Wild Boys of the Road

Wild Boys of the Road (1933)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

William A. Wellman directs this Depression era drama about two boys (Frankie Darro, Edwin Phillips) who run away from home and jump on the railroad route in hopes of finding a job so that they can help their families back home. Once again there must have been something inside of Wellman because there's a lot of passion in this film aimed at the poor who must do what they can to try and survive. This is a very hard hitting film that looks at this kids in a very serious light and it makes for a terrific little gem that deserves more attention than it's gotten within film history. Both Darro and Phillips are terrific in their roles and the chemistry they offer is great. Wellman's future wife, Dorothy Coonan, is also very good in her role as the boys buddy. The first twenty-minutes of the film shows the boys as normal teenagers but then we see their parents lose their jobs and thus forcing them to hit the road. This set up really sells the rest of the film and it also helps us see the suffering they're going to go through for the rest of the film. Wellman does a great job with the tender side of the story as well as a couple great fight sequences where they boys attack some railroad police as well as a rapist. Darro has a bit of Cagney in him and his performance here seems to have had a major influence on what we'd eventually see from The Dead End Kids.