films, with filmmakers still adapting to sound (the following years up to the end of the pre-Code era are certainly better). Regardless, from where I sit, Kay Francis and Jean Arthur (who plays the brother's wife) were largely wasted, their characters mostly just planets in orbit around Powell's. There is drama leading to a great final line from Powell, but the story line for the brother was unsatisfactory because it seemed far too tidy (wow, cured just like that, despite the temptation on the train!).

With that said, the film is worth seeing if you're a fan of the stars, and there were also various little things from the era that caught my eye. Mostly these are shots in New York, including the light streaming through the windows of Grand Central Station, and the big billboards for James J. Walker, a Tammany Hall mayor who was forced to resign a couple of years later. I also liked the neon sign advertising Spider-Web Hosiery in the background of the scene Powell has with Arthur. Lastly, it was interesting to see the swastika on some of the poker chips, but while the Nazis had already appropriated the symbol by this time, it appears these types of chips had been made for decades in America, and mercifully no fascist sympathies were being subtly expressed.

Take a Chance on This One

[view_and_review · 7/10 · 4 February 2024]

Gambling is a risky business. No gambler, no matter how good, stays on top forever. John Marsden aka Jack aka J. B. aka Natural Davis (William Powell) was an ace gambler. He was so lucky he could win at any game of chance. He fronted as a bonds trader to make his huge bankroll seem legitimate.

His wife, Alma (Kay Francis), wanted nothing more to do with Jack and his gambling and his lies. She wanted a straight-laced husband, one she could go to dinner with, one whose friends she could meet, one who was on the right side of the law, and one who wasn't always lying to her.

John was all set to get out of the gambling racket and leave town with his wife until his brother whizzed into town. His brother, Allan 'Babe' Marsden (Regis Toomey), was a good gambler too and he wanted to bolster his wealth by playing the great Natural Davis. Natural, however, was determined to make sure Babe left gambling alone for good, even if that meant forestalling his wife and potentially losing her.

It reminded me of another Kay Francis movie, "The House on 56th Street," when Kay was an ace gambler and she wanted to stop her daughter from getting into gambling.

What Babe didn't know was that Natural Davis was his own brother. And he also didn't know that Natural would go through almost any lengths to make sure he went back home to San Francisco broke and cured of gambling.

"Street of Chance" ended up being a pretty intense movie. I didn't quite expect the suspense at the end. I liked it. It was different and different can be good at times. I got to see William Powell as other than the uber-cool character he always is.

Free on Odnoklassniki.

Yet another take on the Arnold Rothstein story...

[AlsExGal · 8/10 · 4 June 2023]

... with "The Czar of Broadway" being a different film made in the same year loosely based on the famous gambler's life.

John Marsden (William Powell) is a big time professional gambler who goes by the name "Natural Davis" when gambling. He has an office where he is supposed to be buying and selling bonds that acts as a front. John has a baby brother "Babe" (Regis Toomey) who lives on the west coast and who has very recently married Judith (Jean Arthur). They have come to New York City on their honeymoon. What Judith doesn't know is that Babe has run up John's wedding gift to them of ten thousand dollars to fifty thousand dollars by gambling and intends to continue gambling in New York to get the 150K that he needs to buy into the partnership of a firm. At the same time, John's wife Alma (Kay Francis) has served him with divorce papers after a six month separation, and she will not consider reconciling unless John retires as a professional gambler and leaves town with her.

John agrees to stop gambling and leave town with his wife, but shortly thereafter finds out that his brother is getting way in over his head gambling with the kinds of hoods who work along Broadway, and he's put in the position of either having to stop his brother and save him from the path he's been on all of these years, or have one last chance with his wife. Complications ensue.

William Powell played villains through 1928 at Paramount as his looks - if you knew nothing about his voice - allow him to look rather menacing. This was one of those films in which he was playing a bigger role than the types he had in the silent era, yet he is still playing a rather dark character. In spite of some of his more dastardly deeds, though, he is a relatable and even sympathetic protagonist.

I wish this film was better known, and I'd recommend this one. It has plenty of atmosphere - it's almost noirish in style and substance rather than a precode - and it is a good showcase for the talent of the main players, although Jean Arthur is almost unrecognizable here.

Take a journey back to the avenue I'm taking you to.

[mark.waltz · 8/10 · 14 November 2020]

While this was obviously filmed at Paramount's Astoria Queens studio, much of the Times Square footage is obviously blue screen. You can tell because the people in the foreground are not the same ratio of height as those clothes up, and once you get past that, you can enjoy this pre-code drama for the fun elements that it has.

The film stars William Powell as a rackateer working in the gambling industry whose wife Kay Francis has sent him divorce papers. He calls her up and asked her to tear up her copy, but she says she must think about it. Francis admits that she knows what he has been doing all along, and cannot deny her love, but still fears how his life will affect their marriage.

When Powell's younger brother, Regis Toomey, arrives in town with wife Jean Arthur, it is revealed that he has a gambling addiction problem and Powell has been hiding his real occupation from him. But Toomey wants to find out where the action is and Powell, desperate to get his brother on the straight and narrow, allows him to participate in a card game where he will lose badly and thus be forced to give up gambling.

The tables turn when Powell finds himself in trouble and Francis desperately tries to find him. While this isn't on the same level of other gangster movies of the early thirties, it is great for its pre-code elements and a view of 42nd Street that really was captured by the title song of that 1933 musical. Powell is both charming and sleazy, and Francis gets to show both her glamour and her strength. But Toomey is rather one-dimensional and future big star Jean Arthur has hardly anything to do. It doesn't really give a glimpse into the downtrodden view of New York City during the depression, but overall it is an enjoyable film.

A true film noir from 1930!

[JohnHowardReid · 8/10 · 14 December 2017]

Copyright 7 February 1930 by Paramount Pictures. New York opening: 3 February 1930. Running time: 75 minutes. COMMENT: Regis Toomey looks much like his usual self in production stills, but in the movie itself, so cleverly is he made up, and so adroit is his performance, he is actually hard to recognize. No wonder that nonetheless, he easily, and breezily, steals this picture. The other players, including such assets as Kay Francis (who plays Toomey's wife) and Jean Arthur struggle nobly with an over-talkative script that moves rather slowly. Fortunately, director John Cromwell gives life to a great deal of the action.

Despite its 1930 release date, "Street of Chance" comes across as a true film noir (in every respect of that word). In fact, the ironic plot (in which the plans of William Powell's Natural Davis both succeed and fail) is coupled with one of the most downbeat endings ever filmed.