Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #126293 in DVD
• Released on: 2007-05-14
• Format: NTSC

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Mahlon Keane (Robert Armstrong) is a mobster who befriends Rhoda Philbrooke (Carole Lombard) at a charity event and assists her in winning some money she intends for her ailing concert violinist friend. Keane promises to help promote the violinist's comeback in exchange for Philbrooke's hand in marriage. Complications arise for Philbrooke when the violinist, now recovered and preparing for his concert, professes his love for her on her wedding day.

Customer Reviews

For early talkie fans or the Lombard completist
This is one of those early talkies, so the filmmakers had not yet learned that a good film is in delivery of lines, motivation, and screenplay, not just the fact that the characters talk. I'm sure someday people will look at today's CGI movies and make equivalent criticisms. Robert Armstrong plays "the racketeer" here, but he is a kinder gentler gangster. At the beginning of the film he doesn't even "rub out" a member of his gang that has jumped bail on him - he just hands him over to the police so he can get his money back. James Cagney's Tom Powers would have never handled it this way.

This sets up the story so that the racketeer seems quite human and likable. At a charity Monte Carlo night he catches a fallen woman Rhoda Philbrooke (Carole Lombard) cheating at cards and helps her cover up her crime. It turns out Rhoda is broke and really needs the money since she has left her husband and taken up with drunken musician Tony Vaughan (Roland Drew). Racketeer Mahlon Keane then goes to Rhoda's apartment and offers to help her. Mainly, he helps her "dry out" her drunken boyfriend and get him back on his feet. He even arranges for Tony to perform at a big concert. He also asks Rhoda to marry him. He doesn't do this as a condition of his good works, but Rhoda accepts his proposal because she feels beholden to him and she does genuinely like him. In the end, Rhoda realizes that she still really loves Tony but doesn't want to hurt racketeer Keane. Fate intervenes so that she doesn't have to perform this unsavory task.

The one thing that is never sufficiently conveyed to the viewer is why Rhoda loves Tony. He comes across as a drunken weakling that quite frankly seems very indifferent to Rhoda until the end of the film and doesn't seem to mind the fact that he is being helped by someone who is courting her. Probably the worst thing about this film is the unrestored condition it is in. I've seen prints from several companies and they are all in pretty bad shape. The audio is surprisingly good for an early talkie, but the video has lots of scratches in it and is somewhat washed out. The most interesting thing about this film is that it is one of Carole Lombard's very earliest film performances.

Rare classic movie
Film historians will have a lot of fun with 1929's early sound gangster quickie, "The Racketeer", featuring a sexy, young Carole Lombard(just 20 years old). In "The Racketeer", the camera plops down in one place, and rarely budges from there; not uncommon for the clumsy, early talkies. Robert Armstrong stars as Keane, a likeable, gentle mobster. He's quite good here, as the suave, confident mobster. Armstrong's most famous role as Carl Denham in the "Big Ape" flick was still some four years away. Carole Lombard co-stars as Rhoda Philbrooke. At a charity event, Keane helps Rhoda win some money she needs to support her ailing lover, a concert violinist. Keane even promises to promote the violinist, in exchange for Rhoda's hand in marriage. In "The Racketeer", Carole Lombard is young and graceful, but not very effective; she's just too raw, and it's years before she would learn the ropes from John Barrymore in "Twentieth Century(1934)". Lombard displays little warmth in her scenes with either man. Roland Drew, as the violinist, is lifeless and boring. His character's apparent drug problem produces no sympathy. The source print for "The Racketeer" looks tarnished and damaged, but what do you expect for a rare survivor of 1929? "The Racketeer" was shot at the old Pathe Studio in Culver City, now known as Culver Studios. Stock New York street scenes match poorly with the back-lot set.