How sad is this?

A very feeble attempt at affirmatie action

A different way of telling a story

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Brought into the NYPD to break up a racket attempting illegal unions, Walter Abel has his hands full as he deals with the unknown element with far reaching involvement in bullying the truckers delivering goods all over the country. But this doesn't worry the head man (Humphrey Bogart) who has his ways of doing what he needs to do to keep the truckers scared. Among them are George Brent and Allen Jenkins who want no part of the racket, but aren't willing to squeal either. The rackets have sinister methods which range from destroying the breaks on the truck, blowing them up and beating up those who refuse to play ball. For one veteran trucker, he finds a date with death at the Union Square subway station where it is too crowded to have witnesses.Ever since seeing this as a teenager, the subway station scene remained vivid in my mind, and I often think of it while standing on crowded train platforms. Gloria Dickson as Bogart's wife and Penny Singleton as Jenkins' spouse offer typical wifely concern with the future Blondie quite aggressive in her characterization. Interesting detail of what the racket is all about and how the racket squad deals with them adds to the interest in this enjoyable B film from the very macho Warner Brothers which released at least a dozen of tough talking films like this each year.

Tough gangster movie with Humphrey Bogart playing a racketeer putting the squeeze on truck drivers hauling produce. The unlikeliest of all truckers, George Brent, tries to fight the mob but eventually is forced to cooperate. Brent is an ill-fit for a working class Joe but he does an admirable job. Allen Jenkins is fun as Brent's friend Skeets. Walter Abel is OK as a crusading DA, inspired by Thomas Dewey, but doesn't seem like a match for Bogie. Between him and Brent, neither really powerhouse personas, it's no wonder Bogie walks away with the film. From the very first scene Bogart's character is fed up with failure and wants to make it to the top by any means necessary. It's like they took all the gangsters he's played up to this point and rolled them into one, giving them a final chance to make it big. And no matter how bad he was to others in this, I was pulling for him. The rest of the fine cast includes Gloria Dickson, Penny Singleton, Henry O'Neill, Fay Helm, and Joe Downing. Nice action and characters. If, like me, you're a sucker for seeing old cars and trucks in action in older films, you'll get your fill here. Definitely worth a look for fans of the WB crime dramas of the 1930s.

This was the first Humphrey Bogart movie I ever saw when I was a young kid growing up in the 60's & 70's. I first discovered Bogie on "Humphrey Bogart Theatre" on TV. I was very impressed with his portrayal of a mafia style crime boss. Gangsters were once Bogarts specialty, he was good at it, this movie pre-dates "On The Waterfront" & is almost as good. The film opens with Bogart bent on wanting to take over the entire town & muscle in on the trucking business. "I got plans & I got organization", "nothings going to stop me", "I'll make this whole town pay off from blue-backs to bankers".This is Bogart playing the lead role as John "Czar" Martin, Manhattens most powerful gang chief, Bogie is very cold & ruthless in this one & it's clear he is the main character even though he's not in every scene, most of the film focuses more on the George Brent character as one of the truckers who complies with Martins underworld organization after Bogie's henchmen sets Brents truck on fire. Eventually he & Allen Jenkins rally all the truckers against Bogart in a free for all. It's a propaganda movie showing why unions were needed & organized in the 1930's but it also shows how corrupt unions can get by bribery & intimidation by the syndicate.The absence of Bogarts character doesn't really weaken the film but creates an interesting mystique for his character is much talked about but hardly ever seen which heightens & magnifies Bogarts exciting screen presence. Like in "The Petrified Forest" Bogie played a famous celebrated John Dillinger style outlaw. He doesn't enter the film until the 2nd half of the movie but his character is mentioned consistently from the very beginning of the film creating this mystique. Kind of a sense of mystery so you just sit & watch the movie just waiting in suspense to see when "Duke Mantee" first enters & dominates the movie from that point on."Racket Busters" does a similar thing with Bogart's character as "Czar" Martin & the gimmick works & for once Bogart doesn't get killed in the end unlike his other gangsters where he gets bumped off. Sometimes less is more, a character that lays low or not seen much makes the character that much more interesting & desirable. In "The Maltese Falcon" Floyd Thursby was a character much talked about all through the entire movie..... but never seen. I have a bootleg copy of "Racket Busters" & I don't think it's out on DVD yet, it should be because it's not too bad, it's a standard programmer & it's worth watching if you're a fan of Bogart & gangster films like I am. Racket Busters is the precursor to On The Waterfront. What more can be said ?

**SPOILERS** With his paid-off politicians and judges now swept into office big time mobster John "Czar" Martin, Humphrey Bogart, doubled his efforts to take over the trucker's union. It's the hard working and take no BS truckers that were still independent of Martin and his mob.Terrorizing most of the truckers into to joining his union, and kick back half their salaries to it, Martin hit a roadblock in tough and independent minded teamster Denny Jordan, George Brent. Denny saw Martain for the cheap and cowardly hoodlum that he really was and refused to be intimidated by him. That's until Denny lost his trucking business, by Martin's hoods putting the torch to it, and having his wife Nora, Gloria Dickson, end up with a sanitarium with a nervous breakdown because of it. With the governor appointed Special Persecutor Hugh Allison, Walter Able, looking to put Mattin and his organization out of business and behind bars Denny was the man he hoped, by turning evidence against Martin, to help him do it. As things turned out Danny in him not wanting to be a rat, or informer, even against a murderous thug like Martin decided to play it safe and not go before a Special Grand Jury and tell it of Martin's shake down and strong-arm activities. That in fact gave Martin a free hand to do anything he wanted to without fear of the law!What Martin wanted was to control the city's food supply with the truckers refusing to truck in any goods of the members of the food or produce industry who refuse to kick back to him. Not really caring about the truckers or their families but only using them for his own criminal purposes it became evident to former union chief Pop Wilson, Oscar O'Shea, that they'll end up without their jobs, and in many cases behind bars, after they finished doing Martin's bidding. By trying to stage a walkout on Martin and his corrupt union Pop ended up being pushed under the subway tracks and run over. It's then that the former union trucker and now tomato salesman Streets Wilson-no relations to Pop-played by Allen Jenkins picked up the ball that poor old Pop dropped. Streets tries to get the truckers to go against Martin's orders to boycott food distributors who refuse to play ball, that's in paying off, to him.***SPOILERS*** Streets courageous efforts to break Martin's vice-like grip on the truckers union did in the end cost him his life. But by him showing that being a free man, from Martin and his mobs control, was worth risking or,in Streets case, giving one's life for. It was both Pop's and Street's murders that finally got Denny and the truckers to get up off their behinds and take on the Martin Mob and finally put an end to the reign of fear and terror that he and hoods like himself used to get their way in both city and state government!