Based on a radio show this short (an hour) film is a bit of a meandering mess.
the plot of the film has two gangs going to war and somehow in the middle of it all the daughter of an oil man is kidnapped. As the police try to solve the crime(s), Cosmo Jones, a genius and amateur criminologist forces himself into the case.
This is a weird film where the title character doesn't show up for a quarter of the running time. When he does show up he sort of seems as if he were added into the mix for no good reason, with a young police Sargent taking the lead. Its not until into the second half of the film that he takes center stage. Another weird twist is Mantan Moreland who is listed fourth in the credits as a "star" and he only shows up close to the half way mark in a role that requires him to do little more than stand around for most of his screen time (I guess a pay check is a pay check).
The problem is that the film wanders to and fro with out any real direction. Its starts off as a gangster story, shifts to the cops, shifts again to gang war film, turns again into a murder tale then swerves into the kidnap tale. Characters take center stage then fall to the background over and over again, not like in an ensemble film where there is ebb and flow, instead its like seeing a series of almost unconnected photographs. The result is a rather bland and un-involving movie, which is a shame since the film does have some genuinely good moments (the near torture of Moreland is horrifying in a very real way) and there are more than its share of funny lines.
Not really worth seeking out, I'd pretty much let this one slide unless I ran across it on TV, in which case it would be worth taking a peak.
the plot of the film has two gangs going to war and somehow in the middle of it all the daughter of an oil man is kidnapped. As the police try to solve the crime(s), Cosmo Jones, a genius and amateur criminologist forces himself into the case.
This is a weird film where the title character doesn't show up for a quarter of the running time. When he does show up he sort of seems as if he were added into the mix for no good reason, with a young police Sargent taking the lead. Its not until into the second half of the film that he takes center stage. Another weird twist is Mantan Moreland who is listed fourth in the credits as a "star" and he only shows up close to the half way mark in a role that requires him to do little more than stand around for most of his screen time (I guess a pay check is a pay check).
The problem is that the film wanders to and fro with out any real direction. Its starts off as a gangster story, shifts to the cops, shifts again to gang war film, turns again into a murder tale then swerves into the kidnap tale. Characters take center stage then fall to the background over and over again, not like in an ensemble film where there is ebb and flow, instead its like seeing a series of almost unconnected photographs. The result is a rather bland and un-involving movie, which is a shame since the film does have some genuinely good moments (the near torture of Moreland is horrifying in a very real way) and there are more than its share of funny lines.
Not really worth seeking out, I'd pretty much let this one slide unless I ran across it on TV, in which case it would be worth taking a peak.