User reviews

Power-line repairman Edward G. Robinson marries prostitute Marlene Dietrich, but she finds herself enamored by hubby's best friend and colleague, a gallant George Raft.

There is much to enjoy in Raoul Walsh's exhilarating melodrama, and although it adheres rather too strictly to a proved formula, Walsh, always a great master at this, gives depth and dimension to the action. Walsh paints a vivid and loyal picture of this blue-collar environment of camaraderie and pranks, and Alan Hale's repairman is the whole deal rolled into one, there is not ONE joke about high voltage that he doesn't know, or doesn't repeat, ad nauseam. Every workplace has one! 'Manpower' is full of the trademark Walsh dynamics, comparable to the electric power, the frequent thunderstorms and the high tempo. The action is engrossing, the film overall is smoothly produced, briskly edited, brilliantly lit, designed and photographed. Never did sleekly wet, black raincoats photograph more memorably.

Robinson and Raft are congenially cast, but Dietrich is a long-shot as the prostitute turned housewife. "How's this dame stacked up?", Robinson asks of Raft, before he is introduced to her. Raft, waveringly: "Oh, just a dame ...". Well, she photographs like a goddess, and is impossibly glamorous. And quite improbably so.

Don't expect another Walsh masterpiece, but brace yourself for a hugely enjoyable flic that just whirls by you.

"Manpower" is a 1941 Warner Brothers film directed by Raoul Walsh. Walsh said that Jack Warner used to call him to his office and say, "You have to direct this film for me." Walsh would ask, "Who's in it?" "Oh, I don't know," Warner would moan. One wonders if "Manpower" was one of those films, though it would be pretty hard to forget that you had a film with Marlene Dietrich scheduled.

The story is that of a typical love triangle. Hank (Robinson) and Johnny (Raft) are linemen; Hank falls hard for Dietrich, who works at a clip joint. He proposes and though she tells him up front that she doesn't love him, she accepts. Then she finds herself in love with Johnny.

Dietrich is stunningly beautiful though I was distracted by a wig that seemed to overpower her face. And when was the last time you heard her described, as Raft does, as "just a dame?" Hardly. She is very good as Fay, who, while she gives it a go with Hank, wants her chance at real happiness. Robinson, who could play pathetic like nobody's business, gives us a pretty pathetic Hank here - injured so that instead of working on the power lines, he's now a manager, unlucky in love and dumpy looking. For a guy who could play mean as dirt, he portrayed these blustery, insecure men very well. Raft is a very dapper Johnny, a nice contrast to Robinson.

With the exception of an exciting ending, there really isn't anything exceptional about "Manpower" except the cast and the fact that it rains a lot. Definitely worth seeing for the unique casting.

A very interesting movie directed by Raoul Walsh. Filmed in black and white is a plus especially for the scenes in the rain. Stormy atmosphere sets the mood for this story of competition, lust and love. Edward G. Robinson and George Raft work on a road crew for the power company. When they aren't trying to repair downed lines, they are vying for the attention of Marlene Dietrich. Robinson and Raft put their acting skills to the test. There is a very strong supporting cast that includes: Ward Bond, Frank McHugh and Alan Hale.

Note: During the filming of MANPOWER, Robinson and Raft had to be pulled apart several times scuffling over Dietrich.

Manpower, is typical of the Warner Bros. action films of the 40's. It's filled with drama, tension, comedy and action. There is a lot of memorable dialogue, which puts modern films to shame. Probably, the best feature of this film is the cast. Dietrich, Robinson and Raft are topnotch. The supporting cast of Alan Hale, Frank McHugh, and Ward Bond lend superb comic relief. Manpower is a fun film which deserves repeated viewings.

