I Was Framed (1942) User Reviews

A really good idea...ineffectively executed.

[planktonrules · 4/10 · 11 September 2014]

According to IMDb, "I Was Framed" is a remake of the 1939 John Garfield films "Dust Be My Destiny". However, if you read the summary of the Garfield film, it pretty has nothing to do with "I Was Framed". I also saw the Garfield film and although a bit of the plot is the same, I cannot see that one is a remake of the other at all. However, for the life of me, I KNOW that "I Was Framed" is a remake (or some film is a remake of it), as I recognized so much of the film--especially the scene where the reporter is set up for a drunk driving arrest. I KNOW I've seen it...but what film?! If you know, let me know--I just know is it NOT "Dust Be My Destiny".

The film is about a reporter who doggedly pursues criminals who are high officials. However, these folks are very powerful and very dangerous and Ken (Tod Andrews) is bound to get the worst of it. Yet he continues his one-man crusade until eventually the mob IS able to get him out of the way by framing him for a crime and getting him sent to jail. He makes his escape midway through the movie--and at this point the film fizzles. Instead of quickly working to prove his innocence, most of the rest of the film is a dull account of he and his wife hiding from the law...only to find out in the end that the cops caught the real criminal behind the drunk driving setup some time ago--but they couldn't find Ken to tell him until then! Huh?!

The bottom line is that the film has some very good elements and is slick--since it's a B-movie from Warner Brothers. But it also is unsatisfying and the plot seems to meander--like it needs to be rewritten. Worth skipping but not terrible either.

B movie from Warners

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 15 September 2014]

As someone mentioned, this is supposedly a remake of Dust Be My Destiny which starred John Garfield. I don't know, since I haven't seen Dust, but if Warner Brothers remade The Maltese Falcon twice (actually the famous Maltese Falcon was the third film), they could certainly have remade Dust Be My Destiny. They remade just about everything else.

Tod Andrews, who had a prolific TV career later, plays Ken Marshall, a reporter who discovers political corruption. If it comes out, it will ruin one candidate's campaign for governor.

Ken is rendered unconscious, with booze poured all over him, and then placed in the driver's seat of a car that's sent down the highway. After an accident kills three people, Ken goes to prison. He is able to escape, however, winds up in another town, and builds a new life for himself, even getting a reporter job under another name. Then one day, an old cellmate shows up and blackmails him.

This is an okay film with the big star being Regis Toomey. Someone mentioned that the wife didn't look pregnant up to the moment she gave birth. Back then, all a woman did was faint, and you were supposed to know she was pregnant. I think the censors didn't allow pregnancy to be shown, because if you look at movies like The Great Lie, the pregnant person never looked pregnant. As Lucille Ball said, "Today you can not only see that a woman is pregnant, but how she got that way."

Passable minor film that doesn't live up to its title

[mbhur · 5/10 · 7 July 2020]

With a title that boldly states "I Was Framed" I expected an intense, edge-of-my seat experience, but alas, this is Warner Brothers in 1942, not the '30s, and apparently now a kinder, gentler studio. Strangely, the first 10 minutes or so are an almost exact remake of the classic Warner Brothers Cagney prison drama, "Each Dawn I Die," but then it abandons the plot before the reporter protagonist actually goes to prison. The rest is completely unrelated to the Cagney film, made just three years earlier. (I can't really think of any other film that starts as a remake than abandons the source material, but it was all WB property, so they could do what they want).

Here, instead of going to prison the reporter takes it on the lam, along with his pregnant wife, and they have the good fortune to be passing through the world's nicest small town when she needs medical help. That's when the movie takes a turn into softness and sentimentality, and it all becomes rather bland. The couple meets a kindly old doctor who not only refuses money for delivering the baby, but offers to let them live with him rent free for several months, and then gets the reporter a job on the town's paper, run by his best friend (Who of course doesn't even ask for credentials or writing samples, convenient since the reporter has to use a fake name. Good thing there were no internet searches then). Fast forward five years and the reporter is a huge success on the paper and a pillar of the community, and he and his wife and their impossibly adorable daughter are still living with the doctor. The only suspense in the movie comes when a convict who had known the reporter in jail shows up. He's a nasty character, but you never have a sense that anything really bad could happen to all these super nice people. (And the doctor comes to the rescue again. In his spare time he's apparently a finger print expert).

