Simply A Masterpiece

Good movie but grossly overrated

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

Between Midnight and Dawn (1950) (Alert of spoilers) Edmond O'Brien is on the beat as a "prowl car cop" with his partner. It starts out good then delves into personal relationships and avoids anymore gritty noir. There's a decent car chase scene, some bad script continuity like the cops finding the car that shot up one of the main cop protagonists with ease and no stand out villains (think Lee Van Cleef in Kansas City Confidential (1952), Neville Brand in D.O.A. (1950) or The Mob (1951), William Conrad in The Killers (1946) and Richard Widmark in Kiss of Death (1947).) The ending is ridiculous as well, since one lousy main bad guy (Donald Buka) takes a young girl hostage and one hundred cops show up with searchlights.Edmond O'Brien is his usual big-mouthed self, annoying us plenty; he's better as a villain.Still, worth a look for the old city view (Pacific Electric Building, Los Angeles, California (1905)) and lovely Black and White Film.City That Never Sleeps (1953), a Republic Pictures noir with Gig Young as a cop on the beat, is a lot better.

Two patrol cops, one a light-hearted rookie (Mark Stevens), the other a cynical veteran (Edmund O'Brien), are old army buddies who fall for a pretty new secretary (Gale Storm) in their division and together escort her out for a night on the town. She is determined not to fall in love with a cop, having watched her mother ("Batman's" Madge Blake) go through losing her cop husband in the line of duty, but sweet mama interferes to the point of renting the second half of their duplex home to the two, frustrating Gale who wanted to steer clear of the two entirely outside of the office.Dominating the sugar-coated situation comedy of this plot line is the determination to bring down a local crime kingpin (Donald Buka) who has resorted to violence in order to prevent his organization from being taken over by an even more ruthless mobster. This leads to one of the two cops being brutally murdered and the determination of the killer to escape from prison and seek revenge with the help of his nightclub singer girlfriend (Gale Robbins). This leads to a tense stand-off at the end involving Buka, Robbins and a screaming little girl whom Buka uses as a shield in order to get away. The mood changes drastically from the brief foray into light-hearted slapstick to gritty street drama, and the violence is actually quite graphic. It's not a great film, but certain sequences will have you on the edge of your seats.

I found this movie to be very enjoyable to watch. There was no masterful overriding story, but it moved along at a good pace, was quite genial and had no faults. It might be called an early "procedural" in today's lingo: lots of radio squad car scenes, beaming messages in cop talk back and forth, well photographed auto chase scenes and shootouts. The directing, script, acting and cinema-photography were superior. In the movie the cops were all righteous and the criminals all incorrigibly bad. Three things stood out for me, favorably: (1) I was always a big Gale Storm fan, stemming from my childhood watching of "My Little Margie" re-runs on TV (Gale was the co-star of the TV show, and part of the romantic triangle in this movie). (2) The repartee was often witty and jocular and never off-putting. For example, on an early date, Officer Rocky Barnes (played by Mark Stevens) is having his first dance with Gale Storm, and, holding her tightly he says, "I've been waiting a long time for this." She replies, "I can believe it. I feel a rib cracking." He responds, "Oh, control yourself, Barnes. This lady's got to last." (3) The relationship between the two police partners (Stevens and Edmond O'Brien) was friendly and jocular. It was nice to observe their respect for each other. Both were quite competent. O'Brien was the more serious, cynical and hard on criminals. Stevens was more relaxed and sensitive to criminals' feelings.

An American Cinematheque presentation at The Egyptian.B-movie, second-feature that plays as a cross between classic noir and serial melodrama. As such, it's easy to see how it's often credited with being a predecessor of the police procedural.Stevens and O'Brian play two likable LAPD patrol cops. Gale Storm the wholesome new dispatch girl who keeps their attention at night. Most of the movie deals with the growing and affectionately written romance between Stevens and Storm, making the whole thing seem at times like a vintage episode of 'Payton Place'. But make no mistake, we're in noir territory, and it's only a matter of time before we're dealing with gangsters, their molls, heartbreaking tragedy and small children being held from eighth floor windows.The leads are so charismatic, and the writing so sharp, that it's almost impossible not to like this film. Another little post-war gem of a movie.