This original screenplay from writers Richard Macaulay and Jerry Wald is essentially a drama about California linesmen for the power company, two of whom (Edward G. Robinson and George Raft) get tangled up over a sultry woman just out of the pen (and a recent graduate of a local clip joint). Uneasily cast film with overlays of raucous comedy, brotherly roughhousing, static adventure...but oddly, no romance. Robinson and Marlene Dietrich end up married, but the union seems loveless (she's indifferent to him, while he stays mostly hungover). Dietrich sings one colorless tune and seems to fight a case of the blahs. Special effects are good, but the mostly male supporting cast quickly tire the ear with would-be lascivious stories of 'dames' and 'babes'. Eve Arden has some funny one-liners playing Marlene's hostess co-hort, and there's a wild bit of satire set in a hash-joint. **1/2 from ****

"Manpower" isn't exactly the kind of film that requires much brain power. It is a case of what you see is what you get. That isn't to say that the film isn't good or entertaining, it is. It is a more undemanding kind of film. It is unfortunate that the two leads didn't work together again at "Warner Bros." Much has been made of the slight tension on the set between Edward G. Robinson and George Raft. It is true that both people had a different style to the way they worked and that was the source of the tension. It is not true that they both engaged in a fist fight. What happened, was that Robinson and Raft exchanged a few words and Raft slightly elbowed his co-star in the ribs. Supporting players Alan Hale and Ward Bond quickly kept them apart and Robinson left the set for a while. The story is about two engineers whose friendship is compromised by the arrival of a woman (Marlene Dietrich). That is all the there is but it's enough. Alan Hale comes out with his usual silly one-liners, as does Frank McHugh. They provide some comic relief which doesn't intrude upon the film. George Raft enjoys a couple of punch ups and they are good enough.

Edward G. Robinson and George Raft are a couple of linemen. Robinson is the foreman of the crew and a bit of a lug when it comes to the opposite sex. Raft however is a smooth operator.

They both meet Marlene Dietrich at a clip joint, the Code euphemism for a bordello. Robinson falls for her and Dietrich's looking for a way out of the working life. They marry, but she starts getting a yen for Raft and that brings on trouble.

Manpower has a place in film history having nothing to do with the content or the quality of the movie. While visiting his good buddy George Raft on the set, one Benjamin Siegel was introduced to Virginia Hill as depicted in the film Bugsy. There's a scene where Raft gets into a brawl with Barton MacLane that is depicted in Bugsy.

And if that wasn't enough, Raft and Robinson got into a real brawl over Marlene just like in the film. It seems as though Dietrich was involved with Raft during the production. But Raft was not the most educated of men.

Edward G. Robinson came from a slum background like Raft, but he'd educated himself and in fact was a well known art collector. Dietrich was no dummy herself and she and Eddie got friendly on the set, talking about stuff that Raft didn't have a clue about. Of course this got George jealous and they had a knock down drag out over her. You couldn't buy that kind of publicity. Lucky for Robinson Raft didn't call on Ben Siegel for his services.

So Manpower entered its place in Hollywood lore. Too bad the film wasn't any great masterpiece. It's entertaining enough though with a good cast of Warner Brothers regulars supporting Ms. Dietrich and her gentlemen friends. It seems though just about every film Warners made back then had either Alan Hale or Frank McHugh in it, in this case both. They're always entertaining. Add to that Eve Arden in her usual role as the wisecracking best friend of the heroine.

Not the greatest film ever made, but a historic one and not bad on the entertainment scale.

Missed this great Black & White Film Classic with Edward G. Robinson, George Raft and a great cast of Classic Actors! In this film Edward G. Robinson, (Hank 'Gimpy'McHenry),"The Red House",'47,is the boss of a gang of linemen who have the hard task of putting up electric and telephone lines. George Raft,(Johnny Marshall),"Red Light",'49, plays a rough guy who looks after his buddy 'Gimpy' and does not like Marlene Dietrich,(Fay Duval),"Touch of Evil",'58 who is an all around the town gal. Gimpy falls deeply in love with Fay and wants to marry her in the worst way, even if she does not love him. This is an entirely different story and the all the great actors make this a truly great Classic film from the 40's.!

MANPOWER (Warner Brothers, 1941), directed by Raoul Walsh, stars an powerhouse cast of Edward G. Robinson, Marlene Dietrich and George Raft in a routinely made screenplay dealing with the life and times of a couple of hard-working linemen. Following the pattern to Walsh's earlier directorial assignment, THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT (1940) featuring Raft and Humphrey Bogart as truck driving brothers, with Ann Sheridan and Ida Lupino the female co-stars, the surprise of MANPOWER comes not so much for its familiar plotting but the interesting casting of Marlene Dietrich (on loan-out assignment from Universal) in a sort of role that could have gone to either Sheridan or Lupino of THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT fame.

