As pointed out by David Shipman in his book on movie stars, the blacklist knocked Edward G Robinson off the A list for a number of years, but some of the lower budgeted films he made during this time such as Illegal have proved surprisingly durable, particularly on television.
He plays a DA who quits prosecuting after sending an innocent man to the chair and becomes a defence lawyer.
Robinson uses a variety of flashy techniques in his new career – he punches out a witness, takes poison, blackmails a business owner – but gets in over his head when his protege (Nina Foch) is tried for murder.
The script is from two top writers, James Webb and W.R. Burnett (writer of Little Caesar). The cast is full of familiar faces – Chief from Get Smart, Bones McCoy from Star Trek, one of the assassins from North by Northwest, Hugh Beaumont, Jayne Mansfield.
Like a lot of films from director Lewis Allen, it’s fast paced and unpretentious – although I’m confused by the ending, does Robinson die or not? It implies that he does but no one seems to overly worried about it, or acts as if they want to call an ambulance.
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