A couple of other notes. Though a short story called "Dust Be My Destiny" is listed by IMDB as source material, this movie has zero relationship to the John Garfield movie of the same name (also from WB) except in the extremely general sense that both movies have a couple on the run. Also, a couple of reviewers here have wondered why the wife, though 9 months pregnant, shows no visible signs of her condition. This was true in all Hollywood movies of that era, as apparently it was thought that showing a pregnant woman's stomach was in poor taste. (I'm guessing also that the studios did not want to show their lead actresses in a way they considered unglamorous.) In this movie, the convention causes a moment of unintentional comedy. When the reporter tells the doctor his wife needs help, the doc looks right at her and says, "What's the problem?" Then, when she starts to faint, he says "Oh," finally getting it. Apparently even a doctor with decades of experience couldn't discern a Hollywood pregnancy.

Note for trivia buffs. Veteran character actor Sam McDaniel, who brings warmth and dignity to what might have been a cliched African American servant role, was the brother of the great Hattie McDaniel, the first African American to win an Oscar.

I watched it. You don't need to.

[Jim Tritten · 3/10 · 25 August 2002]

Forgettable crime drama with hero newspaperman framed for manslaughter (he really did not do it). Wise con tempts him to join an escape from County Jail but during execution, the confederate gets left behind and our hero actually steals a car. Our hero has obviously watched cowboy movies because he outwits the cops by pulling into a side road and watching the trailing patrol car go by.

In meantime hero encounters the nicest folks in View Point - `The City with the democratic point of view, pop. 44,176.' His wife gives birth, they stay as a guest of the town doctor (for five years), and our hero becomes the editor of the View Point News. The confederate escapes from jail, gets off a freight train, sees the hero and blackmails wife. Smart doctor suspects something, gets the con's fingerprints and the cops come in to save the day.

Wow, all in 61 minutes! Despite the breakneck speed of the story, there is time to listen to child actress Patti Hale sing and recite multiple lines of poetry. How did she learn all those lines? And why does the final scene need to have the 5-year old daughter in the room while the police discuss her father's past?

Obvious underlying themes of crime does not pay is worth at least one line of dialog. Another theme is that you can't teach an old dog new tricks - our hero gets framed initially because he is going after a politico and he repeats the behavior later in View Point.

Too Bland

[dougdoepke · 17 September 2014]

A crusading reporter is framed, sent to jail, but escapes to make a prosperous life in a new town, only to be blackmailed by an old cellmate he's double-crossed.

Despite the promising plot elements, the crime movie lacks needed grit, surprising for a Warner Bros. production. As a crusading reporter, Ames (aka Andrews) is much too bland to spark proceedings. Things pick up in final scenes, but by then it's too late. There's good support from McDaniel (Kit) and Harmon (Blake), but I'm with those who find blonde tot Hale on the annoying side. She's over-doing the aren't-I-cute bit. And catch that climax; it's like they had 30-seconds to tie up every loose end. I expect the production was rushed to accommodate burgeoning wartime audiences eager for escape. Now, I don't know about Dust Be My Destiny (1939), but the plot has a distinct resemblance to 1941's Strange Alibi, except the fall guy here is a reporter instead of a cop. A re-make wouldn't be surprising considering a speed-up on the programmer assembly line. Anyway, this 50-some minutes is easily passed up, especially if you've already seen the superior Strange Alibi.

okay war-time shortie

[ksf-2 · 6/10 · 23 March 2009]

Regis Toomey as "Bob", the newspaper editor, is the biggest name in this 1942 shortie. One of his reporters, Ken Marshall (Michael Ames aka Tod Andrews) gets a good photo of some shenanigans taking place, but the local mobsters catch him, destroy the photo, and try to destroy him and his career. The script and the acting are pretty cardboard and ordinary. The local cops are all on the take, so our hero can't get any help from them. It looks like Andrews did mostly television appearances. The wife, played by Julie Bishop, worked with all the biggies in numerous war-time films and westerns. Aldrich Bowker is the kindly old doctor who helps them out. Keep an eye out for Sam McDaniel as Doc Brown's servant. They gave him some of the best lines. The film devotes a whole lot of time to the couple's little daughter "Penny" (Patti Hale), and even has her sing a song. Turner Classics showed this at 3 am, which probably explains why, as of March 2009, there are only 25 votes. It's an okay story, written by Jerome Odlum, but the ending is a little too abrupt, almost as if the original ending were skipped for budget reasons. The U.S. HAD just entered the war...

redo

[SnoopyStyle · 3/10 · 11 July 2020]

Investigative reporter Ken Marshall is on the trail of crooked politician Gaines who is running for governor. After a series of articles, he is kidnapped and forced into a staged drunk driving incident which kills 3 people. He is sent to prison but quickly manages to escape.

