You Can't Get Away with Murder

A small-time crook (Humphrey Bogart) lands in Sing-Sing with his young accomplice (Billy Halop) who has a change of heart.

You Can’t Get Away with Murder is the worst kind of melodrama. Slow, grating, and insincere, the film is ultimately an exercise in patience, rather than the moral drama it pretends to be.

Though he has top billing, Humphrey Bogart is regulated to the background in favor of Billy Halop, one of the Dead End Kids who’d previously starred with Bogart in Angels with Dirty Faces, Crime School, and Dead End. Crime School, incidentally also shared director Lewis Seiler and second-billed Gale Page, making this film something of a reunion.

The problem is that Halop lacks anything resembling charisma, instead coming across as a whiny, posturing punk who quickly drains you of any sympathy. Indeed, halfway through the film’s 79-minute running time you’re already rooting against Halop’s character, hoping, no praying he gets shanked in the yard, or even the shower.

Not even a fine supporting turn by Henry Travers as the world’s most harmless prisoner who’s nonetheless locked up for life can free the film from it’s set-in-stone routine of confronting Halop’s character with a moral dilemma only to have him react with postured arrogance followed by a quiet moment where he emotes his guilt.

Rinse and repeat for about an hour.

Yeah, it’s that bad, and if it weren’t for Bogart’s fun, menacing turn, it would be unwatchable. If you’re dead-set on this sort of film, watch Angels with Dirty Faces instead.