UNDERWORLD U.S.A. (1961) B/W 99m dir: Samuel Fuller

w/Cliff Robertson, Dolores Dorn, Beatrice Kay, Paul Dubov, Robert Emhardt, Larry Gates, Richard Rust, Gerald Milton, Allan Gruener, David Kent, Tina Rome, Sally Mills, Robert P. Lieb, Neyle Morrow, Henry Norell

Kid who has had a hard road in life grows up determined to get the men who murdered his father in a gang slaying. Crime drama covers familiar ground, but does so expertly.

Be forewarned: the following material contains specific story information you may not want to know before viewing the film:

From Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style, edited by Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward, this article on UNDERWORLD U.S.A. written by Meredith Brody and Silver: "Samuel Fuller is a director with a noir bias comparable to that of Nicholas Ray, Robert Siodmak, and Don Siegel. These four men each have different viewpoints, but all of them are singularly suited to film noir and have created films utilizing noir style in all genres. Additionally, Fuller's filmography contains numerous war films and Underworld U.S.A. reflects that: it is a war between the F.B.I. and the crime syndicate, both of which are described in militaristic terms. The protagonist of Underworld U.S.A., Tolly Devlin, is not only a soldier in the war but also one of its refugees, as an orphan who desires revenge, and ultimately one of its casualties. Like one inured to war's horrors, Tolly is incapable of human response apart from what is needed for the success of his quest. His sexuality, for instance, is dominated by his need for information about his enemies, and making love is essential for eliciting information from Cuddles. Fuller also exploits brutal violence for visual impact. Both Tolly's and Cuddles's faces are marred by vivid bruises and large bandages throughout much of the film; their visages passively reflect the fundamental and pervasive influence that violence exerts on their lives. Under that influence Tolly is unrelentingly and mechanistically devoted to his personal battle plan, a plan that puts him in opposition, supported by Fuller's staging and composition, to both criminal and legal forces. In that self-centered position, Tolly resembles Skip McCoy in Fuller's Pickup on South Street. Unlike McCoy, Tolly Devlin is not saved by the influence of Cuddles and Sandy as McCoy was by the similar characters of Candy and Moe in the earlier film. Perhaps because Devlin's overriding motivation is revenge rather than simple avarice, perhaps because the efforts of Cuddles and Sandy on his behalf are not so self-destructive as those of Candy and Moe for McCoy, Devlin does not survive. Like an exhausted warrior, Tolly is literally and figuratively finished when his revenge is complete; and he dies alone, in the same alley where his father perished to the ironic strains of 'Auld Lang Syne.'"