Night Court (1932)

Good movie but grossly overrated

For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

In the Pre-Code Era MGM at Least Tried Once in a While to be Socially Relevant and Concerned. In This One the Studio Ventured Into WB Territory with a Rather Nasty Story About a Corrupt Judicial System at the Bottom Level, the Night Court.A Good Cast Makes the Most of this Heavy Melodrama About a Married Couple with an Infant being Sucked Into This Cesspool of Corruption Only Because of Proximity. What Goes On Here is Not Pretty to Look At. Some Pre-Code Situations are Exploited to Explain the Frame-Up with Prostitution On Display Throughout This Rather Ugly Picture of Depression Era Folks Being Railroaded by the System and the Authorities. The Odds are Overwhelming and Only Determination and Some Luck Can Get Them Out of It.Aside from the Heavy Drinkers and Undraped Females the Film Contains Some Brutal Beatings and Truly Evil Characters. At One Point Judge Walter Huston Says..."Get me some Bad Boys, some Really Bad Boys!". Some of the Story is Gut-Wrenching when it Concerns the Happy Couple's Baby. The Movie is Not Easy Entertainment and Tries Mightily to Make a Statement About Some Social Concerns at the Time. The Ending May be a Tidy Wrap-Up but it is a Welcome Relief and Although Just a Fictional Placebo, that's About All a Movie Can Offer.

In 1931 Frankenstein and Dracula were thrilling audiences. But neither is as scary as 1932's Night Court because the events depicted here could really happen to you and me. Philips Holmes and Anita Page do the best work of their careers, first as a loving married couple, and later as desperate persons undone by a corrupt system. Things go from bad to worse and still worse until it seems there is no hope for the couple - torn apart, imprisoned, assaulted. Walter Huston plays the villain wonderfully until his over-the-top mad scene. Holmes' acting at the climax must be seen to be believed - absolutely perfect. There are many instances of horror in films of the period but Night Court maintains this fear from the moment Page opens the envelope. This film is a class act, better than Public Enemy or Scarface in its depiction of corruption. It deserves to be better known.

Disregard the mundane title, this is a good movie. The website classifies its genre as a crime/ thriller picture, and it is exactly that. It stars Walter Huston, arguably America's best actor, as a terminally corrupt judge who is interested in self-aggrandizement and self-promotion. Rotten to the core, he victimizes a young couple with a baby he suspects knows something about his lurid after-hours affairs. Huston has never been better when at his worst and runs up against a good guy (in this case, a good judge), who, as they used to say in the 30's, wants to 'get the goods' on him. Good Guy Judge is played by Lewis Stone (Judge Hardy, of Andy Hardy fame).Things get worse before they get better, and the scenes with Anita Page, as the young wife arrested on a phony charge, are hard to watch. Phillips Holmes plays her husband in one of the best roles of his short career (he was the cowardly weasel in "An American Tragedy").The movie, made so long ago, is outdated particularly in the resolution of the cases that come before Judge Moffett. Defendants are held and tried at breakneck speed, often with out benefit of counsel. As we know, the wheels of justice grind very slowly nowadays. And everybody has at least one lawyer.Do yourself a favor and get past the unimaginative title - this film is proof that you can't judge a book by its cover, or a movie by its title.

Odd what one sees in these old crime dramas. This one is pretty good, with star Walter Huston in particularly villianous form as a corrupt judge and the long- forgotten Phillips Holmes as the cab driver who brings the hammer of justice down on the jurist. But what sticks in my mind now is the harrowing situation of an innocent young family torn apart by the judge's efforts to elude a special prosecutor, resulting in mom Anita Page framed for prostitution and their baby wailing in an orphanage. Still watchable. We should all look this good at seventy-plus.