Richie-67-485852 George Raft has his own style of doing things unique unto him which makes for memorable movie watching. Throw in a decent story, some dames and someone trying to kill someone and you have Hollywood doing what it did best in the 30's, 40's and 50's. Imagine you were out for the night and wanted to catch movie, this would be one of thousands that the studios would churn out. Here we have Raft playing a straight shooter and a mystery of mysteries just pops up right in front of him and becomes personal as it unravels. Ships at sea, fog, large amounts of money, women, bad guys, good guys and various sound affects soon weave a tale of entertainment. I recommend a sandwich with a tasty drink plus some delicious personal candy favorite for this little gem. By the way, it was always the custom for the good guy to get the girl in many movies of that time because that is what was going on more often than not. No exception here and the only thing is, which girl? Also, you had to be good with your fists and guns were last resorts or no fair. Enjoy

Chris Hansen Johnny Angel was a movie that gripped me early and tightly, but when all is said and done left me wanting a bit more.The characters are first rate: George Raft is plays your trademark noir good guy with rough edges leading role and does so very nicely. Claire Trevor plays a calculating woman with a heart of ice that only Johnny can melt. Both give very strong performances; I felt that they could have used some more development, but I almost always do with these types of movies. Hoagy Carmichael is a first rate supporting character in Celestial O'Brien, a quirky, musical taxi driver. He is right up there with my all-time favorite secondary characters. The rest of the cast is decent, not nearly as strong as the above three, but not weak enough either to really detract from the movie.The overall feel of the movie is superb. The cinematography is generally dark and gritty (as is typical in the genre) and really draws you into the scenes and gets you emotionally involved. The scene where Johnny is searching the ship by himself was especially excellent, it had me on edge the whole time. The director, Marin, really did a first-rate job on the film, and it's worth watching just for the acting and the direction.The story had good points and bad points. The basic plot line is quite good and fairly fresh, considering the usual formulaic plots noir often gives you (not that I mind terribly). Other comments will give you the basic plot outline, so I'll skip it, but let me say that it is, at first anyways, even more interesting than you might think. The problem is, the movie doesn't quite flesh out all of the aspects of it and leaves several loose ends and plot holes. It's really exasperating, and almost made me rate the movie even lower, but I won't spoil the plot here by mentioning the specific holes. It's hard for me to fathom why the movie starts out so strongly and then ends so sloppily! I believe it was based on a play, so perhaps the play script got a bit mangled as they tried to fit it into the feature film/noir mold, or there were budget problems. It is a rather short movie, they certainly had time for more plot and character development.But, all that aside, it is a very solid film that is well acted and directed. Even if though the thought of what it could have been is frustrating at times, the plot still never fails to keep you interested for the length of the film. It probably won't go in my collection, but I would still recommend it to anyone who likes classic movies or noirs to give it a watch.

mjrobbins111 Confusing script, poor acting and unrealistic New Orleans setting lead to very disappointing movie. Coincidences abound and long boring exposition scenes are required to tell the story. George Raft much too old for his character and, seemingly, much to bored to make a real effort at acting. Miss this one.

ctb-2 George Raft plays the good guy for a change, and Claire Trevor plays the villainous femme fatale in a nicely done mystery. This was the first time that I remember seeing Signe Hasso in a film, and I very much enjoyed her performance as the subject of George Raft's rescue, and romantic interest.