Can you feel a chill in the air? A shiver in the bones? The distant weep of newborns? That’s because Monogram Studios, the most detestable cheapjack over-producer of franchises of all the 1940s, is at it again, offering up their 4-F equivalent of the popular Dead End Kids and Little Tough Guys franchises.
It begins in 1940, as producer Sam Katzman simply noted a similarity of successful films. No gold star for him, these movies all starred the same kids, but there’s more. These were melodramas on juvenile delinquency, with more formula elements than you would think necessary. But Sam would.
Most important is a numerical constant, that these films must always have six starring boys in them (because it’s what’s been done). Now, Universal had already bent the rules when making Little Tough Guy, as only 4 of the 6 “Dead End Kids” were available. Ah, but for Monogram, and their proposed new troupe of “East Side Kids” (originality points – 0.0), there were no former “Dead End Kids” on tap. (The Dead End Kids series having ended in 1939 while still good.) If you think that’s gonna stop the unscrupulous creativity vampires at Monogram, you do not understand this studio’s nefarious ways.
To lend some quantum degree of credence to their endeavor, Monogram nabbed up one of the spurious actors from Little Tough Guy to be their headliner: Hal E. Chester. Even then, Monogram hadn’t the cachet to get the other pseudo-“Dead Ender,” David Gorcey. Instead, they took on Harris Berger, the 10th most important of the 11 “Little Tough Guys.” These were their stars, folks, the “boys” expected to earn the inaugural “East Side Kids” film (East Side Kids) its bread.
Rounding up the cast of six, ‘cause there’s gotta be six, damn it, they just tossed in…eh, four other aimless children:
Donald Haines was a child actor in the 1920s, meaning by 1940 he was still struggling to maintain that gig (that’s called a stubborn refusal to accept reality). He was in the Our Gang series, better known as the Little Rascals – a series of shorts, keeping it out of this blog’ crosshairs. Like many an otherwise unemployable actor gone to seed, Haines found regular employment at Monogram. He was killed in action during WWII.
Frankie Burke has been in a Dead End Kids film, but not as a “Dead End Kid.” Rather, he was in Angels with Dirty Faces playing a young James Cagney, so well did Burke model his entire existence upon the man. This is a good casting call.
Sam Edwards was a…was a…a radio actor. That is all.
About # 6, Eddie Brian, nothing is known.
This is not the set-in-stone “East Side Kids” troupe – over 22 films, 20 actors would float through. However, with East Side Kids, the trap was set, and soon actual “Dead End Kids” would fall to Monogram. The popularity, skill and chemistry of these more-famous faces is what lent the East Side Kids franchise its relative longevity (and noted prolificacy). But it had to start somewhere. All in all, here’s what the franchise has to offer:
1. East Side Kids (1940)
2. Boys of the City (1940)
3. That Gang of Mine (1940)
4. Pride of the Bowery (1940)
5. Flying Wild (1941)
6. Bowery Blitzkrieg (1941)
7. Spooks Run Wild (1941)
8. Mr. Wise Guy (1942)
9. Let’s Get Tough! (1942)
10. Smart Alecks (1942)
11. ‘Neath Brooklyn Bridge (1942)
12. Kid Dynamite (1943)
13. Clancy Street Boys (1943)
14. Ghosts on the Loose (1943)
15. Mr. Muggs Steps Out (1943)
16. Million Dollar Kid (1944)
17. Follow the Leader (1944)
18. Block Busters (1944)
19. Bowery Champs (1944)
20. Docks of New York (1945)
21. Mr. Muggs Rides Again (1945)
22. Come Out Fighting (1945)
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East Side Kids is not substantially different from the Warner Brothers Dead End Kids movies, in terms of content. It’s the same tale of boys being fought over by the forces of law and crime, with a healthy dose of directionless melodrama ala Little Tough Guys. The differences lie in the Monogram approach, the quality of the actors, director (Bobby Hill – that boy ain’t right), and screenwriters.
