The Saint In New York is the first of the RKO films with Leslie Charteris' character The Saint. It's a 1938 movie with Louis Hayward as Simon Templar. Hayward would return to the character in the 1953 film The Saint's Girl Friday, which is also known as The Saint's Return. George Sanders would take over the character in the second RKO film and remain for 4 more sequels. George would go onto play The Falcon for RKO and he'd be replaced by Hugh Sinclair for the last two films.
In 1937 Alfred Hitchcock met with RKO, he was interested in directing the film, but it was directed by Ben Holmes in the end. Charles Kaufman and Mortimer Offner wrote the screenplay based on the 1935 Charteris novel of the same name.
There's plenty of crime in New York City and the crime commission is out of ideas. One members suggests fighting fire with fire and he talks Simon Templar into coming to New York to fight crime. The Saint decides he likes the idea and agrees to break up the powerful underworld gang at the head of the crime wave. In his first act Simon saves the life of Police Inspector Henry Fernack, played by Jonathan Hale, and the two men become friendly. I always enjoy Jonathan as Inspector Fernack. The Saint rips up the underworld gang and leaves a trail of dead crooks lying around. He catches the head of the gang, the secretive Big Fellow, in a big reveal at the end of the film.
It was an entertaining film with some fights and some quips. I liked Hayward as The Saint, he's more like the character in the books of the time. The script is pretty good and there are a few good character actors in the cast. Keep an eye out for Jack Carson, Sig Ruman, Charles Halton and Paul Guilfoyle.
Sadly, there doesn't seem to be a reasonably priced DVD in the US, there is a DVD on Amazon UK that goes from £13 for a used copy to £39 for a new one. The only DVD listed on Amazon US is the UK one and the seller is asking nearly 80 bucks. I was lucky enough to find a descent download the other day. It's better than the copy from Turner Classic Movies I'd have. Since it's been more than a decade since I watched the movie, it was a good reason to check it out once again.
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