Vice Squad (1953)

hyped garbage

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Arnold Laven's VICE SQUAD is a 1953 "police procedural" B that follows LA police chief Edward G. Robinson around for a day and he sees it all: a patrolman shot, a marriage bunco, pickpockets, an "escort service", a bank heist, police snitches, and other flotsam and jetsam with some harmless insanity and adultery thrown in for good measure. It's all in a day's work for the chief, a no-nonsense man with a kind side (reminiscent of Robinson's "Asa Keyes" only less verbose) who gives everything from misdemeanors to murder raps the attention they merit and even manages to squeeze in an appearance on a TV talk show (cut short, of course, when he finds out the cop died). He's got time for everyone and always gets his man but the methods the police use would cause rioting in the streets today. Oh well, the ends justify the means and it's all for a good cause at the end of this day. Actors like Eddie G., Barbara Stanwyck, and a host of others always did their professional best in these kinds of '50s B's which makes them a pleasure to watch even if the movies themselves aren't so hot. This one's not bad with the LA locations and unsung character actors (milquetoast Porter Hall, sinister Lee Van Cleef, sweaty Adam Williams, and an uncredited Percy Helton) all helping to raise it a notch above the routine. The billed-above-the-title co-star Paulette Goddard didn't hurt, either, and makes the most of her brief scenes. She's a sassy "escort operator" in sunglasses and mink that was probably based on "Hollywood Madam" Brenda Allen, in the news at the time for testifying before a Senate subcommittee hearing on police corruption in LA. Those hearings became the basis for William McGiver's THE BIG HEAT, which was made the same year and, in fact, VICE SQUAD seems like a "good cop/bad cop" counterpoint to Fritz Lang's brutal noir.

EDWARD G. ROBINSON viewed this period in the early '50s as his B-film era, but VICE SQUAD is an efficient, if low-budget product that gives him a chance to show his stuff in a story about the day to day activities of a police precinct in '50s L.A. PAULETTE GODDARD gets top female billing in what is essentially a cameo role as her career was obviously in decline at this point. She's sassy and brittle as the head of an escort club who agrees to cooperate with Robinson's police investigation.Robinson is seen adroitly handling a number of sticky situations, including the death of a policeman and the reluctance of a witness to talk; the discovery that a bank heist is about to take place; and the effect of the cop killing on a gang of car thieves. It's interesting to catch an early glimpse of LEE VAN CLEEF as one of the car thieves.There's a film noir look to Joseph Biroc's first rate B&W photography with excellent use of light and shadows and it's directed in brisk style by Arnold Laven. All of the intertwined stories are smoothly coordinated but the tension doesn't start building until about forty-five minutes into the bank heist sequence.Actually the police tactics shown are pretty underhanded, so it's not exactly a flattering portrait of police procedures--but they do seem credible.Packs just as much suspense as another crime melodrama with a New York locale--THE NAKED CITY. The shots of L.A. in the early '50s establish atmosphere from the start. Well worth viewing.

Vice Squad starts off like a sip of espresso: dark, strong, with a scorched aftertaste. But soon it grows lukewarm. It had the makings of a solid ‘50s crime drama but dilutes them with quirky human-interest vignettes that bear no relation to the central story. Less film noir than a dutiful police procedural, it looks like an attempt to reprise the more intense Detective Story of two years earlier.Still, it's not a bad movie, if humdrum, centering on the killing of a cop by two members (Ed Binns, Lee Van Cleef) of a gang planning a bank job. All the plot strands lead to Chief of Detectives Edward G. Robinson (did anyone ever enunciate English more precisely?). Among them are witness Porter Hall, reluctant to get involved because he was seeing his mistress (Joan Vohs); his big-shot, big-mouthed attorney, Barry Kelley; ritzy madam Paulette Goddard, deputized to pick up information from clients she and her girls `escort;' reluctant stoolie Jay Adler; and gang member Adam Williams, who's losing the nerve to go through with the heist. Populating the more remote subplots are Percy Helton, who thinks he's pursued by `television shadows' and a phony Italian `Count' pulled in for marriage bunco. The bank job comes off, but not quite as planned, as plainclothes police are planted on the scene. But Binns and Van Cleef manage to nab a hostage....The busy plot advances clearly enough (despite some lapses in continuity: The mistress' name is `Vicki' in an address book but `Vickie' on her mailbox). The most arresting part of Vice Squad are the scams, subterfuges and outright blackmail the police use to pressure witnesses to talk. They're presented not as expedient short-cuts to find a policeman's murderers but as routine – business as usual. In that regard it reflects the super-patriotic climate of America during the Red-Scare years, though there's not a Communist in the movie, let alone any suggestion that officers of the law may be overstepping their bounds.

If you're old enough to remember L.A. in the early fifties, this is particularly fun. Lot's of location stuff, downtown, Long Beach or San Pedro. And the bank robbery takes place in Beverly Hills on Camden or Roxbury Drive, just below Little Santa Monica Blvd. Edgar G. Robinson is great as always. It's a cousin to Noir, lots of great faces and character acting. They couldn't afford a lot of sets, or any star beyond E.G.R., which is part of the charm of the movie. And if you like Detroit when it still had character, you'll love the great early fifties cars.