Young Fugitives

Plumped with incident, the storyline of this Universal Pictures "B" film is punctuated with humour and light romance, the work being a welcome addition to Alpha Video's burgeoning catalogue of re-released and little appreciated American cinema of, in the main, the 1930s and 1940s. As the modestly budgeted work opens, Joel Bentham (Harry Davenport) is seen in his boarding house room, decorated with memorabilia from Joel's four years of service as an officer for the Union Army during the War Between The States, and later at the home of best friend Tom Riggins (Tom Ricketts) whose looming death will leave Bentham as the only remaining Northern veteran of the conflict, and possessor of $50,000 bestowed upon the final remaining survivor. It becomes obvious to Joel that a large segment of the Midwestern township population among whom he lives is yearning for a specimen of his newly acquired wealth, but such will not be the case because the old warrior, along with his servant, curmudgeonly Benjie (Clem Bevans) move away as method of protest against the widespread cupidity surrounding the two men, to the rural home of old comrade Riggins, taking with them a female hobo, Meg (Dorothea Kent), whom they have recently adopted. In compliance with a vow made to his old comrade Tom while at the latter's deathbed, Bentham makes contact with the deceased man's estranged grandson Ray (Robert Wilcox) who resides in Chicago, and invites the young man to dwell with Joel and Benjie, an action smoothly undertaken by Ray, who has determined to his satisfaction the considerable financial potential of relocation to the former Riggins homestead. Being involved with Windy City thugs, Ray is no stranger to illegal activity, as immediately becomes apparent to Meg and Benjie. Yet, Joel's connection with reality is also strong, and it only remains to be seen as to Ray's ability to reform his ways, as well as the degree of salutary influence that the three other principal characters might have upon him. Able veteran director John Rawlins does not belabour a viewer with a surfeit of styles for what is, after all, a slight albeit good looking affair, and he handles his cast of competent players to good effect, while a wide range of clever and creative montage and editing is contributed by Frank Gross. The film is crisply paced, thereby allowing for ongoing character development until its final pages, when financial limitations and shooting schedule restrictions hurry the production along. There is nary an untidy line delivered by Davenport, a superlative actor, and his timing during a monologue delivered early on is representative of his top-echelon work. This is one of the better transfers from Alpha, and a viewer will therefore be pleased to avoid having to suppress disappointment with flawed elements of what in lieu turns out to be a DVD package of excellent visual as well as sound quality.

YOUNG FUGITIVES has an interesting premise which is about a geriatric old-timer who is awarded a huge cash sum of money for being the last living Civil War veteran in his part of the country. His newly-acquired fortune leads to both good situations and bad, as the old boy meets some new friends but, unfortunately for him, becomes acquainted with a robber gang who plan to get the money for themselves.

The situation that follows is part hostage film and part crime thriller, but for the most part it's just a slow and stagy drama. There's a heck of a lot of talk here which doesn't really add much to the discussion and the characterisation is nil throughout. The plot simply moves from A to B to C throughout in a very simplistic way which is perhaps unsurprising given this film's B-movie background.

This DVD is available from Alpha Video and unlike most of their releases the print is pretty good. Also, like other Alpha DVDs, this one has no captioning or special features (other than ads for other Alpha releases).

Harry Davenport was a wonderful old character actor and it's hard to imagine anyone not loving him in films. Here in "Young Fugitives" he has an unusual opportunity to actually star in a film instead of playing a supporting character--so I naturally had to get a copy of this film.

Early in the film, Davenport's friend dies and that leaves him as the only surviving Civil War veteran. Apparently, there is some sort of $50,000 survivors bonus that he's receiving--and suddenly the folks in his town go from neglecting him to loving him. Fortunately, Davenport is no dummy and sees right through them. He gives some of the money to a lady who deserves it but that still leaves him with $45,000--a huge sum of money for 1938.

Soon, however, a couple young people come into Davenport's life. During a roundup of 'hobos', a pretty young lady (Dorthea Kent) takes refuge with Davenport and he sort of adopts her. A bit later, the grandson of his recently deceased Civil War veteran friend (Robert Wilcox) comes to town after Davenport sends him a telegram. It's pretty obvious the guy is a bit of a user but Davenport tries to help him for the sake of his friend. But will this jerk disappoint or rise to the occasion? And what, exactly, does Davenport have cooking in his scheming mind? Tune in to this nice family film to find out for yourself.

While this certainly is not a great film, it's quite enjoyable and great for casual viewing. Don't expect "Gone With the Wind" in quality, but just a nice old fashioned story--the sort you certainly don't see any more. A cute script and Davenport....what more do you need?! By the way, two things I should point out. Davenport plays a Civil War vet--though he was actually born in 1866--a year AFTER the war ended. Also, the oldest Union and Confederate veterans actually did not die until the 1950s and by 1938 (when this film was made) there were actually quite a few vets still living.