OUTSIDE THE LAW (1956)

Berlin, 1946. Johnny (Ray Danton) is in his last few days with the postwar American occupying forces. Back home, he was a convict who, along with his prison buddy Harry, was given a chance at freedom by joining the military. One night, Harry says he can't join Johnny for a beer; we then see Harry approach two men in a car and give them a package. He clearly expects some money from them but what he gets is a bullet that kills him. Not long after this, a glut of counterfeit money starts showing up in the States, and treasury agents think that Harry was involved in a counterfeit ring. When Johnny gets to Los Angeles, he is approached by T-Man Maury Saxton to help investigate with the promise that his criminal record will be wiped clean. The problem is that this necessitates him working with his father Alec (Onslow Stevens). The two have a stormy past but Johnny agrees to the job. They know the paper used for the near-perfect bills comes from Seattle, and as they narrow down the possible local purchaser, Johnny's mission is to get close to Harry's widow Maria (Leigh Snowden) to see if she knows anything. Johnny and Maria hit it off and he finds out that the two had a hasty marriage in the States before Harry went overseas and she really barely knew him. But she's friends with a shady character named Don Kastner (Grant Williams) who seems neurotically jealous of Johnny. At Papa Gomez's restaurant, Johnny and Maria have dinner and grow close, with Maria remarking on Johnny’s "deep, warm, lonely eyes" and they share a kiss. Papa Gomez lets Don know (the two have a connection that is not clear to us yet), and that night Don and some thug friends break into Johnny's apartment. The thugs beat the shit out of Johnny while Don stands in the dark with an excited leer on his face. Alec has singled out the Philip Bormann import company as the likely supplier of the counterfeit paper, and it turns out that both Maria and Don work there. Johnny heads to the office to punch out Don. When Johnny’s dad figures out that Johnny is serious about Maria, he tries to take him off the case, but Johnny won’t rest until justice is served. 

I am pleased yet again with another B-movie discovery from the 1950s. Some call this noir, but it's not, with Johnny’s criminal past being the only noir element. It's a crime film which borders on hard-boiled, largely because of the ass-kicking Johnny gets. It's a good scene, made memorable by the almost lustful look in Don's eyes. Grant Williams (Don), pictured at left, is best known as the Incredible Shrinking Man, and though he's good in that, this is probably his best movie role—he was also a detective in the Hawaiian Eye TV series. Don is a slimy, passive, neurotic bully and Williams brings him vividly to life. The handsome Ray Danton is just as good in the lead (he's in almost every scene) but less showy role of Johnny. The treasury agents are a homogeneous bunch of white men in suits, acted in appropriately low-key fashion, but Onslow Stevens does manage to stand out as Johnny's father. Though the father-son relationship remains thorny, there is the promise of reconciliation in the final moments. As often happens in these films, the leading lady (Leigh Snowden, pictured at top with Danton) is underserved by the writing but she does work up some chemistry with Danton. I like that the father and his colleague Maury (Judson Pratt) have enough of a friendship presented that you could almost imagine a buddy movie centering on the two of them. Raymond Bailey (Mr. Drysdale on The Beverly Hillbillies) is solid as the suspicious Philip Bormann. I fear overselling this—it's no timeless classic, but I sure enjoyed it as a Saturday afternoon B-film. Online critic Colin Edwards says the movie is nothing special but is a professional and "efficiently well-made piece of entertainment" and what's wrong with that? Directed in a non-fussy manner by Jack Arnold (Shrinking Man, Creature from the Black Lagoon). [Blu-ray]