They Drove By Night
– US, 1940
The entrepreneurial spirit hovers over most of Raoul Walsh’s
1940 road film They Drive By Night,
and it is both a blessing and a curse. I say this because while it inspires
people to dream of economic freedom and security, it also acts like a siren,
calling normally sensible men to accept sometimes dangerous tasks simply
because they get them a step closer to their all too elusive goals. It is this
danger that worries the housewives and girlfriends left behind by their
journeyman husbands, and it is this danger that ultimately pushes some into
much more stable 9 to 5 jobs, jobs which lack the sexiness of being a rig
runner but which put people at the kind of ease that is difficult to put a
value on. It is this incongruity that makes one character in the film curse
that her husband was in an accident in one breath and thank the heavens for it in
another.
The film tells the tale of Joe and Paul Fabrini (played by
George Raft and Humphrey Bogart), two rig runners with dreams of finally taking
charge of their lives. Their dream, in keeping with the times, is a rather
small one: owning two or three rigs and running a shipping business with them.
At the start of the film, their dream has them in debt and, in Paul’s case,
extremely sleep-deprived. Regardless, Joe’s dream remains in tact. As viewers
hear Joe and Paul discuss their plans for the future, they are also shown their
alternative – working for an established trucking company, a job with would possible
give them steady work but leave them with little chance of moving up in the
world.
At a diner frequented by truckers, Joe and Paul meet Cassie
Hartley (Ann Sheridan), the diner’s sassy, no-nonsense waitress. The scene in
which this character is introduced is slightly uncomfortable, for as much fun
as it is to watch Cassie fend off the flirtations of her male customers – and those
of her employer apparently – the scene is a reminder of just what women have
had to endure over the years and subsequently why movie characters like Joe
must have seemed like every woman’s dream. She ends up heading with them to Los
Angeles, and along the way, she and Joe bond in a sweet and slightly realistic
way.
If the film had kept its focus on Joe and Paul’s dream, as
well as Joe’s relationship with Cassie, I have no doubt it would work much
better today that it does. However, while the first half builds up the dream of
making it on one’s own, the second half moves away from it completely. In that
part of the film, we find Joe in the kind of job we never thought he would take
while simultaneously being pursued by a character much more appropriate in
piece of film noir than a road movie about real world issues. It’s as if
Hitchcock’s screenwriters got a hold of the script and said, “What this script really
needs is a murder.” It didn’t.
Also dating the film is its inclusion of two characters
purely for comic relief, an unfortunately common occurrence in early dramas.
The first character is a truck driver known as Irish (Roscoe Karns). For some
reason, his character has a particular odd attachment to a pinball machine, and
I’m not sure how that could have been funny even back in 1940. The second comic
character, Ed Carlsen (Alan Hale), is slightly less confounding. He’s a former
trucker who worked his way up the corporate ladder without losing one iota of the
trucker inside him. When we first see him, he sticks his head out the window of
his corporate office to watch a fist fight. As he offers both play-by-play
analysis and in-fight coaching, he resembles a kid getting his first look
inside a candy store. Ed is a pivotal character, yet he tells some of the worst
jokes you’ll hear in a film. Even stranger is the fact that the crowd he
travels with howls in appreciation. Perhaps they’re just kissing up to him.
I have no doubt that some viewers will find the second half
of the film extremely enjoyable. For me, it strays too far from the social
themes that the first half of the film works so hard to establish, resulting in
a film that will likely be remembered more for its noir elements than for its
social commentary. It’s a pity, really. The film is well acted throughout, and
Bogart, here featured in a supporting role, demonstrates just why he would be
elevated to A-list status a year later. Sheridan is memorable in a role that
requires her to show both her rough and soft sides, and Ida Lupino gives a
credible performance as Joe’s pursuer, Mrs. Lana Carlsen. As for the film’s
climactic scene, it only works if you belief that Lana, with all of the money
she possesses, would hire a completely incompetent lawyer who doesn’t question
his own witnesses beforehand and who doesn’t know how to protect his own case. If
that’s your idea of realism, then have at it. (on DVD)
3 stars
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