Directed by: Jules Dassin
Written by: A.I. Bezzerides (novel & screenplay)
Starring: Richard Conte, Valentina Cortese, Lee J. Cobb, Barbara Lawrence, Jack Oakie, Millard Mitchell, Joseph Pevney
WARNING: Plot and/or ending details may follow!!! [Paragraph 3 only]
Nick Garcos (Richard Conte) returns from a round-the-world engagement to a home that, at first glance, typifies the ideal American household. His father's working-class singing voice booms across the backyard; his mother fussily busies herself with the daily chores; his girlfriend Polly (Barbara Lawrence) bursts jubilantly into the room, embracing him in a passionate, sensuous kiss. But looks can be deceiving: a well-intended gift of Chinese slippers betrays a recent family tragedy; Polly's disappointed response to another gift hints at a fractured romance, a relationship borne not from love but the love of money. The family's facade of happiness is exposed as a sham, and it's the peeling back of this superficial skin with which Jules Dassin's Thieves' Highway (1949) is concerned. A seemingly-innocuous industry, that of fresh fruit cartage and wholesale, is shown to wallow in depravity, thuggery and callous opportunism. In this way, the film might be considered a companion piece to the director's previous effort, The Naked City (1948), which similarly exposed gruelling drama within the confines of the audiences' daily lives.
Richard Conte was one of the most interesting leading men of his era. His big-shot crime boss in The Big Combo (1955) might be the decade's most charismatic villain, but he could also play the resolute hero, as in Preminger's Whirlpool (1949). To Thieves' Highway he brings a cocky self-assurance, the sort of fearless conviction that's bound to blow up in one's face eventually. Lee J. Cobb's conniving fruit wholesaler, Mike Figlia, is a small-time crook, but one who invokes the viewer's contempt through his ruthlessly-capitalist exploitation of the humble working-class American. Only the females aren't as memorably drawn: Barbara Lawrence's Polly is rather abruptly discarded as a self-seeking gold-digger, as though only to allow for a romance with possible prostitute Rica (Valentina Cortesa), who grows a heart of gold. Thieves' Highway no doubt inspired Henri-Georges Clouzot's nail-biting The Wages of Fear (1953), another classic tale of trucking peril, but unfortunately it itself lacks the French director's gritty cynicism, or at least a degree of pessimism as absolute as Clouzot's.
This slackening of tone is seen most tellingly in the film's dramatic climax, a confrontation between Garcos and Figlia. The sequence doesn't work because it's conflicted between two opposing moral viewpoints. In one sense, Dassin appears to advocate Garcos' vigilante action in subjecting Figlia to a physical beating, since he successfully reclaims his stolen payments and achieves some degree of mental closure regarding his father's crippling. However, at this moment, as Garcos collapses onto the bench in exhaustion, policemen enter the diner and arrest Figlia for his crimes – but not before one officer sternly wags his finger at Garcos for taking the law into his own hands. To have an excellent film intruded upon by such an awkward, juvenile moral lesson is bad enough, but the film could have gotten across the same message in a more powerful manner. As the police stormed into the diner, my blood had suddenly run cold with the chilling thought: what if Figlia is dead? Out of pure bloody-minded pride, a good man would have been condemned for life, the ultimate testament that vigilantism is not the answer.
