Mary Burns, Fugitive

Forgotten, well written and acted, gritty crime drama. Sidney is excellent as usual. The big surprise is Brian Donlevy, soon to be typecast as western villains until attaining bigger starring or co-starring roles in the 40s, playing Spike, a soft=spoken gangster, devoted to his boss Alan Baxter, menacing in his quiet.

Sylvia Sidney is Mary, who runs a coffee shop. Her mysterious boyfriend shows up, and says he has to be in Canada that night. She agreees to marry him, but then there's a big shootout, and Mary is off to jail. Brian Donlevy (way before Beau Geste or Glass Key) is in here as Spike. When Mary breaks out of jail, the gang thinks it's a trap to catch the thugs. and maybe it is... Melvyn Douglas is a grouchy patient in the hospital where Mary gets a job. The gangsters and the cops catch up with her, so its a race to see who can catch who first. Sidney was married to bigshot publisher Bennett Cerf (for a whole six months) and starred in Hitchcock's Sabotage the year after this one. Directed by Bill Howard. he started in the silents, and continued into the 1940s. This one is pretty good. some typical gangster movie bits, but it all works.

When she was young and in her salad days Sylvia Sidney seemed to be cast as innocents with lives buffeted by time and circumstance. In the title role of Mary Burns, Fugitive rural girl Sylvia who works in a coffee shop has fallen for smooth talking city guy Alan Baxter.

She learns the hard way that he's one of the FBI's public enemies when she gets brought in on a holdup and Baxter escapes and she's caught. After trial and conviction she's sent to women's prison for 15 years.

In this film everybody manipulates Sylvia, her cellmate brassy Pert Kelton, G-man Wallace Ford, and the rest of law enforcement as an 'escape' is arranged hoping she'll lead the cops to Baxter. But she really doesn't know anything and can't convince anyone of that fact.

There are some real good performances here from Sidney and from Baxter as one cold villain with one weakness, the hots for Sylvia. Just as cold and villainous but without the libido problems is Brian Donlevy in one of his earliest roles. He meets quite an end.

With the part of the arranged escape that doesn't go quite as planned some elements of White Heat are here.

This one is a crackerjack sleeper from Paramount.

Other than the premise, which sounded very interesting if not original, Sylvia Sidney was my main reason for wanting to see 'Mary Burns, Fugitive'. Such an expressive and sincere actress with eyes and expressions that told so much in a nuanced way. Melvyn Douglas also gave plenty of great performances, whether in suave roles or paternal ones. Brian Donlevy was a bit hit and miss for me and it did depend on the role, as cliched as that sounds.

'Mary Burns, Fugitive' turned out to be a solid film with a lot of notable things in a good way. Sidney certainly being one of them, not surprising as she was one of the best things of pretty much every film she starred in, and was pleasantly surprised by Donlevy. 'Mary Burns, Fugitive' is not a perfect film and its full potential is not followed all the way through. It could have done with more grit and there is one performance that was rather weak for my tastes.

That weak performance coming from a very bland Alan Baxter, who is neither sympathetic or formidable (didn't really detect much of anything really) and has little chemistry with Sidney. Which should have smoldered but instead doesn't even achieve lukewarm level.

As said, 'Mary Burns, Fugitive' could have done with a little more grit and thrills, not going for the full punch enough and not quite giving enough freshness to familiar elements. It starts a touch slow as well, before picking up quite quickly.

Sidney however is her usual expressive and easy to root for self and Douglas shows that he can do cantankerous just as well as he can do suave and fatherly, although his role is smaller than his billing indicates. Most surprising is the quietly menacing Donlevy. The rest of the cast also fare well, namely Pert Kelton, excelling in a role that one might think on paper wouldn't fit her. William K. Howard keeps the intrigue up and does generate some suspense.

It's stylishly and atmospherically shot, not looking too studio-bound or cheap. The script doesn't blow the mind, but it has energy at least, it's cohesive and the dialogue flows. The story likewise, complete with some neat twists and it entertained and intrigued me enough.

On the whole, solid but not spectacular. 7/10

Sylvia Sidney is a dope who falls for a city slicker only to find out he's a crook. She gets convicted for aiding and abetting. After her prison break, the cops use her to ferret out the boyfriend she now hates. She lands a job washing dishes in a hospital and meets snowblind explorer Melvyn Douglas.

Maybe I've seen Sylvia Sidney suffering in far too many low-class weepers, demonstrating that the Shomin-Gekim was not a Japanese genre. Here's proof that there were lower-class people in the American audiences, and they liked to think their lives were as interesting and worthy of making ridiculous stories about as snoots on Park Avenue. Even the occasional swell might take off his top hat to look at a shop girl, were she pretty as Miss Sidney. Miss Sidney is a dope, the guys on the side of the law are as heartless to the poor girl as gangsters, and it's so obvious that she's a good girl that Melvyn Douglas can tell it with his eyes bandaged.

Miss Sidney needed to make more comedies. Alas, she didn't get to do that for many years in the movies. She was too good at being sad, and shy and oppressed, and making the audience wait to hear her break down and cry out at the unfairness of it all, which she finally does here about eight minutes before the end of this one.

Director William K. Howard tells the movie in a straightforward manner, and it isn't until about 50 minutes into it that he unleashes his quick-cut Dutch Angle style to let you know something exciting is about to happen. It's an awful burden that Miss Sidney has to carry this whole movie, but she does so.