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Undescribable Perfection

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Filmed by a Poverty Row studio with a largely unknown cast, augmented by former Universal stalwarts Evelyn Ankers and Turhan Bey, PAROLE INC., is a good example of a so-called "problem picture" designed to draw attention to one of the iniquities blighting late Forties American society.In this case it is the corrupt parole system whereby habitual criminals are let out of jail on the promise of reform and promptly resume their nefarious habits. This is chiefly due to a corrupt system headed by lawyer Barney Rodescu (Turhan Bey), who bribes two of the five- person Parole Board to vote in the prisoners' favor while trusting in the Board's ability to return positive verdicts. Intrepid federal agent Hendricks (Michael O'Shea) volunteers to expose this racket by posing as a master criminal, infiltrating the racket at its lowest level and discovering how it works. He frequents The Pastime Club, a seedy joint run by Barney's fiancée Jojo (Ankers), and peopled by a clutch of hoodlums all in baggy suits and snap-brimmed hats. The rest of the story is predictable.For an action thriller PAROLE INC. is remarkably static with too much time devoted to lengthy voice-overs from Hendricks as he tells what happened to a tape recorder from his hospital bed. The two nominal stars do what they can with the material: Bey looks immaculate in his tailored suits, but shows a tendency towards sadism, even though he assaults no one. He has a good line in dialogue delivery, describing one of his unfortunate minions as "a jackass," and vowing to get rid of any double-dealers daring to cross him.On the whole, however, Alfred Zeisler's B-Movie is rather too moral for its own good, even though it dramatizes a scenario common to late Forties movies, suggesting that corruption is so rife in American institutions that no one knows how to separate friends from enemies.

This low-budget little crime thriller actually turned out to be better than I thought it would be. Cagney-like Michael O'Shea plays a federal investigator who goes undercover to expose a crime ring that gets undeserving prisoners paroled in its care, resulting in a crime wave that's wracking the city. O'Shea is quite good as the feisty agent posing as a convict on the lam, and Turhan Bey is fine as a slick, villainous lawyer. The script by "B" veterans Sherman Lowe and Royal Cole is serviceable if predictable, and some of the supporting performances are weak, but little-known director Alfred Zeisler keeps things moving along, although a little raggedly. All in all, a pretty good example of the low-budget independent "B" thriller of the late '40s. Worth a watch.

Michael O'Shea becomes an undercover agent in an attempt to discover who's behind the self-evident corruption of the parole board. The printed prologue informs us that this is a serious social problem, that the streets are filled with "repeaters", and that there is one peeking through your window right now, waiting for his chance to strangle you and pillage your household.O'Shea finds out that the friends of a recently sprung parolee hang out in the Pastime Club, "a combination night club and cheap café." Whatever happened to cheap night clubs anyway? The old movies are full of them but the only ones left seem to be Birdland and the Las Vegas lounge acts. It's a terrible loss to the community.The plot is a little too complicated to spell out. Some of the mob behind the corruption are not as bad as some of the others, although at the end, O'Shea's identity is discovered and they give him a real working over. No problem though. We see him swathed in bandages, dictating the story from a hospital bed, his recovery assured by the ministrations of the ever-popular Bess Flowers as Nurse Mary.The movie is one hundred percent routine. It wouldn't really be helpful to describe more of the contorted plot. Besides, I haven't the time. There's a recidivist pervert at the door and it sounds as if he's urgent.

Lively actor O'Shea manages to give a lift to this otherwise routine programmer. For some reason these 'undercover' crime films were popular at the time, maybe because of the built-in suspense of being found out by the gangsters. Anyhow, Hendricks (O'Shea) manages to infiltrate a gang that sells paroles to imprisoned convicts. Heading up the gang, in a twist, is the lovely Evelyn Ankers, otherwise known as the queen of scream for her many horror movie roles. Making a belated appearance as the gang's attorney is the sleekly swarthy Turhan Bey (Rodescu).I'm not sure why the narrative is told in flashback from Hendricks' hospital bed. Maybe to assure audiences that whatever the dangers, he survives. I wish there were something especially noteworthy about this exercise. There may not be, but the movie's smoothly done, surprisingly so for tightly budgeted independent production (Orbit Productions). Okay as a harmless time passer.