A flood of new theatrical releases has left me with little time of late to watch DVDs, but I do have a quick review of an interesting RKO B-movie and a video chat with Linda Blair, star of the “Exorcist,” out today on Blu-ray.
“Bunco Squad” (1950), one of the more obscure Warner Archive Collection releases of late, is an above-average noir entry from RKO’s B-movie unit, which was soon to be rendered obsolete by TV. Indeed, the film’s star, Robert Sterling, who had once been groomed for stardom by MGM — he played Clark Gable’s brother in “Somewhere I’ll Find You” (1942) before World War II interrupted his career — would appear in just one more major movie (seventh billed in the “Showboat” remake) before launching into a long career in TV, most notably as the star of “Topper,” rarely returning to the big screen for outings like 1962’s immortal “Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.”
Here Sterling’s a hotshot detective on L.A.’s bunco squad, assigned to expose a phony spiritualist (Marguerite Churchill, John Wayne’s leading lady two decades earlier in “The Big Trail”) whose shady boss wants to separate an old lady (Elisabeth Risdon) from her millions by offering the old lady contact with her recently deceased son. Sterling’s campaign involves his partner (Douglas Fowley), his actress girlfriend (Joan Dixon, making her debut in an undistinguished career that ended eight years later, playing John Wayne’s wife in his brief cameo at the end of RKO’s unfortunate George Gobel vehicle “I Married A Woman”) and Dante the Magician (Laurel and Hardy’s “A Haunting We Will Go”), who seems to really enjoy playing himself.
The generic premise is directed with great skill and pace (it’s 68 minutes long) by the severely underrated Herbert I. Leeds (nee Levy) who toiled on all of Fox’s B-movie series in the late ’30s and early ’40s. The head of the spiritualist gang is expertly played by Richardo Cortez (nee Jacob Kranz), who after this retired from the screen and joined a Wall Street brokerage firm, returning to acting only for John Ford’s “The Last Hurrah” (1958) and an episode of “Bonanza.”
Cortez, who minus his usual toupee looks a lot like Stanley Tucci, was originally hired by Paramount in the ’20s as a replacement for Rudolph Valentino, but the brother of great cinematographer Stanley Cortez (“The Magnificent Ambersons,” “Night of the Hunter”), but with some notable exceptions (as a Jewish doctor in “Symphony of Six Million”) spent much of the ’30s and ’40s playing detectives (Sam Spade, Perry Mason) or criminals. Ricardo also very competently directed seven B-movies for Fox in the late ’30s, but completed his contract at the studio playing suspects in the Charlie Chans series.
Above is the interview with Linda Blair. I haven’t yet had a chance to watch “The Exorcist” Blu-ray, but I did see the fascinating behind-the-scenes footage demonstrating how the film’s groundbreaking effects were achieved without digital assistance in 1973. Blair joins in the commentary with director William Friedkin and cinematographer Owen Roisman, under whose supervision this never-seen footage was shot.
