An Offer You Can’t Refuse #17: Murder, Inc. (dir by Stuart Rosenberg and Burt Balaban)

Posted on July 4, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman

We all know the famous line from The Godfather. “I’m going to make him an offer he can’t refuse.” Of course, everyone also knows that “It’s not personal. It’s strictly business.” There’s another line that’s almost as famous: “One lawyer with his briefcase can steal more than a hundred men with guns.” That line comes from Mario Puzo’s novel. It’s never actually used in the film though it’s certainly present as a theme.

The idea of organized crime essentially being a huge corporation is hardly a new one. In fact, it’s become a bit of a cliche. Nearly every gangster film ever made has featured at least one scene where someone specifically compares their illegal activities to the day-to-day business of politicians and CEOs. However, just because it’s a familiar analogy, that doesn’t make it any less important. It’s hard not to think of organized crime as being big business when you consider that, in the 30s and the 40s, the mafia’s assassination squad was actually known as Murder, Inc.

Murder, Inc. was formed in Brooklyn, in the 30s. It was founded and initially led by a man named Lepke Buchalter. Lepke was a gangster but, because he was Jewish, he couldn’t actually become a made man. However, he used that to his advantage when he created Murder, Inc. The organization was largely made up of non-Italians who couldn’t actually become official members of the Mob. The major mafia families would hire Murder, Inc. to carry out hits because they knew that, since none of the members were made men, they wouldn’t be able to implicate any of the families if they were caught by the police.

It was a good idea and Lepke and his band of killers made a lot of money. Of course, eventually, the police did catch on. A member of the organization by the name Abe Reles was eventually arrested and agreed to be a rat. Lepke went to the electric chair. Reles ended up falling out of a window. Did he jump or was he thrown? It depends on who you ask.

19 years after Reles plunged from that window and 16 years after Lepke was executed, their story was told in the 1960 film, Murder, Inc. Lepke was played by David J. Stewart while Reles was played by Peter Falk. The film is told in a documentary style, complete with a narrator who delivers his lines in a rat-a-tat-tat style. We follow Reles as he goes to work with Lepke and as he harasses a singer (Stuart Whitman) and his wife (May Britt), forcing them help him carry out a murder and then allowing them to live in a luxury apartment on the condition that they also let Lepke hide out there. (It’s probably not a surprise that a professional killer wouldn’t turn out to be the best houseguest.) Eventually, a crusading DA (Henry Morgan) and an honest cop (Simon Oakland) take it upon themselves to take down Murder, Inc.

To be honest, there’s not a whole lot that’s surprising about this film but it’s still an entertaining B-movie. The black-and-white cinematography and the on-location filming give the film an authentically gritty feel. The action moves quickly and there’s enough tough talk and violent deaths to keep most gangster aficionados happy. The best thing about the film is, without a doubt, Peter Falk’s portrayal of Abe Reles. Falk is magnetically evil in the role, playing Reles as a man without a soul. Even when Reles finally cooperates with the police, the film leaves no doubt that he’s only doing it to try to save himself. Falk plays Reles like a tough guy who secretly knows that his days are numbered but who has convinced himself that, as long as he keeps sneering and threatening people, the rest of the world will never figure out that he’s been doomed all the time. The more people he kills, the higher Reles moves up in the corporation and the more he tries to take on the look of a respectable member of society. But, no mater how hard he tries, Reles always remains just another violent thug. Falk was deservedly Oscar-nominated for his performance in this film, though he ultimately lost the award to Spartacus‘s Peter Ustinov.

Murder, Inc. may be a low-budget, B-movie but it’s also a classic of gangster cinema. It’s an offer you can’t refuse.

Previous Offers You Can’t (or Can) Refuse:

Psycho-Killer: Peter Falk in MURDER INC. (20th Century-Fox 1960)

Posted on April 5, 2018 by gary loggins

cracked rear viewer

American filmgoers have had a long love affair with the gangster movie. The Pre-Code era was riddled with rat-a-tat-tat tommy gun action from Warner Brothers, MGM, and the other studios, helping to make stars out of Edward G. Robinson , James Cagney , Clark Gable , and a host of movie tough guys. Things quieted down once the Code was strictly enforced, but the gangster was still around, sometimes in comedy masks as likeable lugs, deneutered yet always lurking on-screen in some capacity.

