The Glass Key

A fun movie to watch with some good dialogue and some great moments, but it just doesn't have the punch or style to compare with the better Noirs out there.

Decent early noir with some good performances and great dialogue: "My first wife was a second cook at a third rate restaurant on fourth street". Has some key elements that influences Kurosawa's "Yojimbo" as well as the Coens' "Miller's Crossing".

I didn't really care for the plot; political corruption tales don't get me excited, and the story is rather convoluted, in typical Hammett fashion. But taken scene by scene, the movie is mighty entertaining. In terms of individual moments, probably the highlight for me was the scene where Ladd is held, not just for the brutality but also the tension and the cinematography and Bendix's psychotic performance. The film's greatest asset is its dialogue, which really crackles. Lots of classic lines.

Kind of confusing story since the beginning throws you right into all the characters. Fav scene: "but I'm the district attorney!"

William Bendix far outshines his bigger screen contemporaries Ladd and Lake in this mostly forgettable tale of political corruption. His turn as the sadistic and charismatic lug Jeff adds some excitement to what is mostly a dull affair.

Starts off a little clunky but gets better as it goes along. Veronica Lake is good but Alan Ladd and William Bendix steal the show.

A faithful version of the Hammett novel, with an excellent cast.

Good noir with an interesting plot and that's lifted even higher thanks to some solid directing, but mostly its cast. Veronica Lake is there to just look pretty and does so effortlessly. Alan Ladd does a convincing job in walking the thin line between likeable lead cause of his loyalty and amoral problem solver. Lake and Ladd also do have great chemistry together. But it are Brian Donlevy as the charismatic streetwise corrupt boss and William Bendix as the sadistic hoodlum that steal the movie.

an average noir, has some good action, dialogue and twists going for it. it's still pretty silly and thin though

It touches on a the bigger issue of political corruption, but mostly forgoes delving deeper for the sake of entertainment. The murder mystery element is handled pretty well, but the denouement is somewhat underwhelming (it doesn't make much sense, really). That said, Ladd is good as the bad-ass enforcer, but he is totally outshone by William Bendix as the sociopath it's easy to sympathise with.

Nice pulpy noir that crams in some political corruption and a rather unusual love story (one that gets a little more unusual at the end). Unfortunately, Alan Ladd as Le Samourai is the main character even though he's supposed to be behind the scenes, and there's not quite enough time spent with an amazingly unhinged hood.

Enjoyable, and pretty fun to watch just to realize how influenced Millers Crossing was of it.

Fun but overly convoluted political noir that picks up steam as it goes along. Love the line "My first wife was the second cook at a third rate restaurant on 4th St." Ladd is pretty good, but probably not as good as he was in This Gun for Hire the same year. William Bendix steals every scene he's in as the halfwitted henchman.

Top notch role for Alan Ladd in his break-through year. He completely steals the picture from everyone. Even Veronica Lake! Only one close to matching him was William Bendix as the killer henchman always beating him up. There was so many little things which made The Glass Key (1942) so great. Some weak characters too, which stopped it from being one of those elite pictures. But with what's displayed, we have a real enticing crime drama.

Hammett's writing style is handsomely evocative of atmosphere and situation and the angle is practically always that of a neutral onlooker, a stand-in for the audience. The Glass Key and Miller's Crossing signify two distinguishing readings of Hammett. The former is a straightforward conversion, the latter takes basics from Red Harvest and then sets them afloat in a plot which reverberates with a virtual mirror image of The Glass Key but also wanders gamely into original ideas.

There is a shocking amount of dialogue that amounts to characters saying other character's names. This makes things quite confusing for such a brief running time. Still, everyone looks good and delivers some nice performances. William Bendix, in particular, gives a fairly unhinged performance as a henchmen that likes violence.