High Tide

There are B movies from the forties, and then there are really good B movies from the forties. This one belongs in the latter group. A good case could be made that it is among the best B films ever made. It has editing flaws to be sure, and some of the dialogue is corny and there are throwaway lines, but the primary plot and set-up for the film are first-rate. It will keep you guessing from beginning to end, and I guarantee you that you will most likely be guessing wrong, like I did. And I usually don't guess wrong in these films. That alone should tell you something about the plot. Good luck trying to guess the man (or woman?) who is the secret killer.

"High Tide" is a crime film that in many ways seems like film noir. While it doesn't have the terrific camerawork you'd expect with noir, the snappy dialog, violence and dark tone of the film make it noir in my book.

The film begins with two men after a wreck tosses them and the car into the surf. Tim (Don Castle) has a leg pinned under it and Hugh (Lee Tracy) is too badly hurt to move. The tide is coming in and the two men appear about to drown...and then the film goes back in time to eventually show you how the two men got into these straits.

The story that follows is about a newspaper...which isn't surprising considering Tracy played reporters in films more than any actor I can think of right now...but it clearly must have been a few dozen times. Some hoods are apparently chasing after Hugh and so he hires Tim to investigate and be his body guard. Soon Hugh is shot, but survives...but the owner of the paper is killed. Instead of waiting for the cops to investigate the case, Tim does what is common in B-movies of the day...he investigates himself and soon becomes a suspect in the crime. What's next? See the film.

I liked the story very much and the acting as well. However, be prepared to feel a bit confused about the surprise ending! Tim apparently figures out the entire conspiracy even though logically it was difficult for him to have done so. So, I say watch this still good film and just accept the twist on face value and don't question it.

"High Tide" is a totally obscure but wonderful B-movie film noir from the Monogram mill. It opens with a car careening off a desolate seaside cliff -- its two occupants (Lee Tracy and Don Castle) injured and trapped in the wreckage. As the turbulent tide quickly threatens to engulf them, the events leading up to their predicament are recounted -- a twisty tale of a cynical, crusading newspaper editor (Tracy, naturally) taking on the mob while the high-living owner frets. The latter has even more problems when Tracy hires his jaded wife's ex-lover (Castle) as a private investigator.

Solidly directed by John Reinhardt (who also triumphed with another seedy, minimally-budgeted Monogram noir called "The Guilty"), the dialog is snappy but eloquent, there are plenty of venetian-blind shadows, silhouetted figures and moody low-key lighting, and the plot is nicely unraveled. Only the annoying library-style music lets the side down (lending it that inevitable "B" quality, of course). Tracy was playing out the string on poverty row at the time, but his wry staccato readings and weary-but-steadfast demeanor are a perfect fit here.

Private eye Tim Slade (Don Castle) and newspaperman Hugh Fresney (Lee Tracy) are trapped by their car crash. They wait for their deaths with the incoming high tide. The movie flashes back. Fresney had been writing columns against gangster Nick Dyke. Dyke goes over Fresney's head to make a deal with his boss Clint Vaughn. Fresney hires Slade, "good reporter gone wrong", to join his crusade.

Normally, I love me some film noir. I like the opening premise. Maybe Slade could be trapped in a more precarious position. The waves should be slapping his face to elevate the intensity. In general, I'm not feeling these characters. They are very noir stereotypes. It's falling a little flat but I still like the overall tone. It's a borderline case.

...but then I always love watching Lee Tracy at work, so that does make up for the lackluster execution of what could have been a good little mystery.

The film opens in an interesting manner with two guys at the site of a wrecked car with the tide coming in. They are both injured and sure to drown if something or someone does not intervene. It is obvious from the conversation that one of them is the bad guy but which one? This is to get your interest, then the film cuts to the back story which amounts to the entire movie.

Lee Tracy plays Hugh Fresney, editor of a Los Angeles newspaper. Somebody takes a couple of shots at him and the owner of the paper, Clinton Vaughn, one night, and Fresney is not sure whether the shots were meant for him or for Vaughn, so he calls up an ex-employee of the paper (Don Castle as Tim Slade) to investigate the situation. However, the reason for Slade being an ex-employee is that he was in love with Clinton Vaughn's wife, and in fact, still seems to be so. There are lots of side spats and odd goings on that keep you guessing until the entire thing is unraveled in a monologue that is delivered at such a machine gun pace that you will have to rewind a couple of times to catch everything.

Another problem is that just about every player in this film is so anonymous that it is hard to keep track of who is who, plus a couple of the players are so physically similar to one another that you won't be able to tell which character is actually on screen at the time. Then there are characters that show up, do or say something odd, and are never mentioned again. There is the question as to why Slade is so vital to solving this case when he was just a reporter before, not a P.I., and why the investigating police detective, played by the not so anonymous character actor Regis Toomey, seems so impotent and pig headed about everything. He's a great cartoon of a cop, but not much of a problem solver. Finally there is Julie Bishop as Julie, a secretary who only shares a couple of scenes and a couple of sentences with Slade, yet she seems to gather from him saying "You should see the lights of San Francisco some time" - Slade's new hometown - as a proposal...and she is right? Usually they have a name for girls who make such assumptions and that name is stalker, but here it is fiancée! I'd watch it for the weirdness of it all and for Lee Tracy, who gave every role his all. It's just too bad he blacklisted himself from A list productions back in 1934.