The individual scenes are muddled, remarkably fast, and purely expository. They last mostly 20 seconds each, a sign of very poor writing, when the Dead End Kids films had elegantly constructed, multi-purpose scenes. (And Dead End, as a stage adaptation, barely had any cuts.) Events happen, it is never confusing per se, but the movie’s point beyond mere plot is never clear. The emotions are understated, if they’re even there. Even individual snippets of dialogue sound like mere, imitative pastiche of period gangster clichés. It is all a watered-down aping of superior films, without an understanding of how they work. (It’s Monogram, baby!)
The yarn is that old standard about a man, Knuckles Dolan (Dave O’Brien), wrongfully convicted of murder – to go by ‘40s cinema, actual murderers are never caught. Anyway, police inspector Pat O’Day (Leon Ames, who’d soon actually escape Monogram for real movies) thinks someone in the Dolan family is keeping tight-lipped about the real killer, for ill-stated reasons having largely to do with being “yeller.” In order to solve this case “for the kids on the street,” Pat resolves to start a successful “Jr. Police” boys’ club for Knuckles’ younger brother Danny (Berger) and his fellow East Side Kids.
So starts the remarkably lame central thread, a dramatization of YMCA-styled juvenile rehabilitation. Without any publicly-recognized “Dead End Kids,” the script is overeager to assure audiences these hooligans are “just good kids” who are “good at heart” and “only mean good” and overall are “good” because Monogram couldn’t afford thesauri. It is the underlying social point of this subgenre, of no interest today except for historians.
Pat is on the side of, yes, good. On the side of…let’s say “bad,” for a lack of invention, is Milton “Mileaway” Harris (Dennis Moore). This guy isn’t 1/100th what James Cagney was in Angels with Dirty Faces, as he has no use beyond plot – like all this film’s figureheads. Mileaway is a counterfeiter, and the actual murderer, and his big scheme involves, um, er, befriending the East Side Kids in order to vaguely embarrass Pat. I dunno, I welcome back the classic Monogram villains, without motivation or plan or sense. (East Side Kids is perhaps in the upper echelons of the studio’s output, by the way.)
The East Side Kids (Danny, Dutch, Skinny, Peewee, Mike, Pete), all newly assembled actors asked to mimic a hideous Joisey jivin’ they just aren’t comfortable with, resort to a stilted cacophony. I cannot see what the audience draw in this was, as the real troupe is pretty grating already with their “Shaddup, ya mug!” attitude and air of entitlement. Okay, whatever, it seems for no reason there is always a purposeless scene where a wealthy kid is hassled by our favorite street toughs, and never mentioned again. This served (or “soived”) a purpose (or “poipose”) in Dead End, with its socio-economic narrative. Here it’s just a waste of scant time, as moneyed brat Algernon “The Mouse” Wilkes (Jack Edwards) is as far removed from actual human behavior as the East Side Kids, but in the other direction.
Unnecessary hassling over with, the East Side Kids move on to necessary hassling, thrashing about a German (or “Goiman,” read: Nazi) shopkeep who, frankly, is just as hateful in his mule-like refusal to compromise as these other characters are. He gets Pat in trouble with the cops, for stupid reasons, and also reveals Knuckles’ imminent execution. This upsets Danny, who thought Knuckles was “in South America.” Where’d he get that idea from?!
Now Danny understands his own narrative, how he must rescue Knuckles via delinquency. I’m too tired to probe the logical steps here, but let’s say Danny teams up with Mileway to achieve this in vague terms (or “toims”), because at this point they need the villain to “tempt” the kids.
Mileaway’s first (or “foist”) task – for Dutch – is to switch out a parcel over in police HQ. So over they all go, Mileaway and all six children, accomplishing this while the police captain hopes to have a comprehensible dialogue scene – Ha! And when the parcel – a $5 counterfeiting plate – is now found to be blank, the captain accuses Pat, because it’s the narrative point where a hero cop is lambasted, so there is something to “overcome.” Man, Monogram saps my élan.
Some stuff happens with different kids and their radios, to little end. I don’t know what that was about, but this “20 second scene” approach surely must make 62 minutes of film a real challenge to fill up.
Time passes, as very vague scenes transpire with indistinguishable characters walking through rooms and down sidewalks. A strong authorial voice is sorely lacking.
