Rent The Glass Key (1942)

a smack of gangsterism - The Glass Key review by Cato

Not as good as I expected, in that I was hoping for a little more in the way of acting from Alan Ladd, or perhaps the character he was playing. The part was of a bodyguard to Brian Donleavy, but the reasons for that set up were not really spelt out enough for non political types like me. It all smacked of gangsterism, although I suppose times were rougher then. Anyway, for all the beatings up from the great William Bendix in this his first film, it wasn't a hit for me.

Good Film Noir - The Glass Key review by LE

You can see why Kurosawa said it was an influence for Yojimbo. A man playing off two criminal factions against each other - although for a different motivation. There are also very similar plot points to the Japanese film. Can't quite work out what the 'Glass Key' is referring to as a title but I like that sort of ambiguity. Ladd is such a strange leading man, but that strangeness gives the film a distinctive quality. Lots of homoerotic undertones. I'd never heard of Stuart Heisler but he has created a pleasingly strange genre picture here. Worth seeing. Unfortunately the commentary by Barry Forshaw is comically poor. He makes a few factual errors which is bad enough but doesn't even attempt to refer to what's happening on screen at all. After 30 years you'd think people would now know what the purpose of a dvd commentary is and not just use it for a rambling monologue. Commentate on the film we're watching. The production company shouldn't really have let it go out tbh. Fortunately there is a brilliant video essay by Alastair Phillips to make up for it. Very interesting perspective which enhanced my appreciation of the film.

Dirty Politics. - The Glass Key review by Steve

Knotty hardboiled whodunit which pulls together diverse strands from a few recent box office hits. Brian Donlevy is top billed as a crooked political heavy, much as he was in The Great McGinty in 1940. Alan Ladd- as Donlevy's smooth finagler- and Veronica Lake are reunited following This Gun for Hire earlier in '42.

And it's faithfully adapted from a Dashiell Hammett novel, a year after The Maltese Falcon. Though the context is more like a '30's gangster film. It had been made already back then with George Raft, which is where this convoluted exposé of civic corruption really belongs. There's a whiff of Prohibition.

The political process is ostentatiously run by hoods. There are no good guys so there's no one to cheer for, which may be why it doesn't quite emotionally engage. And there isn't the sadness of film noir. The best features are William Bendix's baroque portrayal of a sadistic thug. And the really stylish direction from Stuart Heisler.

He gives us a couple of astonishing, eye-popping set pieces. And once you have the measure of the serpentine intrigue, there is suspense. Ladd and Lake look good together and there's a lot of fast, sardonic dialogue. It's not in the class of The Maltese Falcon, but still a decent minor crime thriller with something to say about dirty US politics.