By the late 1940’s, film noir introduced us to a darker vision, one seething with murderous rage. Cagney in WHITE HEAT, Robinson in KEY LARGO , and virtually everything Lawrence Tierney was in showed us gangsters were no “swell guys”, but anti-social psychopaths. The 50’s saw the gangster relegated mainly to ‘B’ status, just another genre to pit the good guys against the bad guys. Then in…

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Cleaning Out The DVR Yet Again #38: The Baby (dir by Ted Post)

Posted on December 7, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Lisa recently discovered that she only has about 8 hours of space left on her DVR! It turns out that she’s been recording movies from July and she just hasn’t gotten around to watching and reviewing them yet. So, once again, Lisa is cleaning out her DVR! She is going to try to watch and review 52 movies by the end of Thursday, December 8th! Will she make it? Keep checking the site to find out!)

On October 30th, I recorded The Baby off of TCM.

First released back in 1973, The Baby is a seriously strange little movie. It’s about a 21 year-old man named Baby (played by David Manzy). Why is he called Baby? Because he lives in a crib. And he wears a diaper that occasionally needs changing. And he sounds exactly like a baby. (Whenever he opens his mouth, the sound of an actual baby is dubbed in.) When he’s alone with his babysitter, he eagerly sucks on her breast, half-nursing and half-perving.

Baby is the only son of Mrs. Wadsworth (Ruth Roman, giving a chillingly evil performance). Mrs. Wadsworth was abandoned by her husband shortly after Baby was born and the film implies that she’s taken a lot of her hatred towards her ex out on her son. Despite not liking her son, Mrs. Wadsworth is determined to hold onto him. She gets a weekly welfare check from the state. The money is supposed to be used to take care of Baby but Mrs. Wadsworth uses it to take care of herself and her two daughters.

Who are her daughters? Alba Wadsworth (Suzanne Zenor) is an implied nymphomaniac who has a way with a cattle prod. Germaine Wadsworth (Marianna Hill) is an actress and model who, it’s suggested, has incestuous designs on her brother.

That’s right — they’re a messed up family! However, they do throw great parties, the type that are full of all the typical characters who you would expect to appear in a low-budget film from 1973. Hippies, hipsters, aspiring disco dancers, they all show up. Michael Pataki shows up as well! You my not know the name but if you’re a fan of 70s exploitation films like me, you’ll immediately recognize Michael Pataki.

In order to continue receiving money from the government, the Wadsworths have to impress their case worker. They’ve moved through several social workers and, for the most part, they’ve survived by being so strange that no one wants to spend too much time dealing with them. However, their case has just been assigned to Ann Gentry (Anjanette Comer) and she actually takes an interest in Baby and his life with the Wasdworths.

Ann says that she thinks Baby could benefit from going to a special school. The Wadsworths suggest that she mind her own business. Ann, however, has no intention of doing that. Ann refuses the give up on giving Baby a chance at a better life.

Sounds heart-warming, right?

Well, no.

At first, Ann seems like just another concerned do-gooder. But, at the film progresses, we start to suspect that Ann might have some secrets of her own. We’re told that she lost her husband in a car accident but the details are left intentionally vague. What we do know is that Ann lives in a huge house with her mother-in-law (Beatrice Manley Blau) and we find ourselves wondering why, if her husband is gone, are the two of them still living together.

We also fin ourselves wondering: Does Ann have Baby’s best interests in mind? For that matter, does anyone?

Being a 70s movie, it all ends with a violent home invasion that’s followed by a surprise twist. The twist caught me totally off-guard and forced me to reconsider everything that I had previously seen. It was shocking, it was borderline offensive, it was just a little bit ludicrous, and it was rather brilliant in its odd way.

The same can be said for The Baby as a whole. This is one weird movie and you’ll never see another like it. For that reason alone, The Baby is worth seeing at least once.