The years 1937-39 were extraordinarily productive ones for rising star Humphrey Bogart. He appeared in no less than 20 (!) films during those three years (seven in '37, six in '38 and seven in '39), playing "the heavy" in most of them. His last film of this period was "Invisible Stripes," a lesser Warner Bros. gangster film that still offers much. Bogey, fourth billed here, plays Chuck Martin, an inveterate hood who is released from Sing Sing after a five-year stretch and returns to his old ways back in the big city. Getting out of the slammer on the same day is Cliff Taylor, played by the film's nominal star, George Raft. Back at home, Cliff finds that being on parole isn't so easy. His old girlfriend summarily dumps him, no employer will hire him, and his kid brother (William Holden, here in one of his earliest roles) is being drawn into a life of crime to finance his dream of an automotive shop and to marry pretty Jane Bryan. Good thing that Bogey consents to bring Cliff along on a string of capers to pick up some folding money.... Anyway, while not in the same rarefied league of such Warners gangster flix as "Angels With Dirty Faces" and "The Roaring Twenties," this Bogey outing is still lots of fun. It features an exciting armored-car robbery and resultant high-speed car chase, loads of terrific character actors (Flora Robson, Leo Gorcey, Paul Kelly, Lee Patrick, Marc Lawrence, John "Perry White" Hamilton, et al.), reams of snappy patter and even some brightly amusing bits. (I love the scene in which Bogey and his blond moll are shown exiting a movie theatre that is playing "You Can't Get Away With Murder"...another Bogart picture from 1939!) Bogey easily walks away with this picture, stealing every scene that he is in, and his final words, "You can't live forever," are worth the price of admission alone. It would be another few years until 1941's "High Sierra" and "The Maltese Falcon" really made the world see him in a new light, but "Invisible Stripes" was still a highly entertaining vehicle for his ever-growing talent.
Review of Invisible Stripes
