Highway 301 is a terrific and kinetic crime film, the first such film Andrew Stone made after starting out with innocuous musicals and comedies. Although in some ways it looks like a film noir (deserted rainswept streets at night) it lacks the fatalism and moral ambiguity of that genre; it's more a gangster film in the Warner Brothers tradition, as the police track down the Tri-State Gang, led by obvious psychopath Steve Cochran. There is no backstory of how the gang came together, they just move from one robbery to another in three different states, and there are few details of how they choose their jobs. Cochran has no scruples about shooting his girlfriend (Aline Towne) in the back when she starts to object to his crimes. The first part of the film is devoted to the gang's crimes and the second part to the gang's attempt to kill Gaby Andre in the hospital after Cochran plugs her in a taxi when she tries to escape the gang after her lover, gang member Robert Webber, is killed by the police (he told her he was a salesman). With the help of cinematographer Carl Guthrie and his high-contrast black-and-white photography and editor Owen Marks, Stone (who also wrote the screenplay) keeps this programmer moving quickly without skimping on the suspencse. Like other crime films of this period (Call Northside 777 in 1948, The Phenix City Story in 1955) the film has a narration as well, in this case an introduction by the govenors of three states and brief comments at the end by Edmund Ryan, who plays a police sergeant in the film, that "you can't be kind to congenital criminals."
No comments:
Post a Comment