Release Date: February 13, 1937
Running Length: 71 minutes
Starring: Pat O’Brien, Sybil Jason, Humphrey Bogart
Directed By: William Dieterle
Pat O’Brien stars in this remake of The Making of O’Malley (1925) about a police officer so determined to uphold the law that he fails to see the human element behind the laws. He has no problems citing people for such minor infractions as a shop awning being 6 inches too low or a boot black having too many stools at their stand. His rigidness has made the citizens, most of them good honest people struggling during the depression, to be weary, or fearful, of him. His commanding officer tries to teach him to temper his judgements with mercy as strict adherence to the law will only lead to the people mistrusting the peace officers. “We need the people on our side,” he admonishes but O’Malley feels that he is just doing his duty.
This leads to an incident where he pulls over John Phillips (Humphrey Bogart) for driving his car with a busted muffler. Despite his pleas that the delay will cause him to be late for his first day at a job he desperately needs, O’Malley cites him causing him to lose that job for being five minutes tardy. This spirals into a crime of opportunity where Phillips steals from a unsympathetic pawn broker and gets arrested leaving his wife and crippled daughter without support of any kind.
O’Malley is chastised for how he handled the situation and, failing to see what he did wrong, is given an assignment designed to motivate him to quit the force and rid the police of his merciless interpretation of the law. From here there are no real surprises where the story goes and anyone who stops to think about this story will have the entirety of it figured out right out the gate. Therein lies this films greatest weakness.
Pat O’Brien is fine in the leading role. He genuinely comes across like a man who feels he is in the right, even when it is obvious he is being too literal in his enforcement of the laws. He gleefully reads through the law book looking for minor infractions to cite those around him, even going so far as to threaten his mother with a citation when she goes to toss some crumbs out the window for the birds as it is illegal to throw anything out into the street.
Bogart is equally great as the unfortunate John Phillips who starts out happy to have finally found work during the depression only to turn bitter and frustrated to have all that snatched away from him over a simple busted muffler. His theft at the pawn shop is made more sympathetic by being punctuated by a nasty pawn broker who doesn’t hold our sympathies in the slightest.
A major highlight is child actress Sybil Jason who at one time was considered a real rival to Shirley Temple. She is perfect here as the young daughter to Phillips who suffers from a broken leg that was never properly set and therefore cannot run and play with the other kids in her class. Her scenes late in the film where she must convey the frustrations and sadness of being left out are real highlights to an otherwise rote second act. Watching her act it is easy to see how she could have challenged Miss Temple for America’s little princess.
As mentioned earlier, this film offers no real surprises and doesn’t try to challenge itself to be more that a simple morality tale. Even so, it is a charming little film that is never boring and is just short enough to not overstay its welcome. It’s breezy and inoffensive , just not very deep and thought provoking.
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