Bullet Scars ** (1942, Regis Toomey, Adele Longmire, Howard da Silva) – Classic Movie Review 12,754

The 1942 Warner Bros romantic crime film Bullet Scars stars Regis Toomey, Adele Longmire and Howard da Silva. It is interesting as the third time that the studio made this story. Okay, third time unlucky, but never mind.

Director D Ross Lederman’s 1942 Warner Bros American romantic crime film Bullet Scars stars Regis Toomey, Adele Longmire and Howard da Silva. It is interesting as the third time that the studio, fond of recycling old material, made this story. Okay, third time unlucky, but never mind.

Doctor Steven Bishop (Regis Toomey) is bribed and taken off to gang boss Frank Dillon (da Silva)’s secret rendezvous to try to repair a bad guy, Joe Madison (Michael Ames), riddled with bullet holes in a bank robbery, while nurse Nora Madison (Adele Longmire), the wounded gangster’s sister, is press-ganged into helping too.

And then, what do you know?, Toomey and Longmire fall in love and somehow manage to call in the cops when Toomey pens a medicine prescription giving information about the gang’s location.

This mostly quite boring, predictable, unconvincing and humble filler comes from the lower half of Forties double bills and surely knows its own place. Short as it is at 59 minutes, it is still quite dull and fairly hard work. It’s a studio production line B-movie filler, but the prolific director is a brisk and tidy professional, and his actors are certainly competent.

Based on the story False Faces by Sy Bartlett and Charles Belden, and the novel Dr Socrates by W R Burnett, with a screenplay by Robert E Kent, it was previously made as: Dr Socrates (1935) and King of the Underworld (1939). Its main interest is as a cut-price remake of these fascinating, better films.

It is the film debut of Adele Longmire, who signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros in 1941. Stardom eluded her but she played Mabel in People Will Talk (1951), Lieutenant Jane in Battle Circus (1952), and Carmelina in The Turning Point (1952).

The cast are Regis Toomey as Dr Steven Bishop, Adele Longmire as Nora Madison, Howard da Silva as Frank Dillon, Ben Welden as Pills Davis, John Ridgely as Hank O’Connor, Frank Wilcox as Mike, Michael Ames as Joe Madison, Hobart Bosworth as Dr Carter, Roland Drew as Jake, Walter Brooke as Leary, Creighton Hale as Jess, Hank Mann as Gilly, Sol Gorss as Dude, Don Turner as Mitch, Tod Andrews, Charles Drake, Stuart Holmes, William Hopper, Fred Kelsey, Frank Mayo, Jack Mower, and Jack Wise.

© Derek Winnert 2023 – Classic Movie Review 12,754

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