Then Mileaway’s next chore for his teenaged henchmen gives me something to latch onto. He has a criminal buddy, a “classy gentleman,” hand the boys stacks of flyers to pass out throughout the neighborhood, advertising the grand opening of Morton’s Depression Era Junkery, or something. He even admonishes “I don’t want ‘em shoved down a sewer.” It is a sign of my sudden fatigue that this was inexplicably hilarious. Heh heh heh, “shoved.”…Sorry.
A montage depicts the passing of the ads – or at least, it seems a montage. It could just be the impatient pacing style. I mean, I didn’t see a single spinning newspaper! It turns out that hidden within these ads were wads of counterfeit simoleons, a strange plan to pepper the slums with bad cash.
For some damn reason, Pat is implicated in this (see his similarly unfounded accusations above), and he goes on the run from the law. The police captain actually now starts putting out radio announcements demanding the swift deaths of both Pat and Danny (why Danny?!), and Pazuzu only knows if this moment has a context in the overall film.
Those similarly context-free radio kids appear again, presumably to foil the captain’s radio transmission. This is just a guess, as I do not understand 1940s radio technology just as a ‘30s bootlegger wouldn’t be able to follow the cell phone usage in Scream.
What next? Skinny, a lesser East Side Kid even in this troupe of nothing but lesser East Side Kids, goes to a…to a house, to deliver a…thing to a…person. I think. (This thing’s as badly assembled as 21 Grams, and that was intentional.) Streetsahead – excuse me, Mileaway is here, acting blandly, and Skinny manages to parse out that he’s the villain. Because the movie is 80% over. Then Mileaway pulls out a pistol to shoot a cop who is suddenly right there, and runs off, though I swear it’s done so poorly I only figured it out minutes later when other characters stand over this cop’s body, and helpfully exposit what just took place. And with Mileaway now wantonly shooting up the streets at large, a manhunt is organized – for Pat! Um, guys…
The East Side Kids decide they need to chase Mileaway in a car. Algernon, the Mouse, is reintroduced solely so he can provide our heroes with a car, because that’s the only way that was gonna happen, right? One car follows another, Danny hostage in Mileaway’s car (as they in fact quip they must be a “mile away” – the cleverest line ever in a Monogram motion picture!). It’s played like a raucous car chase, but even 1940 audiences would be unimpressed. It’s called speed-cranking, guys, and it’s ok in your era. Use it!
Danny makes the car crash, and Mileaway does his best (read: worst) James Cagney impression as he rushes into a tenement and shoots it out with the coppers. Dutch (the Huntz Hall wannabe) of all people gets a sudden surge of civic responsibility – spurred on by the fake cereal police badge on his chest (!) – and rushes up to the rooftops to do climactic battle with Mileaway. Why not Danny, or Pat? You know, a major character.
Maybe it’s because Dutch falls to his death. (Whoo!) Mileaway is arrested, no thanks to Dutch, and confesses to the killing Knuckles was accused of and yadda yadda happy ending. Except Dutch is suddenly dead, for no reason, and with no emotional resonance and no fallout, in yet another arbitrary moment which characterizes this film.
East Side Kids was at a disadvantage from the start, since it has a pieced-together anti-cast, and Monogram does not make good movies as a rule. They are cheap bastards, devoting so little cash to their own efforts I’m certain I spent more money today watching this thing (I rented it from Netflix, and ate some popcorn). Oh, and the script was likely written in the same amount of time as this write-up. But, as stated, this was just meant to get Monogram’s leaden foot in the door of the “let’s rip off Dead End” subgenre. That’ll get the attention of the still-active “Little Tough Guys,” and start their slow acquisition from Universal. Pray for their souls.
Related posts:
• No. 2 Boys of the City (1940)
• No. 3 That Gang of Mine (1940)
• No. 4 Pride of the Bowery (1940)
• No. 5 Flying Wild (1941)
• No. 6 Bowery Blitzkrieg (1941)
• No. 7 Spooks Run Wild (1941)
• No. 8 Mr. Wise Guy (1942)
• No. 9 Let's Get Tough! (1942)
• No. 10 Smart Alecks (1942)
• No. 11 'Neath Brooklyn Bridge (1942)
• No. 12 Kid Dynamite (1942)
• No. 13 Clancy Street Boys (1943)
• No. 14 Ghosts on the Loose (1943)
• No. 16 Million Dollar Kid (1944)
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