Crime Wave (1953)
- General info
- Available formats
- Synopsis:
- Three San Quentin escapees (Penny, Hastings and Morgan) kill a cop in a gas-station holdup. Wounded, Morgan (Nedrick Young) flees through black-shadowed streets to the handiest refuge: with former cellmate Steve Lacey (Gene Nelson), who's paroled, with a new life and lovely wife, and can't afford to be caught associating with old cronies. But homicide detective Sims (Sterling Hayden) wants to use Steve to help him catch Penny (Ted de Corsia) and Hastings (Charles Bronson), who in turn extort his help in a bank job. Is there no way out for Steve?
- Actors:
- Sterling Hayden, Gene Nelson, Phyllis Kirk, Ted de Corsia, Charles Bronson, Jay Novello, Nedrick Young, James Bell, Dub Taylor, Gayle Kellogg, Mack Chandler, Iris Adrian, Joe Bassett, Charles Cane, Timothy Carey, Tom Clarke, Fred Coby, Dennis Dengate, Eileen Elliott, Fritz Feld
- Directors:
- André De Toth
- Producers:
- Bryan Foy
- Writers:
- Crane Wilbur, Bernard Gordon, Richard Wormser, John Hawkins, Ward Hawkins
- Aka:
- The City Is Dark / Don't Cry, Baby
- Genres:
- Classics, Drama, Thrillers
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Reviews (2) of Crime Wave
Tight Cops, Tighter Corners - Crime Wave review by griggs
I wasn’t expecting Crime Wave to be this brisk and atmospheric. It rattles along at about 70 minutes – all night streets, shabby apartments and bad decisions – and somehow never feels rushed. You’re dropped into an ex-con’s attempt to go straight, and the film just keeps tightening the screws as his past comes knocking with a gun in its hand.
Sterling Hayden is the secret sauce here. His detective is tall, tired, charismatically sardonic and detached, a man who’s seen too many screw-ups to waste sympathy but still hasn’t gone completely numb. Every time he lopes into frame the film gets a little funnier and a little more dangerous; I could happily have spent more time with his cop just needling suspects and colleagues.
Visually it’s a treat: tough little location shots, noir shadows without the self-parody, and a world that feels properly lived in. You can imagine a flabbier, longer version of this story. I’m very glad this one sticks to the good stuff and gets out clean.
Fifties Noir. - Crime Wave review by Steve
Bleak, hardboiled crime film with Sterling Hayden as the tough, laconic detective in pursuit of a pair of escaped jailbirds/cop killers who stage holdups for spending money; then move in on a parolee because the criminal code means ex-cons may be leaned on by the bad guys at any moment. They are never really free.
Gene Nelson is going straight with a good job in research and a beautiful wife (Phyllis Kirk) who believes in him. They are taken hostage by Ted de Corsica and Charles Bronson who plan one last job before they scoot. Postwar B-pictures are routinely tagged low budget, but the poverty of this one imposes the whole aesthetic.
The edits are long and there's zero noir lighting. It was completed in under two weeks and uses footage from other films. Everything feels threadbare. But there is a good script and an interesting cast, particularly Hayden as another cynical, world-weary cop. This time, he's on edge as he's given up smoking. See it just for him.
This is a brutal, macho underworld of victims, stooges and thugs. Among the supporting cast, Jay Novello makes an impression as a struck off alcoholic doctor always on call to take bullets out of gangsters. He isn't free either. The story is routine but its aura of tawdry despair and strip lit insomnia gives it an identity.