"Motive for Revenge" is a slack grade C thriller from the mid-1930s. Not every plot has to have a few shreds of logic but this one defies common sense. Donald Cook -- in a performance so wooden it gives timber a bad name -- is a bank clerk who can't come up with the funds to satisfy his wife and her doting mother. So he robs the bank, gets collared by the cops and is sent off to the slammer for seven years. Which provides an excuse to throw in a slew of prison stock footage. Meanwhile, the missus marries a bloated, arrogant buffoon who manages to get himself shot. Whodunit? The answer probably surprised even the screenwriters who came up with it. Irene Hervey gives a remarkably deft performance and a few decent stage actors manage to make the most of their cardboard roles. But otherwise, it's strictly Grade C.
Review of Motive for Revenge