The plot revolves around linemen working for the Pacific Power and Light Company: Hank McHenry (Edward G. Robinson), foreman of the crew, and Johnny Marshall (George Raft), his closest friend working directly under him. Called out on an emergency assignment during a thunderous storm, the maintenance crew risk their lives surrounded by high voltage wires dangling from telephone poles. As Hank nearly loses his life by having his foot tangled in a hot wire, Antoine "Pop" Duval (Egon Breacher) loses his own by not getting out of the way of a live wire. Because Johnny happens to be Pop's closest friend who earlier arranged for his daughter's early parole from prison, Johnny, accompanied by Hank, ends up breaking the news to Fay (Marlene Dietrich). Though Fay's lack of emotion towards her father's death leaves Johnny cold and angry, Hank, however, feels differently towards her. Working as a hostess at a clip joint called The Midnight Club, run by Smiley Quinn (Barton MacLane), Fay meets with one of the linemen, whom she later marries, only to put a strain on their (Hank and Johnny's) friendship.

Others members of the Warners stock players appearing in this production include Frank McHugh (Omaha); Alan Hale (Jumbo Wells); Eve Arden (Dolly); Joyce Compton (Scarlet); and Ben Weldon (Al Hurst). Highlights consist of Walter Catlett (Sidney Whipple) as a high strung hospital patient who falls victim of numerous childish pranks from the visiting, fun-loving linemen; while Billy Wayne (Benny, the counterman) gets his quota of laughs in the dining room sequence by calling out the food orders. There's also Ward Bond playing Eddie Adams, another fellow lineman, who, on numerous occasions, "gets out of line." Marlene Dietrich sings one brief song, "He Lied and I Listened," while Beal Wong gets more time vocalizing, "Chinatown, My Chinatown."

While credited as an original screenplay by Richard Macauley and Jerry Wald, much of it appears to be reworked from earlier screen material, mainly First National's own TIGER SHARK (1932) with Edward G. Robinson and Richard Arlen as tuna fisherman in love with the same girl (Zita Johann). Warners production of SLIM (1937) featuring Pat O'Brien, Henry Fonda and Margaret Lindsay, also about linemen, is often an overlooked item bearing little connection to MANPOWER. Even so, movies aren't made, they're remade (or recycled).

Though basically known for playing crime figures, MANPOWER does offer both Robinson and Raft a chance to act in something other than tough guys holding guns. Of the two feature films to team Robinson and Raft (their second being A BULLET FOR JOEY (United Artists, 1955)), MANPOWER, has become the most worthwhile and revived of their collaborations on commercial television. On the other hand, Dietrich's Warner Brothers debut should have been something special, or at least different. A costume or biographical drama, for instance, in European setting and lavish sets. However, it did offer her a chance working opposite Robinson and Raft for the only time, thus becoming a worthy attraction to what's basically a man's movie. Though Dietrich had been conflicted between two men before, her finest opportunity are the ones opposite rugged he-men types of Randolph Scott and John Wayne in both Universal's 1942 productions of THE SPOILERS and PITTSBURGH.

With a great start of action, comedy and crisp dialogue, a pity MANPOWER didn't fulfill its full potential at 103 minutes. Even through some of its weaker passages, MANPOWER is still be electrifying, thanks to Raoul Walsh's know-how direction and skill. Available on DVD, MANPOWER can also be found on Turner Classic Movies cable channel. (**1/2)

Everything about MANPOWER is highly improbable, including the casting of EDWARD G. ROBINSON as a lineman in love with the alluring clip-joint hostess MARLENE DIETRICH and the three-way romance that includes GEORGE RAFT as a jealous blue collar onlooker who warns Robinson about the pitfalls of marrying Dietrich.

Raoul Walsh directs it in his customary boisterous style, letting ALAN HALE, FRANK McHUGH, WARD BOND and BARTON MacLANE overdo the rowdy blue collar supporting roles. The comic relief offered by Hale and McHugh is below par this time and becomes tiresome long before the tale reaches a climactic storm scene.

