Too much of everything

Simply Perfect

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

A DANGEROUS PROFESSION is a rather disappointing slice of film noir starring gangster favourite George Raft. Raft plays a former cop now working as a bail bondsman who is persuaded by a femme fatale to help raise the money to get her innocent husband out of prison. However, on his release the plot thickens, and Raft finds himself up against some sinister criminal types if he wants justice to be served.The plot is an interesting one and all of the ingredients are right, so it's just a pity the execution is so sloppy here. A DANGEROUS PROFESSION is anything but dangerous: there's endless talk, a bored-looking Raft wandering around aimlessly for a long while, and not much else. It lacks suspense and a sense of pace to keep it moving along, and instead it just feels stodgy. I did like Ella Raines as the alluring femme fatale, though, and Pat O'Brien is always watchable.

"A Dangerous Profession" is a decent enough film...the sort mildly entertaining stuff that George Raft made in the post-war years. It begins with Vince (Raft) working as a bail bondsman along with his partner (Pat O'Brien). Apparently Vince used to be a cop but decided to change careers. Why he wanted a change soon becomes apparently when his old girlfriend, Lucy (Ella Raines) shows up to try to bail her stupid husband out of jail. This IS a surprise...as Vince hasn't heard from her since she disappeared some time ago...nor did he know she was married...and had been when he knew her! Of course it's a surprise but Vince is a dope...so he helps her and her dopier husband. But when the husband soon is murdered, things get really, really confusing. So what's next?This is a mildly interesting film but it suffers a bit from Raft's relatively dull screen persona as well as his being a bit too trusting to be realistic. The story also becomes a bit confusing and is, if you think about it, a bit like a reworking of "Casablanca"! Odd but worth seeing if you like old film noir movies.

Bail bondsman George Raft gets in over his head when he bails out robbery suspect Bill Williams, the husband of an old girlfriend (Ella Raines). This puts him up against various factors on both sides of the law including a fellow former partner (Jim Backus, ultra-serious here) and officer Pat O'Brien. As he gets further involved in his ex-girlfriend's life and finds out information on Williams, the pieces of the puzzle get more puzzling, resulting in a murder.This is certainly watchable, if a sometimes dull film noir/mystery, the audience getting equally as confused as Raft as he tries to wrap everything up. The intro lesson on how the bondsman works is interesting, but perhaps a different case with more developed characters and less people involved in the first place. Still, lighting and shadows provide the right atmosphere, and Raft's detective work is appropriately seedy. One of the people whom Raft interviews slightly looks and very much sounds like Werner Klemperer of "Hogan's Heroes" even though he is not listed in the credits for this film.

A career police detective turned bail bondsman (George Raft) meets his ex-flame (Ella Raines) (he knows it's her because of the scent of the perfume that's in her and her husband's hotel room which he and detective Jim Backus search) in a fairly intricate story about her husband (Bill Williams) whose arrested for suspicion of killing a cop and then bailed out by Raft, against the wishes of his partner (Pat O'Brien). Why he's bailed out and who actually comes up with sufficient money to get him out of jail make for interesting viewing. As well, Ella Raines hits some of her more sultry looking scenes in this movie, which may not be the best movie she's ever been in, but still percolates along more than acceptably, especially when the real killer emerges as the sharp little film heads out of LA and into a convenient canyon.