Armored Car Robbery

Armored Car Robbery (1950)

Runtime: 68 minutes

Directed by: Richard Fleischer

Starring: Charles McGraw, Adele Jergens, William Talman, Douglas Fowley

From: RKO

Here is another film noir seen by me, and another one I rate pretty highly (4 stars in this case). Onto the Letterboxd review, and I'll be back early Tuesday night with something special:

This film was watched by me today for a few reasons. I had heard of it before as being another film noir from the director and star of The Narrow Margin. Its straightforward title was amusing to me. I was glad it was only barely more than an hour long. And, it's available on Warner Archive Instant. Thus, this day was perfect for me to check it out.

The plot is as to the point as its title; four nefarious characters (led by a man calling himself Purvis, played by William Talman) get together to perform the title act. Of course, one of them does it for a dame and she plays a bigger role in the story than you'd expect. They pull off the heist and kill a copper; his partner Lt. Cordell (the hardest of hard-boiled, played by Charles McGraw, who was great at it) is quite determined to capture them, w/ the help of his new wet behind his ears partner.

The movie is no-nonsense and you get nothing but how the criminals get together to pull off the robbery that happens right outside a baseball stadium during a game, the criminal act itself then its ramifications, including in-fighting among the crooks and the cops working the case trying to crack it, and you get to see them go step by step through the clues and they are aided by some mistakes from the bad guys.

I enjoyed how things were no-nonsense and they got down to brass tacks and you saw 68 minutes of the case from the beginning up to its memorable conclusion. McGraw and Talman are great as the lead face and heel and the rest of the cast does admirably.

It has the standard hallmarks you'd expect in a film noir so if you enjoy the genre and/or rate The Narrow Margin highly you really should watch this. Plus, I am sure it's leagues better than the 2009 Nimrod Antal film Armored!