... because you have this typical Depression era love story with a young couple in love but not enough money to get married at a time when married women were not expected to work after marriage. The guy, Joe WIlson (Spencer Tracy) is an optimistic fellow, living with his pseudo gangster brother and his baby brother that the gangster brother is trying to influence.
Joe quits a dead end job and buys a gas station and starts to make plenty of money. His fiancee (Sylvia Sidney) has been away from him a year working as a teacher to also save money. And then the day comes for them to reunite - there finally is enough money. He drives a car across country to meet up with her. And she waits and waits for him. Joe is never late. But little does she know that things have gone terribly wrong. That's where this tale goes to a very dark place.
Without giving away too much, a chain of events are set off that rips all optimism away from Joe and leaves him a changed and bitter guy, and he sets off on a really terrible yet understandable road of revenge.
This is probably the first real meaty role at MGM that Spencer Tracy got, and others followed soon after. It's also a rare 1930s message picture from that studio, dealing with mob mentality and violence. Although most mob violence was directed at African Americans during that time, so it does not quite have the courage of its convictions, it is still engaging.
