''Armored Car Robbery'' is a 1950 American

film noir Film noir (; ) is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarded as the "classic period" of American '' ...

starring

Charles McGraw Charles McGraw (born Charles Crisp Butters; May 10, 1914 – July 29, 1980) was an American stage, film and television actor whose career spanned more than three decades. Early life McGraw was born to Beatrice (née Crisp) and Francis P. B ...

Adele Jergens Adele Jergens (November 26, 1917 – November 22, 2002) was an American actress. Early life and career Born in Brooklyn, New York, as Adele Louisa Jurgens (some sources say Jurgenson), she rose to prominence in the late 1930s when she was named ...

, and William Talman. Directed by

Richard Fleischer Richard O. Fleischer (; December 8, 1916 – March 25, 2006) was an American film director whose career spanned more than four decades, beginning at the height of the Golden Age of Hollywood and lasting through the American New Wave. Though h ...

, ''Armored Car Robbery'' is a heist movie, a subgenre of crime-based films. It tells the story of a well-planned robbery of cash from an armored car when it stops at a sports stadium. The heist goes awry and a tough Los Angeles cop sets off in hot pursuit of the culprits.

Plot

Mastermind Dave Purvis is a professional criminal who devises a scheme to rob an armored car on its last pickup of the day. He recruits Benny McBride, who brings Mapes & Foster to complete the gang of thieves. Benny needs money because his wife Yvonne, a

striptease A striptease is an erotic or exotic dance in which the performer gradually undresses, either partly or completely, in a seductive and sexually suggestive manner. The person who performs a striptease is commonly known as a "stripper" or an "exo ...

dancer, has lost interest in him and is seeing another man. Unbeknownst to Benny, the man she is two-timing him with is Purvis. The robbery itself, at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles, begins as planned but goes wrong when a passing police patrol car intervenes. Purvis kills one of the police officers from the patrol car and he and his fellow robbers make their getaway. Lt. Jim Cordell, the dead policeman's partner, takes it upon himself to bring in his partner's killer and throws himself into the case, assisted by a rookie officer, Danny Ryan. Meanwhile, Purvis's gang unravels bit by bit as distrust and paranoia begins to build. Benny, wounded by police during the heist, is killed by Purvis as he demands his share of the loot from the robbery and attempts to seek medical help. Foster is killed by the police as the three attempt escape. After Mapes gets away, tries to meet Yvonne at the Burly Q where she works, intending to use her as a means to find Purvis, who has kept all the loot for himself. The waiting police, however, arrest Mapes at the Burly Q and learn Purvis's identity. Ryan goes

undercover To go "undercover" (that is, to go on an undercover operation) is to avoid detection by the object of one's observation, and especially to disguise one's own identity (or use an assumed identity) for the purposes of gaining the trust of an ind ...

disguised as Mapes in order to glean information from Yvonne, who knows of Mapes but has never met him. Purvis interrupts and captures Ryan. He is shot and severely wounded while escaping, but manages to inform Lt. Cordell that Purvis and Yvonne are leaving the country by chartered airplane from Los Angeles Metropolitan Airport. Lt. Cordell and his team corner Purvis and Yvonne at the airport, and Purvis is crushed by a landing plane as he tries to escape across the runway.

Cast

as Lieutenant Jim Cordell *

as Yvonne LeDoux * William Talman as Dave Purvis *

Douglas Fowley Douglas Fowley (born Daniel Vincent Fowley, May 30, 1911 – May 21, 1998) was an American movie and television actor in more than 240 films and dozens of television programs, He is probably best remembered for his role as the frustrated m ...

as Benny McBride * Steve Brodie as Al Mapes * Don McGuire as Detective Danny Ryan *

Don Haggerty Don Haggerty (July 3, 1914 – August 19, 1988) was an American actor of film and television. Early life and education Before he began appearing in films in 1947, Haggerty was a Brown University athlete and served in the United States Army ...

as detective driving final pursuit car *

James Flavin James William Flavin Jr. (May 14, 1906 – April 23, 1976) was an American character actor whose career lasted for nearly half a century. Early life The son of a hotel waiter of Canadian-English descent,Flavin's obituary, distributed by United ...

