Another Hollywood detective series that finesses the business side of things. Who employs this suave crime solver? Is he paid for his services? And what of his classless/clueless assistant? Awfully charitable fellows, no? This late entry in the enjoyable R.K.O. FALCON series (seventh of nine with Tom Conway*) standard-issue doings in spite of having Joseph H. Lewis at the helm. An outstanding director of B-pics, Lewis’s next, MY NAME IS JULIA ROSS/’45, ought to have led to A-list gigs. And while films like GUN CRAZY/’50 and THE BIG COMBO/’55 followed, rote :B’s and tv series his only reward. Here, there’s just so much Lewis can do as Conway’s Falcon and rough-edged partner Edward Brophy, while traveling by train to San Francisco, stumble onto a smuggling conspiracy thanks to a little dog and a little girl they try to help. All they want to do is get the rich tyke safely home, but murder, abduction, ‘reformed’ crime boss Robert Armstrong, arrest and mob enforcers keep getting in the way. But with its polished look, clunk-free cast and explosive finale, FALCON on the high end as these little programmers go. Though, after witnessing so much mayhem & murder, that little girl will be traumatized for life and need her inheritance for med bills.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *George Sanders was the first ‘Falcon,’ but passed the baton on to real-life brother Tom Conway who co-starred with Sanders as the original character’s brother in the fourth title, FALCON’S BROTHER/’42, then nine more times on his own.
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