Saturday, April 02, 2022

Movie review - "Last Train from Bombay" (1952) **1/2

 Jon Hall's last film for Sam Katzman sees him looking a little chunky and puffy - the lithe days were long gone. He wears a suit most of the time, he just doesn't seem as active as before.

The best thing about this movie is its setting - it takes place in India post-Independence during clashes with Pakistan. Hall is a diplomatic ("the vice counsel at Lucknow") tracking down an old friend who turns up dead and involved in an assassination attempt against a noble.

The piece doesn't quite work - it's very start stop - but it has novelty in its setting (albeit this means plenty of brownface). But when the action moves it's enjoyable. There's fistfights and assassinations and Hall steals a plane and parachutes out, pulls over a car, escapes from a guard house... it's got a serial feel. It's quite fun in the second half apart from puffy Hall. Decent support cast.

No comments: