99 River Street 1953 Screenplay by Robert Smith, direction by Phil Karlson. I'd started watching this on YouTube and quickly I knew I had seen this film before. I thought I'd seen it more recently, say the last 3-4 years, but it was in January 2011 that I last set eyes on it. Surprisingly, for me, I remember many scenes quite vividly.
It's a nice crime drama with a solid cast, a great screenplay and nice production values. John Payne is a New York City cab driver, that's him with Frank Faylen on the left, Frank is the manager of the cab company. Frank's career started in 1936 and ended in 1978, sadly most people would know him for being the father of Dobie Gillis in The Many Loves Of Dobie Gillis. John used to be a champion boxer but an eye injury retired him from the ring. His wife, Peggy Castle set on gold digger eleven, isn't happy working to help keep a roof over their heads. She thinks she should be living the good life, she would but for her stumble bum husband. That's Peggy with John in the picture on the right. She sure looks like someone wanted to escape her life.
Peggy takes up with the criminal scumbag in the picture on the left. That's Brad Dexter, he's been in a lot of entertaining films and TV shows. He plays a creepy villain here. That's Evelyn Keyes with Paul in the other picture. They've just discovered Paul's been framed and the police are on the way. Now he's on the run, looking for a crook, and Evelyn is helping him out. It's touch and go, there's other players in the mix. Not a nice crowd at all.
I liked it the second time around, as much as the first. I'd certainly want to watch it again sometime. You can see a nice copy on YouTube in the link above and for those that like it enough, there's a Kino Lorber DVD available.
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