Charles McGraw holds a gun on worrying Peter Brocco in 'Roadblock.' |
But it’s not all bad news, in fact, there’s a lot to stick around for.
A clever twist at the beginning gives a hint about where the story is headed. Insurance investigators Joe Peters (Charles McGraw) and his partner Harry Miller (Louis Jean Heydt) have a way of tripping up thieves with carefully laid traps. It’s this subterfuge that gives us a clue about Joe’s inner world. He’s skilled at pulling the wool over crooks’ eyes. But, clearly, it won’t be long before his penchant for theatrical misdirection takes him down a different path.
Joe is a straight arrow, but once he meets hot tamale Diane (Joan Dixon) his morally upright resolve begins to crumble. Diane, he quickly learns, is no slouch at working a scheme or two of her own. She hustles a discounted airline ticket, which conflicts with Joe’s moral standards, or so it seems. Beneath his mask of ethical superiority lies a con man wannabe. In Diane he sees a pretty face and perhaps a kindred spirit and, a bit too quickly, he goes goo-goo-eyes over her.
Diane (Joan Dixon). |
Joe is in a downward spiral, although he’s not aware of it, and soon she’ll be on the upswing. Somehow, they’ll meet in the middle and connect. Unexpectedly, and inexplicably, things begin to change with Diane once the two couple up. Could it be that beneath her materialistic exterior lies the heart of a woman yearning for true love and the simple life of an insurance inspector’s wife? How that transformation comes about is not quite clear. Without warning, she seems to join the ranks of the exceedingly small sorority of femmes fatale who experience the curative powers of romance.
But all is not well with the smitten Joe. His gangster cohort soon convinces him that she’ll tire of the simple life, and he becomes convinced that he must take drastic action. He devises a plan to score a large cache of loot.
For a film that tears at the fabric of believability, the story moves forward quickly enough to keep us from noticing or caring too much about how little sense much of it makes. It might be called a weak sister to “Double Indemnity” (1944), which is about another insurance man scamming the system in order to hold onto a gorgeous babe.
Doomed by the choices he makes. |
Joe’s foray into criminal enterprise is a leading example of emotions overwhelming logic. His rookie entry into the world of crime is doomed, and pretty soon the couple ends up on the lam. He aims to get himself and Diane to Mexico where they can live outside the reach of U.S. law enforcement. The finale takes place in the Los Angeles River bed, a dry concrete gulf that Joe desperately detours through with the police in hot pursuit — in today’s Los Angeles the chase would undoubtedly be telecast live to boffo ratings.
Despite it all, don’t be deterred. This low-budget RKO production, shot for around $200,000, doesn’t show the thread-bare trappings of many a cut-rate endeavor. Like a handful of other cheapo productions, “Roadblock” is gritty, a bit slap-dash, but somehow keeps us watching. Just think of it as a savory tidbit for times when you’re not in the mood for a heavy meal.
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