Fans of the star trio will probably overlook these faults and find the film passable viewing, but it's nothing special and easily forgotten. EVE ARDEN gets to sling some one-liners in the kind of role she always played with verve and skill.

Linemen working on electrical wires at the height of a severe thunderstorm is stretching things a bit for the melodramatic climax.

"Manpower", made for Warner Bros. in 1941, is one of the most exciting and pleasurable of all classic action adventures. It's great to see the positive reviews from fellow users; I have been looking forward to it for some time and I finally saw it. What a picture! I'm a huge Raoul Walsh fan and "Manpower" ranks with the director's greatest works - "Me and My Gal", "The Roaring Twenties", "Gentleman Jim", "The Strawberry Blonde", "Objective, Burma", "Pursued", et al. The film is extraordinary for a number of reasons, but the most obvious reason is a top notch cast: Edward G. Robinson, Marlene Dietrich, George Raft, Ward Bond, Alan Hale, Eve Arden, and the lovable Frank McHugh, performing his hilarious shenanigans and slapstick.

The film concerns a group of emergency power repairmen who work on a high voltage power lines during ferocious storms. Throughout "Manpower", Walsh emphasizes group camaraderie and the strong bond of working class Americans. It is also filled with Walsh's trademark boyish gusto and unsophisticated Irish ribaldry, but it somehow lacks the bittersweet nostalgia and wistfulness of "Strawberry Blonde" and "Gentleman Jim".

The same way Walsh's "Strawberry Blonde" is a remake of a charming 1933 Gary Cooper vehicle called "One Sunday Afternoon", "Manpower" is a remake of Howard Hawks'1932 adventure "Tiger Shark", also starring Edward G. Robinson as a tuna fisherman. Here, Robinson plays power lineman who happens to be in love with an ex-con girl, sensitively played by Marlene Dietrich. Robinson's rival is George Raft and their climactic aerial duel amidst jolting electric wires are among the highlights of the film's stunning action scenes.

A movie directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Edward G. Robinson, Marlene Dietrich and George Raft. Robinson and Raft play electricans who work on power lines and Dietrich plays the daughter of an old electrician who just got out of jail. Raft doesn't think much of Dietrich but Robinson falls for her pretty fast and wants to marry her. Raft tries to talk him out of it and he won't listen. Dietrich doesn't love Robinson but he talks her into it. She quits her job at the nightclub and moves in with Robinson. This is probably the only movie which has guys working on power lines and this movie also stars Ward Bond and Alan Hale as fellow electricians.Robinson and Dietrich do a pretty good job and Raft was never a very good actor but he is OK here.

Edward G. Robinson and George Raft are lineman. Robinson falls in love with Marlene Dietrich, a hostess at a clip joint, and marries her, even though she frankly admits she doesn't love him. Instead, she yearns for Raft.

It's muscular men getting into muscular fixes, and a pretty standard scenario by this time. Robinson is solid as always in a role derived from his turn in Tiger Shark. Raft is ok, and pretty good at slapping around women. This is the role he passed up THE MALTESE FALCON for, and he blackballed Bogart from the picture, which meant Bogey was in the other movie. The good supporting role belongs to Eve Arden as Dietrich's cynical B-girl friend, even though it's a story about the camaraderie of tough men in tough jobs, isolated from women.

Some nice camerawork by Ernest Haller is obscured by a print that's battered in some sections and printed too dark in others.

Edward G. Robinson may be well-liked by his co-workers repairing electrical wires, but he's not very successful with women. His best friend George Raft tells him not to worry, that the right girl's out there and he just has to wait. Another pal, Ward Bond, merely teases him. "You've been turned down so many times, you look like a bedspread!" When someone dies on the job, Eddie G is introduced to the man's daughter, Marlene Dietrich. He's smitten, but she has a good reason for resisting: she's an ex-con working as a dance-hall girl. Shady, jaded, and decent enough to tell him he deserves better.