This is a redo of "Each Dawn I Die" starring James Cagney. The first part is almost exactly the same which includes reusing the same car crash footage. The rest is completely different. None of it is an improvement. First, Cagney can't be replaced. Second, I'm not sure about the rewrite. I don't think I've ever encountered a redo. Maybe Rob Zombie redoing Halloween. I just can't believe the story. It turns an interesting prison drama into a dull non-dramatic life. I don't know the point of it all. The first part is a copy and the most notable about the rest is an overacting little girl.

Mind Jarring Juxtapositions One of Director Lederman's Trademarks

[LeonLouisRicci · 7/10 · 29 September 2014]

The Unsung and Almost Forgotten Director D. Ross Lederman's Career Spanned Four Decades and is Awash in B's Filled with Mind Numbing Transitions while Compiling Sometimes Drastic Dramatic Changes in Tone and Presentation that Make You Pay Attention.

In this One for Example, the First Act is Film-Noir, Completely Night Time, Shadows Lurking Everywhere and Sinister, Creepy Villains About. But when the Framed Man Escapes from Prison, a Reporter who was Exposing Corruption at the Highest Level, with His Pregnant Wife Along, Ends Up in a Small Town "A Democratic Town", the Feel of the Film Snaps into a Drama of Socialism where Payment for Health Care is Not Expected, and is Happily Included with a Place to Live and a Job.

It is this Type of Jarring Juxtaposition that is Trademark Lederman. The Middle Act is Complete with a "Charmer" Child that Sings and Hangs About with a Negro Servant Given Many Lines and is a Good Friend to the Tantalizing Tot. Another Lederman Rule Shattering Flourish.

Then in the Third Act Things Tense Up Again for Another Foray into Crime and Punishment when a Blackmailer Shows Up and Not Only Demands Money, but Wants the Wife to be More "Friendly". The Director Again with a Scene that Bends Hollywood Tradition.

Sure the Ending is Abrupt and the Film is Not Wholly Realized and is Not as Successfully Rendered as Some of the Director's Other Entertaining and Hard-Hitting Quickies, but has Enough Against the Grain Goofiness to be Worth a Watch and Overall Lederman Showing Why His Movies are Not Quite the Same as His Hack Contemporaries.

Could Have Been Nice

[Bacardi1 · 2/10 · 10 March 2009]

This COULD have been a nice tight - if poorly acted - little Grade B/C film noir piece if someone had had the brains not to devote a solid 20-30 minutes to Patty Hale, whose poetry/song/supposed-light-comedy stints brought me to the point of nausea. This entire film looks to be nothing more than a vehicle for her. How very very sad.

I also found it unexpectedly funny re: the wife having her baby, although she was slim as a green bean in all her immediate before birth shots. I can only guess that it may have had something to do with the censors at that time.

But still - nothing ruins this little flick more than little Patty Hale.

America's cops, prosecutors, judges and prisons exist solely . . .

[oscaralbert · 6/10 · 11 July 2020]

. . . to fulfill the whims of Corrupt Communist Capitalist Corporate One Per Center Fat Cats, the always eponymous Warner Bros. warn We Loyal Patriotic True Blue Union Label Working Stiffs with I WAS FRAMED. The worst fears of the prophetic prognosticators from Warner have been borne out, now that a Kremlin KGB Chief and his henchmen are conspiring together to appoint perverse legal lackeys as S.C.O.T.U.S. Justices. U.S. Citizens can expect more of the same, unless the perfidious Pachyderm Party is banned permanently, dismantled and erased, this movie suggests.

Partial remake of Each Dawn I died

[gpmintown · 4/10 · 6 July 2020]

TCM showed the two movies back-to-back this afternoon. For the first fifteen minutes or so, up through the end of the courtroom scene, the two scripts are virtually identical, even as to gestures as well as dialog. Diverged radically after that.

As others have noted, the scenes with the daughter are nauseating. Reduced the rating by at least one point.

Each Dawn I Sigh

[utgard14 · 5/10 · 10 May 2023]

Reporter gets framed for murder and sent to prison. Then some stuff happens. This started out as a promising little B with a nice cast and some action. Then things slow to a standstill for a long while before an abrupt but somewhat exciting climax. I've seen this compared to Each Dawn I Die, probably my favorite prison movie and definitely my favorite James Cagney movie. The only comparison is in the opening framejob. Everything else is different. Each Dawn I Die is superior in every way. This is a fairly dull picture. It does have some thrilling moments at the beginning, as well as some interesting "that wouldn't fly today" elements like a doctor refusing payment and a creepy murderous-looking vagrant being allowed into a house by a pretty woman who then proceeds to make him breakfast! Oh and there's a precocious little Shirley Temple wannabe who will rot your teeth with every line she says.