This modestly budgeted gangster movie can be seen as a sequel of sorts to Warners' earlier Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond, with Ray Danton doing an extensive reprise of his Diamond role. The interesting part is that here, Diamond is portrayed as a successful, wealthy, almost respectable businessman type, and not the ambitious small time hoodlum of the first movie. He is shown as the established gangland authority figure to whom the younger, on the make Dutch Schultz comes for a job. Diamond is shown giving orders to his henchmen in a palatial office/home, but not carrying a gun himself. His amused, condescending attitude toward Schultz is contrasted with the belligerent, hard nosed behavior of Schultz and his pal Bo Wetzel as a couple of street toughs.
Morrow makes Schultz a believable and more than one dimensional gangster character. He is nasty and crude, coldblooded, vain, greedy, and yet capable of an unexpected charm and shy awkwardness at times. It's a performance that makes the character capable of surprising behavior, sometimes generous and well meaning, with a basic crudity that never quite goes away. Morrow's playing, and the writing, might remind the viewer a little of Rod Steiger's characterization a couple of years earlier in the biographical Al Capone.
The one weakness of the movie is the character of the police detective who ends up on Schultz's payroll. This rather annoying character is perhaps played a little too convincingly by Peter Breck as a spineless boozer, whose wife ends up for a time as Schultz's mistress, though he regains a bit of integrity at the end.
Norman Alden is quite good as Schultz's sidekick Bo Wetzel, with effective turns by other gangster movie veterans like Frank DeKova in various mobster roles. This is a movie definitely worth checking out for fans of Twenties gangster stories. A preachy attitude underlies the action, mixed oddly with a black comedy approach that makes for an interesting contrast in the presentation of the movie's subject.
Morrow makes Schultz a believable and more than one dimensional gangster character. He is nasty and crude, coldblooded, vain, greedy, and yet capable of an unexpected charm and shy awkwardness at times. It's a performance that makes the character capable of surprising behavior, sometimes generous and well meaning, with a basic crudity that never quite goes away. Morrow's playing, and the writing, might remind the viewer a little of Rod Steiger's characterization a couple of years earlier in the biographical Al Capone.
The one weakness of the movie is the character of the police detective who ends up on Schultz's payroll. This rather annoying character is perhaps played a little too convincingly by Peter Breck as a spineless boozer, whose wife ends up for a time as Schultz's mistress, though he regains a bit of integrity at the end.
Norman Alden is quite good as Schultz's sidekick Bo Wetzel, with effective turns by other gangster movie veterans like Frank DeKova in various mobster roles. This is a movie definitely worth checking out for fans of Twenties gangster stories. A preachy attitude underlies the action, mixed oddly with a black comedy approach that makes for an interesting contrast in the presentation of the movie's subject.