Lively, entertaining reviews of, and essays on, old and newer films and everything relating to them, written by professional author William Schoell.

Thursday, May 11, 2017

RADAR SECRET SERVICE

"Remember me, I'm your boyfriend." Adele Jergens, Tom Neal
RADAR SECRET SERVICE (1950). Director: Sam Newfield.

The "Radar Patrol," which uses radar in its war on crime, is after some uranium which was stolen by Mickey Moran (Tom Neal of Bruce Gentry) and sold to a man named Michael (Tristram Coffin). Hard-boiled blonde Lila (Adele Jergens) is supposedly Mickey's girlfriend, but she's playing up to Michael to help Mickey -- although she may be planning a double-cross just as Michael is. Bill Travis (John Howard) and his partner "Static" (Ralph Byrd) are the agents on the case. Riley Hill is a hood named Blackie; Myrna Dell [Why Men Leave Home] is his girlfriend, a waitress named Marge; and the ever-irritating Sid Melton is "Pill Box," a hypochondriac member of Michael's gang. There's some mild excitement at the climax; a good laugh when Marge makes a comment about how Lila really gets rid of her boyfriends after she sees Michael's corpse; and an inside joke when Ralph Byrd, who played Dick Tracy numerous times, makes a remark about "Dick Tracy's two-way radio." The good guys are called Radar Patrol throughout the movie, and not "Radar Secret Service," possibly because there was a serial called Radar Patrol vs. Spy King two years earlier.

Verdict: Pretty dull cops and robbers, but at least it's less than an hour long. *1/2.

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