What makes old Hollywood an ever-fascinating study are the thousands upon thousands of names still to be discovered and studied, such as directors of photography that may not have been as widely-known as those who were held in high regard within the studio system, directors who didn’t have the same clout as a Victor Fleming or a John Ford, and actors who didn’t make it as big as those we know so well even today. And then there are the surprises to be found in the present day, such as Gene Kelly’s first dramatic role, as an Italian immigrant in Black Hand, released by Warner Archive as part of the celebration of the 60th anniversary of Singin’ in the Rain. Over the years, Warner Bros. has done a great service to MGM movies, releasing mega sets of Gone with the Wind, Citizen Kane, and The Wizard of Oz. Black Hand is a so-so example of what else MGM offered alongside these greats, mostly a fascinating study of what Gene Kelly could do when he wasn’t dancing.
Kelly plays Johnny Columbo, whose father, Roberto (Peter Brocco) was killed by the Black Hand, the Mafia, when he went to the police to complain of extortion. Johnny’s mother takes him back with her to Sicily and he returns a decade later to seek vengeance. But not the kind of vengeance we know so well through more violent movies after 1950. Kelly has too innocent a face for that, and so he tries to convince his fellow citizens to form an organization with him to stand against this unjust influence. He enlists the help of Isabella (Teresa Celli), who he knew in childhood, and who certainly remembers him and is supportive in helping him. But the Black Hand cannot be stopped, no matter the crusade mounted, though Johnny also has help from Louis (J. Carroll Naish), an old friend of his family, who doesn’t like the viciousness of the Black Hand and wants to see them snuffed out for good in the courts.
This is the basic structure, and all we can do is sit back and wait, watching bleak, small cityscapes, shadows all around, Kelly doing his level best to make good of a role that most likely served as a welcome break for him, a way to keep himself fresh as an actor, to surprise audiences. He’s definitely done that, so earnest in his portrayal, wanting so very much to do the right thing, to see that those who killed his father can’t kill any more people. The waiting is the hardest part, though, making the movie taxing to get through because there’s really no dramatic tension that’s laced tightly enough within the plot to make us pay close attention. Teresa Celli, a relative newcomer to movies then, having only previously co-starred in Border Incident in 1949, makes for a reassuring presence, and at least can act a little compared to other actresses who appeared in movies in this time and accomplished nothing in their roles, nothing to make us remember. She at least lives up to being a co-star opposite Kelly, even as the sluggish screenplay makes us wait some more, and still wait yet again. It all builds up to a genuinely suspenseful climax, but while the impressively tight editing significantly ratchets up the tension, one wonders why it couldn’t be this way for the entire movie. It’s a problem, but the novelty of Gene Kelly in a drama, his first major one at that, makes it worth at least one viewing.
Before watching Black Hand, I went to Amazon, curious about The Competition, a romance which starred Richard Dreyfuss and Amy Irving as two concerts pianists at a major piano competition. Considering that besides Warner Archive, there’s now also Sony Pictures Choice Collection, and 20th Century Fox Cinema Archives, surely it must eventually appear. And it turns out that it has, through Sony, which released it as a manufacture-on-demand DVD that all these labels offer. The thing is, when we see a movie in theaters that we like a lot or that we love, we anticipate it coming to DVD so we can own it. There’s no real surprise in that, just the forthcoming pleasure of having it in a personal collection. Warner Bros., Sony, and Fox are all putting the surprise back into movies. I always know what the Criterion Collection is releasing way ahead of time, but these studios don’t seem to let it be known what’s being released until the exact month, hence the surprise of finding out about The Competition. Black Hand was also a surprise, not only because of Kelly’s role, but also because who knew that Warner Bros. also had access to these movies? Owning much of the old MGM library indicates that they would own Black Hand too, but compared to, say, Singin’ in the Rain, it’s been buried pretty deep, until now.
Think of these labels as a Cracker Jack box for movies. Unlike Cracker Jack today with those crappy paper prizes, there’s always a prize waiting to be released by these companies, something we may not have known about before, but here it comes, ready to surprise us. Movies have always been wonderful, but this gives extra pleasure in a way that DVDs haven’t in many years. We know what to expect from DVDs in general, but with these, we have no idea what to expect next. That’s the fun of it.
Purchase now from the Warner Archive Collection.
