Mon 24 Jun 2019
A Movie Review by Jonathan Lewis: CODE TWO (1953).
Posted by Steve under Crime Films , Reviews[8] Comments
CODE TWO. MGM, 1953. Ralph Meeker, Robert Horton. Sally Forrest, Jeff Richards. Elaine Stewart, Keenan Wynn, James Craig. Director: Fred M. Wilcox
Code Two, a movie that I was completely unfamiliar with prior to purchasing it on DVD a few days before watching it, is actually two movies in one. The first, which goes on far too long, is a completely inoffensive, if occasionally dull, semi-documentary film about three recruits at the Los Angeles Police Academy. The story follows the three men as they transition from civilians to motorcycle cops working in the Traffic Division. There’s really nothing particularly wrong with this portion of the movie. But there’s no compelling reason for it to exist, either. That is, unless you are really – and I mean really – interested in police motorcycles.
Now on to the second movie, so to speak. This far more invigorating portion of the film is a crime drama/murder mystery in which one of the recruits, a hothead by the name of Chuck O’Flair (Ralph Meeker), must redeem himself and apprehend the cattle rustlers who killed his friend and partner, Harry Whenion (Jeff Richards). There’s some romance between O’Flair and his now deceased friend’s girlfriend, but that thankfully takes a back seat to some standard police procedural moments. There’s a motorcycle chase (of course) and there’s the “calling all cars†segment that I am sure the producers insisted be in the film.
But what really stands out is a final action sequence in which O’Flair must wage a one-man war against a gaggle of cattle rustlers in a slaughterhouse somewhere out in the northern part of Los Angeles County. It’s a fairly violent and rather gritty ending to a film that starts off as a genial look at the day in the life of LAPD recruits.
Meeker is well-cast and makes as much as he can of the part. Look for Robert Horton, perhaps best known for his work in the Western genre, as Meeker’s partner and for Keenan Wynn and James Craig as the police brass. One last thing. The DVD cover tells me that this movie is “the fastest drama on two wheels!†I suspect that’s a bit of hyperbole.
June 24th, 2019 at 11:30 pm
Terrific cast in what seems to have been either an elaborate pilot or an early television film. Anyway, MGM kept the contract people busy.
June 24th, 2019 at 11:40 pm
I found the movie enjoyable, but not entirely focused, and I was puzzled afterward why a bug studio like MGM had anything to do with a project like this. It hadn’t occurred to me that it might have been a TV pilot or film. If it was, that makes a lot more sense.
June 25th, 2019 at 1:37 am
What you need to remember was that Big Hollywood was in transition in ’53; the ABC network had just been taken over by the Paramount Theater chain, and Leonard Goldenson was courting the studios to come into the medium, which many of them had been fighting off.
Goldenson’s major “gets” were Walt Disney and Warners; MGM only came on board in ’55 with their mainly promotional Parade (which TCM shows a lot in off-hours).
There were still a handful of feature series being made as late as ’53; if memory serves, MGM had a couple of those – and this could be one such. Still, L.B. Mayer and the Loew’s brass probably thought TV would fall once the novelty wore off (“Movies Are Your Best Entertainment!”), which turned out to be a miscalculation on their part – but that’s another story …
If Code Two had been earmarked for TV in ’53, most likely it would have gone directly there – and MGM would be proudly proclaiming so right then and there.
June 25th, 2019 at 1:49 am
I also had the feeling that this could have been a pilot, but for the fact that out of the three leads, only one really becomes the star of the show (Meeker) and it doesn’t fit the buddy-cop formula (which was years down the road) or either the police procedural one. A strange little entry from MGM, no doubt. Not sure who the target audience was, either. But they obviously were able to get a good cast assembled
June 25th, 2019 at 8:34 am
Mike, we can just speculate on the finished product, but by 1953 Louis B.Mayer was gone, Schary was in, and Metro in all financial matters was being run, or mismanaged, out of New York.
June 25th, 2019 at 10:08 am
Forget all the TV talk, this was a theatrical film. According to IMDb it was shown all over the world including France and Japan. From TCM database, there were several reviews from those who saw it in the theatre. It also has copies of the film poster and lobby card.
Its box office records reportedly shows the film lost money.
Two odd things mentioned in TCMdb, it credits Gerald Mayer as “fill in director” and nearly all the viewer reviews raved about this film, calling it one of the greatest films they had ever seen. Every positive review was about the motorcycles – one claimed the movie convinced him to become a motorcycle cop.
June 26th, 2019 at 11:24 am
I’ve liked this film ever since seeing it decades ago on Turner Classic Movies.
I liked the first half with the police training better than the second half.
It certainly is a motorcycle movie. Men and their Machines have been big in the movies for a hundred years. Wallace Reid zoomed to stardom in “The Roaring Road” (1919) as a racecar driver.
June 28th, 2019 at 6:47 pm
These semi documentary films were “hot” at this point and fairly inexpensive to produce since big stars weren’t needed. I suspect this one was aimed at younger family audiences with a view to a longer run in drive ins than mainstream theaters.
Either way that finale raises the level of the whole thing.