Manpower is a classic Edward G. Robinson vehicle. He's lovable, means well, generous, and of course, oblivious enough to get heartbroken. I love seeing him happy in his movies, even though it's often short-lived. When he smiles, his whole face lights up. When you watch him in this movie, it's easy to imagine him in the lead role of Love Me or Leave Me - especially since he has a limp. If you love him as much as I do, you'll want to rent this one. It's got the witty banter of the silver screen and starts off with a very fun (and unusual surprise). Eddie G's dancing away in a nightclub and plants a very long kiss on his date - he never gets to have smoochy scenes!

This is not one of Warner Brothers' finest films, as the writing is pretty silly at times and terribly predictable. For example, when the character "Pop" appeared, I said to my daughter that that old guy would have to die in the film--and about 20 minutes later, sure enough, he had assumed room temperature! In fact, throughout the film, the action was pretty ordinary and often telegraphed. Despite starring Edward G. Robinson, Marlene Dietrich and George Raft, the film had a definite "B-movie" feel to it due to the shallow plot and rather one-dimensional characters. This one-dimensionality was especially true with Robinson, as he was amazingly pugnacious and impossible to believe throughout.

Now despite all this and the overall ordinary nature of the film, it still is rather entertaining and worth a look if there is nothing better on television. Not a great film but a decent time-passer.

By the way, a few years earlier, Warner Brothers made a somewhat similar film called SLIM. While MANPOWER is not exactly a re-make, they both have a lot of similarities and involve death and danger on the power lines.

If it weren't for a Life Magazine photographer capturing the two lead actors engaged in fisticuffs, Warner Brothers' August 1941's "Manpower" would mostly be a blip in the historic importance of movies.

George Raft and Edward G. Robinson engaged in a skirmish on the studio set while rehearsing a scene for the Raoul Walsh-directed film about electrical line workers and the hazardous conditions they endure. The fist fight had long been brewing with Raft as the instigator. He had refused two roles which eventually made Humphrey Bogart a star, 1941's "High Sierra" and "The Maltese Falcon." Raft enthusiastically took the role in "Manpower" mainly since it would fulfill his lifelong dream of playing opposite Marlene Dietrich, whom he told his friend Gary Cooper he would "give a year's salary for one night" to sleep with her. Warner Brothers needed a third actor to fill out the triangle love story and slotted Robinson into the role of Hank McHenry, who marries Fay Duval (Dietrich) in the film. Trouble brewed when Raft received third-billing behind Robinson and Dietrich, ruffling the sensitive actor.

During filming, Raft felt Robinson was cozying up to Dietrich a bit too much. In one scene, according to the studio's account in a letter to the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), those on the set claimed the two actors started to argue over a line that Raft wanted deleted, while Robinson felt his character felt the opposite. Raft began to rip into him with a seres of profanities that would make a longshoreman blush. Robinson retreated into his dressing room, only to emerge, not speaking to Raft for an entire week even though their scenes called for the two to interact as friends. At a Saturday rehearsal, Raft reached a boiling point when he was supposed to intercede between Robinson and another character in a fight. He suddenly aggressively pushed Robinson. "What the hell is all this?" Raft said as he unleashed a volley of profanities. Robinson responded, "George, what a fool you are for carrying on in such an unprofessional manner. What's the use of going on? I have come here to do my work and not to indulge in anything of this nature. It seems impossible for me to continue." Raft then lunged at him, with the Life Magazine photographer in the wings capturing all the action. His photos were soon splashed in the nation's newspapers. Robinson walked off the set for some time, causing the picture to go $200,000 over budget. The two eventually returned to the set, but the atmosphere was frosty.

Other incidents also caused delays. Raft, scripted to hit Dietrich, accidentally made contact with her face, sending the actress down a flight of stairs, breaking her ankle. Later Raft, whose character Johnny Marshall climbs a telephone pole, slipped when he reached the top and fell to the ground from 38 feet. Passing out and in shock, he was sent to the hospital with three broken ribs.

The filming of "Manpower" is also known as the picture mobster Bugsy Siegel met extra Virginia Hill on the set. In 1991's "Bugsy," Warren Beatty as Siegel visits his friend George Raft (Joe Mantegna) at the Warner Brothers studio and spots Virginia (Annette Bening) during her scene's as a hat-check girl. She's handed a leg of a smashed chair from a brawl in the restaurant by Raft. Bugsy, in this highly fictional account, falls instantaneously for Hill (The scene in "Manpower" occurs at the 52 minute mark with the real Virginia Hill handed the chair leg.).

