I always thought this was an Edward G Robinson movie and he's in it, but really the star is George Raft. He's the central character - an exiled gangster who gets a chance to return to the USA if he helps kidnap a scientist in Canada for the commies.
The Canada angle gives this some freshness, and I liked seeing Raft in a late lead. He was grey now and had smoked a lot clearly, but has presence and history and it was wonderful to see him cross swords on screen with Robinson.
Dramatically though I didn't feel this worked. I never like it when gangster films cross with anti-commie movies - the genres seem to belong to different worlds (or maybe it's just anti communist stuff ruins the fun). I had a similar problem with Johnny Allegro.
Raft's transformation from not-caring tough guy to hero felt underdone. There was no real logical evident reason for it. I thought Audrey Totter, as the dame, would be part of this, but she just kind of hangs around and talks to the scientist. Maybe they could have given more history to Raft and Robinson - but that doesn't work either.
The most emotionally involving subplot had this geeky librarian girl romanced by a suave gangster which results in her dying. This was effective - the film never manages to top it.
Peter Van Eyck is fine as the main commie and Lewis Allen is a fine no-nonsense director. There's some good tough slangy dialogue as well. I just wish it was better.
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