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Old Ganster Movie

Started by Derf, March 10, 2011, 03:54:05 PM

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Derf

A friend saw part of a movie and asked me if I knew the name of it so she could look for it again. I didn't know, so I'll ask you guys.

It was a black & white comedy. It's about a couple who are gangsters. They adopt a kid but don't want their new daughter to know they are gangsters. They want to go straight, but keep running into people from their past. They go on vacation only to find that some of their old gang are hiding out in their vacation house. One of these guys turns on all the rest during a poker game and kills them. The parents try to keep their daughter from finding them. Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the parents, their daughter has gotten engaged to a police officer, who then shows up at their doorstep. Wackiness apparently ensues.

Does this ring a bell with anyone? I think she saw it on Turner Movie Classics.
"They tap dance not, neither do they fart." --Greensleeves, on the Fig Men of the Imagination, in "Twice Upon a Time."

telegonus

It's A Slight Case Of Murder (1937), based on a play co-authored by Damon Runyon. Edward G.  Robinson stars  as the "beer baron"   :drink: trying to go legit. I've seen it two or three times, find it very funny. Downside: it's not well directed. Had Frank Capra directed this one it might have been a classic.

BTW, it was remade fifteen years later as a musical  :lookingup: , Stop, You're Killing Me! (I think I got that right), with Broderick Crawford in the Robinson role. The film was probably inspired by the hit Broadway musical Guys and Dolls, which was running around the time it was made, adapted from several Runyon stories.

Derf

Great! Thank you very much! I'll have to look for it. It sounds interesting.
"They tap dance not, neither do they fart." --Greensleeves, on the Fig Men of the Imagination, in "Twice Upon a Time."