THE WALKING TARGET (1960)

A California State Prison warden opens this crime drama like so many movies before it, warning the prisoner, Ron Foster, that the 260 grand he hid after a robbery five years before will bestow upon him the film's title. Reluctantly, he signs the prisoner's release, and Foster reluctantly finds himself in the arms of his former girl, Merry Anders, right out of the gate—literally. He cools her jets by asking where she has been for five years. Not one visit. Not one cake. This lady has never used an oven. Like her current favorite boyfriend, Robert Christopher—whose faux excitement of reuniting with Foster is short-lived—she has ulterior motives. They want that money. Unlike these two, Foster later reveals he has a beating heart.

Outside the no-fault cast, a bit of stunt driving in Ford Motor Company's models features prominently, and the matched studio prop car scenery out the rear window is logical and authentic. Less so is the obvious, poorly edited stuntman choreography during two fight scenes. Taking the sting out of any crime film, the misplaced music played under closing credits by an otherwise competent score by Paul Sawtell and Bert Shefter, befits an old Bob Hope comedy-mystery from the past decade.

Attesting to the warden's astute judgment of character, a number of people are on the ex-con's heels, most notably Harp McQuire. He plays a detective, a condescending, tough-talking, wisecracking detective cliché. He stands out in the film for being the only unintended levity in the film. He loathes Foster until the contrived cafe ending. Barry Kroeger, not surprisingly, plays a mob boss with only three scenes to his credit. That is all he needs to establish his character. Weasel Christopher now works as his inside man. Anders, essentially, disappears from the film past the halfway point.

A flashback explains where the money was cleverly hidden. Neither of Foster's partners in the heist survived, one leaving behind a widow, Joan Evans—in her final film—whose physical presence is her acting weak point. Foster's deep remorse for the robbery's outcome has weighed heavily on his conscience. He tracks her to an Arizona cafe she operates to give her the share due her late husband. She wants no part of the stolen money. Soon, everyone knows where she is, and a cafe confrontation between Kroeger, Christopher, McQuire, and Foster ignites. Humorously, before going into the cafe, Kroeger instructs his henchmen, “Check the silencers to make sure they're working.” I expected them to place the guns to their ear to confirm this. The bullets are unrealistically quiet, with three or four cast members going down just as quietly. Because of return fire, McQuire gets tabbed, but the rapid closing suggests he survives.

Notes: Director Edward L. Cahn churned out numerous films like this one. Decent crime films possess all the elements that should make for a memorable movie. Unfortunately, the premise had been done so often—usually, with the grit this film lacks—it has been universally forgotten. This tidy film is produced by Robert E. Kent Productions—as Zenith Pictures—for Edward Small, the executive producer. Small or Kent could produce realism in their pictures in spite of stale scripts and a low-visibility cast. Foster and McQuire team up again after their earlier Robert Kent Production, Cage of Evil. Talk around the office water cooler probably did not include this film, though television's Foster or Anders might have garnered mention. This film marks three in a row with director Cahn in Foster's sparse movie career. The seventy-five-minute film was distributed by United Artists.

MONEY MADNESS (1948)

This bargain-basement, seventy-three-minute film noir, distributed by Film Classics, opens with one of the most confusing flashbacks I have seen. We witness young Frances Rafferty standing before the judge as he passes out her ten-year sentence for being an accessory to robbery and murder. A reporter makes a call, telling the person on the line, you never know who will get off the next bus. There are no wavy, ghostly transition film frames to suggest a time shift. What the viewer actually sees is a bus coming to a stop. Out steps the movie’s lead, Hugh Beaumont, against type as an out-of-balance individual. One might logically assume it is ten years later, after Rafferty’s release. Essentially, the movie begins after the end. Overall, for the mad money spent, the film is not half bad. More like one-third bad. But do not blame the cast.

The music underlying the opening scenes with Beaumont, who is convincing in this role, is just too whimsical. Its use is totally mindless for what is about to unfold. The viewer suspects he is up to no good, yet he seems so Cleaverish. After he gets a job as a taxi driver, his charm flows directly, by pure happenstance, in Rafferty’s direction. She is burdened by the care for her selfish, bitter aunt, who always moans or fakes an attack of some sort when her niece attempts to go out. Beaumont's charm wins them both over, with Rafferty becoming his bride in whirlwind fashion. She likes that he seems different. Not like the others. At about the twenty-five-minute mark, she discovers how different. He is psychotic. Absolutely nothing like the others. He needs a place to hide his unearned cash—two hundred grand—temporarily held in a bank’s safe deposit box. An old suitcase in the aunt’s attic is the perfect location for the money transfer. Thanks to bipolar Beaumont, the aunt comes down with a bout of death, leaving the estate and an attic surprise in Rafferty’s inheritance.

When Rafferty meets with her attorney concerning the will, he senses she is distracted by something. Still using her maiden name, he unknowingly asks her for dinner. Every male in town is hitting on this attractive female. Naturally, Beaumont might take a cleaver to her if he finds out, so she declines, missing her first chance to escape her torture. As Beaumont has already reminded her, she cannot testify against her husband anyway. The attorney later meets with an elderly citizen who speculates about that taxi driver. This bit of gossip and the newspaper headline photos of the three robbers have the attorney wondering if one might be Beaumont, who obviously has had an extreme makeover since that photo was taken. In suspended disbelief, the photo is taken to a photo lab, and he asks them to remove the mustache, clean up the pockmarked face, do the eyebrows this way, and take all the shadows out. This they do. They also changed his lips to give him a more amused expression and rotated his head slightly. No extra charge. It all happens in a matter of seconds as the original photo transforms right before our very eyes in a blurry “flash-forward” transition. Exactly how a flashback should be done. Only in reverse.

Beaumont is there to greet one of the robbers with a revolver. Long before Al Pacino, Beaumont refers to his gun as “My little friend, here." Before releasing a bullet from the chamber, he has the wife turn up the radio’s volume, apparently with the belief that all three of them will not hear the gunshot inside the house. Like a young child closing his or her eyes, believing they cannot be seen. Beaumont tells his wife to get rid of the dead man’s car and hands her the keys. Logically, this might be a great opportunity for her to get out of this nightmare. She could just keep on driving or go to the police with her story. But not in any dim-witted Hollywood script. Escape number two is obliterated.

Our mental patient gets all melancholy after that murder and insists, above all else, he really loves Rafferty. Sure. When the attorney arrives at the house of the “happy” couple, Beaumont once again asks his wife to turn up the volume on the radio ‘cause he’s in a shootin’ mood. Fortunately, a patrol car happens by and hears the raucous party with Artie Shaw music. The good news, Beaumont will not have to serve any time in prison. The bad news, Rafferty is about to start the beginning of the film.