Racket Busters

Racket Busters
1938 - Warner Brothers
Directed By Lloyd Bacon



SYNOPSIS

Gangster Pete Martin (Humphrey Bogart) makes moves to control the produce market in New York. He starts by targeting the trucking business. This angers many truckers including popular driver Denny Jordan (George Brent.) Martin threatens to harm Jordan's pregnant wife (Gloria Dickson) if he doesn't join Martin's new truckers union. Jordan bends and loses many friends in the process... but how many of them must be beaten and killed before he sees the light and helps to kick the gangsters to the curb?



MY THOUGHTS

An enjoyable, but non-essential, Warner Brothers gangster film from the 30's.

Humphrey Bogart is at his snarling bad-guy best here... making the most out of very little. His character has only one ambition - to take control of the city's food supply. That is all he's used for. We never learn anything else about the character. It's very one dimensional. Bogart played thugs like this left and right during this time in his career and always turned in a solid performance despite the weakly written characters. This part was weaker then most. He was given top billing but George Brent, as the hero, has more screen time. Bogart isn't on screen long enough to light up a smoke (I don't recall him smoking once in the film which must have been a departure for him!)

Brent's character is much more fleshed out and he even has a character arc where he grows learns and changes. Brent does a suitable job but the character seems to be all over the place. At the beginning he's a cynical and wisecracking happy-go-lucky type. Once he's 'gone to the dark side,' he does a 180 and is cold, wooden and dull. Such a drastic change doesn't seem realistic at all.

Realism is what the screenwriters were going for here. The scenario seems like it was ripped from the headlines of the day and cobbled together and rushed into a screenplay. With a little more time the script could have been much better... and less predictable.

The magic of the Warner Brothers gangster films does add some needed gloss to the production, as do many familiar faces like Allen Jenkins. The costumes and good use of the studio's backlot add a lot to the production values of this B-movie.

This film is not available on DVD.