Richard Conte was one of the most interesting leading men of his era. His big-shot crime boss in The Big Combo (1955) might be the decade's most charismatic villain, but he could also play the resolute hero, as in Preminger's Whirlpool (1949). To Thieves' Highway he brings a cocky self-assurance, the sort of fearless conviction that's bound to blow up in one's face eventually. Lee J. Cobb's conniving fruit wholesaler, Mike Figlia, is a small-time crook, but one who invokes the viewer's contempt through his ruthlessly-capitalist exploitation of the humble working-class American. Only the females aren't as memorably drawn: Barbara Lawrence's Polly is rather abruptly discarded as a self-seeking gold-digger, as though only to allow for a romance with possible prostitute Rica (Valentina Cortesa), who grows a heart of gold. Thieves' Highway no doubt inspired Henri-Georges Clouzot's nail-biting The Wages of Fear (1953), another classic tale of trucking peril, but unfortunately it itself lacks the French director's gritty cynicism, or at least a degree of pessimism as absolute as Clouzot's.This slackening of tone is seen most tellingly in the film's dramatic climax, a confrontation between Garcos and Figlia. The sequence doesn't work because it's conflicted between two opposing moral viewpoints. In one sense, Dassin appears to advocate Garcos' vigilante action in subjecting Figlia to a physical beating, since he successfully reclaims his stolen payments and achieves some degree of mental closure regarding his father's crippling. However, at this moment, as Garcos collapses onto the bench in exhaustion, policemen enter the diner and arrest Figlia for his crimes – but not before one officer sternly wags his finger at Garcos for taking the law into his own hands. To have an excellent film intruded upon by such an awkward, juvenile moral lesson is bad enough, but the film could have gotten across the same message in a more powerful manner. As the police stormed into the diner, my blood had suddenly run cold with the chilling thought: what if Figlia is dead? Out of pure bloody-minded pride, a good man would have been condemned for life, the ultimate testament that vigilantism is not the answer.7.5/10
Currently my #6 film of 1949:
1) The Third Man (Carol Reed)
2) White Heat (Raoul Walsh)
3) Kind Hearts and Coronets (Robert Hamer)
4) The Set-up (Robert Wise)
5) A Run for Your Money (Charles Frend)
6) Thieves’ Highway (Jules Dassin)
7) Nora inu {Stray Dog} (Akira Kurosawa)
8) The Big Steal (Don Siegel)
9) She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (John Ford)
10) Under Capricorn (Alfred Hitchcock)
2) White Heat (Raoul Walsh)
3) Kind Hearts and Coronets (Robert Hamer)
4) The Set-up (Robert Wise)
5) A Run for Your Money (Charles Frend)
6) Thieves’ Highway (Jules Dassin)
7) Nora inu {Stray Dog} (Akira Kurosawa)
8) The Big Steal (Don Siegel)
9) She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (John Ford)
10) Under Capricorn (Alfred Hitchcock)
Robert Wise was certainly one of Hollywood's most versatile directors, having released excellent films from almost every major genre – science-fiction, horror, drama, musical, war. The Set-Up was produced on a low budget by RKO, with a story that unfolds in real-time (predating Zinnemann's High Noon (1952), which famously used this approach). Despite a taut 72-minute running-time, the film packs a considerable emotional punch, as the sympathetic Stoker places his dignity on the line, sticks to his guns, and winds up being punished for his nobility. Robert Ryan gives a characteristically intense leading performance, eliciting empathy, but also exhibiting a quiet, understated dignity. When his fellow boxers emerge from their bouts, either ecstatic in victory or discouraged in defeat, there's a heartbreaking sadness in Stoker's eyes, as though every time he must front the challenge of his own aging body. Among the compelling supporting performers is David Clarke as a self-deluding washed-up boxer, and Alan Baxter (looking a bit like Frank Sinatra, I thought) as a cold-eyed gangster who wears sharp suits but, unlike Stoker, hasn't any class or principles.
The Set-Up, in exposing the unglamorous side of the boxing profession, certainly served as inspiration for Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull (1980), and probably also influenced Kubrick in his early noir thriller Killer's Kiss (1955). The boxing match between Stoker and Tiger Nelson (Hal Fieberling) is an gritty four-round exchange of bludgeoning blows, and every connecting swipe sent a shudder of discomfort through my body. Even more fascinating, however, is how Wise focuses much attention on the match spectators, perhaps the most depraved selection of sadistic souls you're likely to find at any sporting event: an excited house-wife calls for a prolonging of the boxers' suffering; a blind man cries "go for his eyes," his cruel mind filling in the bloody details; the ever-composed Little Boy (Baxter) watches through shrewd, calculating eyes. The atmosphere of the boxing stadium is oppressive and stifling, the meeting-place of society's most decadent citizens. Ironically, it is only when he is defeated by this environment that Stoker can ever escape its clutches. He strikes the bottom of the barrel, his honour intact only in his eyes.
Gene Tierney was, of course, one of the most stunning actresses to grace the silver screen, but she was also among the most misused. When utilised as a traditional, innocent damsel-in-distress, Tierney's acting is usually dependable without being particularly memorable. However, at least two directors realised that she was at her best when her character's intentions are either ambiguous {see 
Whirlpool is strongest in its middle-act, with Tierney as a wrong-accused innocent for whom every piece of evidence points to her guilt. However, since the story's conclusion is ultimately never in any doubt, much of the film's second half feels as though it is merely going through the motions. I think it would have been more effective had the audience been uncertain of Ann's innocence, just as she herself is unsure. Alfred Hitchcock did something similar just a few years earlier in Spellbound (1945), casting doubt on the virtuousness of Gregory Peck as he is hunted for a crime of which he has no memory. Hinting at the tantalising possibility that Tierney is a murderer would undoubtedly have brought out the actresses' talents, the audience meanwhile tentative about whose story they can trust. For fans of 1940s psychological thrillers, in the same vein as 
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