Evening star., 1951-01-12

about the picture is that it did not
turn out very we'll. AS the police
men, Edmond O'Brien and Mark
Stevens, and their girl, Gale
Storm, end up as less the victims
of nighttime maurauders than of
a totally uninspired film script.
They run through lot of motions
sand emotions whose sum total
is little more exciting than yes
terday's weather report.
This cannot have been the fate
Columbia Pictures expected for a
film designed to show how life
goes for such useful public serv-
ants.
There is promising opening
sequence in Between Midnight
and Dawn" Against the silhou-
cite of a sleeping city, voice tells
the audience that the FBI and
other super-sleuth types make fine
movie heroes. But. the voice goes
on to say. there are other pro-
tectors of the public peace and
security. the local police who
always get there first.
These. are represented by O'Brien
and Stevens two eX-Marine bud
dies in the Pacific. who constitute
the crew of Patrol Car 13. ,O'Brien I
the more mature of the pair, is
the dedicated policeman who hates
disturbers of the peace, mean
souled humans who push around
innocent and helpless types. Ste
vens takes the world considerably
more light-heartedly.
AS he sees it, there is more to
life than the simple conflict be-
tween good and evil; considerable
part the extra value represented I
by Miss Storm as the girl he is
bent upon marrying. She is the
daughter of a police captain who
died in the line of duty and SHES
away from a repetition of her
mothers painful widowhood. /
The principal enemy of the
peace and happiness Of these two
officers and of every one else along
their beat is fashy young hood
1um whose racketeering business
IS conducted from a pretentiouS
nightclub.
This cut-rate villain of count
less screen melodramas is as con-
ventional as pretzel and not a
great deal more interesting. He
Is the kind of rat who likes to
slap down blond night club sing
ers, murder his business rivals.
and is not above threatening to
kill trusting little girl to break
out of a police trap. His major
dramatic weakness is that there
have boen so many other, and
worse, heels in the same kind of
movies
The thinness of the basic script
of Between Midnight and Dawn"
has dictated to Director Gordon
Douglas that he had better build
1t up with whatever he can lay
his hands on.
It turns out there is not much
of this latter either, but Douglas
struggles considerably to make
something of the romance The
fact is that the first As minutes
of his film is consumed with
Stevens and Miss Storm trying
to make something of the most
listless courtship dialogue heard
all season.
When the picture comes right
down to it. there is little Of the
Romeo-Juliet dramatic favor
about the approach of police
man to the heart of the girl of
his choice For the serenity of
humanity, no doubt this is a good
thing but as material for a movie,
1t is not what Between Midnight
and Dawn" hopes it will be.
X X X
The best parts of the film at
the Warner are those which show
with documentary clarity the
workings of radio-directed po-
lice patrol system. To this end,
Columbia Pictures obviously had
the full cooperation of the Los
Angeles department which has an
ADJUSTMENTS.