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That was an excellent one.

One of my all time favorites.

Fresh and Exciting

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

The cop father of a private detective is killed when he stumbles on a criminal enterprise. The private detective decides to investigate the case in the three days left to him before he goes into the army. Much better then it sounds crime drama is a breezy little film, it runs under an hour. With nary a pause once the film gets up and running this is a darkly comedic film about a criminal organization that seems to be harking back to prohibition days. The veteran cast including Dick Purcell and Niel Hamilton really sell the story to the point that I misdirected as to what was going on. This is a superior little film thats worth popping in to the DVD player should you happen to rent or buy it. (Leave a comment)

It's disheartening to see Stuart Palmer's name mixed up in this little film (in every respect of the word) about rubber racketeers. The identity of Mr Big is as obvious as the dimple in Helen Parrish's cheek, thanks not only to Palmer's fall-back on a standard plot stratagem, but to rigid type-casting. Dull Damian is a ho-hum hero, and if I see Robert Homans go into his Irish-on-the-beat act just once more, I'll sic Jack LaRue on to him like a shot. Jack plays a heavy as usual, although Palmer gives him a smart intro as the gangster who survived the police clean-up after prohibition, because he'd taken great care to pay his income taxes on all the murder and high-jacking contracts he took out. Sounds fishy to me, but at least it's a new angle. Vince Barnett has a brief role as a waiter, while Neil Hamilton wastes our time as a crooked businessman. The only bright spot in the movie is provided by happy-as-a-thug Dick Wessel (of all people) who takes a shine to our cute-as-a-vinyl heroine. Yes, Helen plays a disc jockey in one of these places where customers placed a dime in the juke box and relayed their music order to a central exchange full of 78s. This ingenious set-up was featured in several "A" features but here it's given the strictly from hunger treatment.Sherman's direction is B-grade competent, but boring as all get-out. Bring back Sam Newfield! Muddy photography doesn't help liven up interest either. Other credits are equally shoe-string.For a climax, Sherman uses the old Poverty Row dodge of staging a scene on the actual floor of an unvarnished Republic sound stage. Well, he does fill the space up with lots and lots of fake rubber tires. We all know that rubber tires are so pictorially attractive, what could be more excitingly suspenseful than a mild little chase through such wonders?

***SPOILERS*** Soon to be inducted into the US Army, as a second lieutenant no less, private dick Eddie Delaney, Damian O'Flynn, gets involved with this gang of tire smugglers who gunned down his dad police Sergeant Tim Delaney, Robert Homans, who uncovered the gangs secret storehouse. The tire storehouse was already ripped off by former bootlegger, and now rubber tire smuggler, Marty Clark, Jack La Rue. Clark is a slippery eel of a hood who, unlike Big Al "Scarface" Capone, outfoxed the authorities during Prohibition days by not forgetting to pay his taxes.It later turns out that Clark ripped off the tire place from this unscrupulous businessman John Underwood, Neil Hamilton, who like the good and money hungry creep that he is wants to make a killing during wartime by dealing, in selling to the highest bidder, desperately needed rubber tires that the US military needs to defeat Hitler and Tojo. Determined to get his tires back Underwood hires Eddie to track down those who ripped him off with Eddie not at all knowing that Underwood is working against the very country that he as a soon to be a member of the US armed forces is sworn to defend.Interesting little movie that has to do with black market racketeering and this really cute radio disk-jockey Helen Parrish, Linda Ward, who gets involved with the tire smuggling operation. That happens when Helen unwitting answers a phone call telling her to announce a black-out, because of a possible Japanese or German air raid. This was done so that the killer of one of the main tire smugglers can go into action and knock off his victim and be able to get away, during all the confusion, while the light are turned out.On the run after being framed for at least two murders, Clark & Underwood, Eddie with the help of Helen, whom he calls every day on her radio show with song requests, uncover who's really behind these murders and it's someone very high up in the police department. This creep also want's to get in on the action, tire smuggling, by using his power and influence to protect the racketeers with a nice kickback of greenbacks for himself as a reward. I guess it's hard to put your kids through collage or get plastered with high priced booze every night on only a meager policeman's salary.Eddie saves the day and the country, from an acute rubber shortage, by uncovering who's the big man behind the rubber, or tire, smuggling racket and having him and his hoods put on ice together with the frozen tires that they were stealing. In the end pretty Helen Perrish, what a doll, promises to marry Eddie when he comes a marching home from the war. A war, WWII, that he has yet to have even participated in.

A private detective about to enter the Army investigates the murder of a cop by gangsters who are in the stolen tires racket. Along the way he is helped by Helen Parrish the pretty girl who plays records by request. I remembered her from You'll Find Out, a great old movie with Kay Kyser & Co.The cast does a good job and there are some recognizable faces. You will recognize Neil Hamilton who played Comissioner Gordon on the 1960s Batman series and Anne Jeffreys who played Marion Kirby in the Topper TV series. Also Esther Muir who was the blonde Groucho pursued in A Night At The Opera and Dick Wessel who was in many many old movies. Of course there are a few times when things don't exactly make sense but it's entertainment. A nice little B movie that moves along well and wraps everything up in under an hour. It captures the feeling of movies made around that time. Worth watching!I gave it a 6.