The actual fight between Raft and Robinson proved beneficial at the box office with Warner Brothers' playing up the brawl to its full advantage. The marketing department drew up a promotional campaign headlined "Robinson's mad about Dietrich. Dietrich's mad about Raft. Raft is mad about the whole thing." "Manpower" turned out to be a solid hit, earning the studio a nice return for its expenses.

Big names in a mediocre film.

When an elderly employee of a utility pole repair company dies on the job, the company's disabled foreman, Hank McHenry (Edward G Robinson), goes to the man's daughter to inform her of her father's death.

The daughter, Fay (Marlene Dietrich) has just gotten out of prison and is now working as a prostitute.

Hank decides to take Fay under his wing and even though she makes it clear to him that she doesn't love him, they get married anyway.

The first time of their marriage goes well, until Hank's best friend Johnny (George Raft) has an accident and Hank offers to take care of him at his home.

However, Fay falls in love with Johnny with all the consequences that entails.

Reasonable film with Raft and Robinson playing well, the first part is not really interesting, but once the wedding is imminent the story becomes more interesting.

I never really liked Dietrich as an actress, but she does a nice job here.

I wonder how much more than two seconds it took to come up with this movie's title as we tag along with a ragtag group of electrical linemen tasked with keeping America's lights on through fair weather and foul (and is there ever a lot of foul, going by what happens here). Heading up the team are best-buddies George Raft and Edward G Robinson with as female interest, an added dollop of Marlene Dietrich on the side, a cast you'd think think screams gangster flick, although to be fair this particular occupation seems a whole lot more dangerous, despite being on the right side of the law.

Anyway, the characterisations, such as they are, are these. Robinson is the hot-headed, girl-chasing pocket rocket while Raft, his best mate and minder is the dapper, level-headed one. With their unruly but largely good-natured colleagues, including most prominently Alan Hale and Frank McHugh as a goofy double act on the side, they're on perpetual call-out when something happens to disrupt the national grid, usually it seems a ferocious storm of biblical proportions. When one of the vets on the team comes a predictable cropper on site, he asks Raft and Robinson to look after his adult daughter, Dietrich, who's just been released from prison and promptly returns to waitressing at a seedy clip-joint where she and the other young women, including Eve Arden are expected to fleece the ever more intoxicated clientele.

Eddie takes to the girl immediately so much so that he soon proposes to her even though she's not attracted to him. George on the other hand finds that the "treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen," caveman-approach works better because soon enough, despite his treating Marlene with suspicion, disdain and even a dose of physical violence, of course it's him she falls for, predicating the triangle which sure enough will break by the film's climax, as the duo fight it out at 50 feet atop live electricity lines with Dietrich looking on from below.

It's all high-flying nonsense of course. The attitudes to women throughout are Neanderthal with any "dame" in a skirt fair game for a manhandling, be they nurses, costumiers or waitresses. The work the guys do too would keep Health and Safety in work for decades, there's such disregard for personal wellbeing, it's no wonder fatalities are commonplace. I also didn't enjoy the puerile antics of Hale and McHugh finding them old-fashioned and unfunny.

Raoul Walsh does his usual breakneck, man's world direction job, which means there's lots of testosterone, bonhomie, and fisticuffs, Raft and Robinson do their best in their exaggerated roles while Dietrich seems to be acting in a different film all together, all cliches of the hard-boiled working girl softened by an even tougher male played out one more time.

I suspect that the movie's heart might have started out in the right place as being masculine, knockabout entertainment but really its outdated treatment of the women in the cast is quite offensive at times and fatally wings a film that I don't think is any anywhere near to being a career highlight for either the distinguished director or his equally distinguished cast.

With a great cast and director, in the golden age of movies, one can only gasp at the failings of this film. In the first place, the casting is terrible. One has to believe that little Eddie Robinson is a brawling blue collar guy and that George Raft is also a rough, tough electrical lineman. The writing is dreadful, especially the comic relief of Alan Hale. Every move of the film is predictable. And poor Marlene! Mostly, she just simmers and smokes cigarettes. A waste of time for all concerned, especially viewers.