as Lieutenant Phillips *

Gene Evans Eugene Barton Evans (July 11, 1922 – April 1, 1998) was an American actor who appeared in numerous television series, television films, and feature films between 1947 and 1989. Background Evans was born in Holbrook, Arizona and raised i ...

as William 'Ace' Foster

Production

The film was based on a story by Charles Pete and Richard Carroll about a $500,000 robbery, based on a true story - the 1934 robbery at Rubel Ice Company. Originally called ''Gravesend Bay'' it was sold to RKO in March 1949. Robert Ryan was meant to play John Ryan. The studio retitled it ''Code No 3''.RKO TO FILM LIFE OF JOHN BRODERICK: Jerry Gottlieb to Produce Here in Late Fall 'Broadway's One-Man Riot Squad' By THOMAS F. BRADY New York Times 22 Aug 1949: 14. In August 1949 Earl Felton was assigned to write the script. Herman Schlom was producer and Richard Fleischer was to direct. Charles McGraw was cast in December 1949. The film was filmed on location in

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

over 16 days. Locations include

Wrigley Field Wrigley Field is a Major League Baseball (MLB) stadium on the North Side of Chicago, Illinois. It is the home of the Chicago Cubs, one of the city's two MLB franchises. It first opened in 1914 as Weeghman Park for Charles Weeghman's Chicago ...

and the Metropolitan Airport.

Reception

Critical response

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' magazine gave the film a mixed review, calling it an okay film, and wrote, "RKO has concocted an okay cops-and-robbers melodrama ... ndMcGraw, Don McGuire and James Flavin, as cops, do very well. Talman and his cohorts put plenty of color into their heavy assignments. Adele Jergens attracts as a stripteaser and Talman's romantic interest". ''

Time Out Film Guide Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to c ...

'' review lauded the film and called it "a model of its time". They wrote, "Almost documentary in its account of the heist that goes wrong and the police procedures that are set in motion, making excellent use of LA locations, it relies on superb high contrast lighting to meld reality into the characteristic noir look".

''Noir'' analysis

According to

American studies American studies or American civilization is an interdisciplinary field of scholarship that examines American literature, history, society, and culture. It traditionally incorporates literary criticism, historiography and critical theory. Schol ...

and film professor, Bob Porfirio, ''Armored Car Robbery'' possesses the "film noir visual style" of the many RKO crime and suspense films of the early 1950s, such as: high-contrast photography integrating studio and location shooting, expressionistic lighting,

deep focus Deep focus is a photographic and cinematographic technique using a large depth of field. Depth of field is the front-to-back range of focus in an image, or how much of it appears sharp and clear. In deep focus, the foreground, middle ground, and b ...

, and haunting music (by

Roy Webb Royden Denslow Webb (October 3, 1888 – December 10, 1982) was an American film music composer. Webb has hundreds of film music credits to his name, mainly with RKO Pictures. He is best known for film noir and horror film scores, in particular f ...

). Film critic Roger Fristoe believed director Richard Fleischer pushed the boundaries of the

Motion Picture Production Code The Motion Picture Production Code was a set of industry guidelines for the self-censorship of content that was applied to most motion pictures released by major studios in the United States from 1934 to 1968. It is also popularly known as the ...

. One edict was, "Methods of crime shall not be explicitly presented or detailed in a manner calculated to...inspire imitation." ''Armored Car Robbery'', however, had a blunt title, explicit violence and a detailed account of the planning and execution of the crime. As such, even though the criminals are caught, ''Armored Car Robbery'' tested the waters and helped set the stage for other ''films noir'' and heist films like '' The Killing'' (1956), which shares some similarities.

DVD release

Warner Bros. released the film on DVD on July 13, 2010, in its ''Film Noir Classic Collection, Vol. 5''.Abrams, Simon. "Film Noir Classic Collection: Volume 5." SlantMagazine.com. July 20, 2010.
Accessed 2011-11-19.

References

External links

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Armored Car Robbery
at Letterbox DVD {{Richard Fleischer 1950 films 1950s crime thriller films American crime thriller films American black-and-white films American heist films 1950s English-language films Film noir Films about organized crime in the United States Films set in Los Angeles RKO Pictures films Films directed by Richard Fleischer Films scored by Roy Webb 1950s police films 1950s heist films Films scored by Paul Sawtell 1950s American films