Johnny Eager

Last updated
Johnny Eager
Johnny-Eager-1941.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Screenplay by John Lee Mahin
James Edward Grant
Story byJames Edward Grant
Produced by John W. Considine Jr.
Mervyn LeRoy
Starring Robert Taylor
Lana Turner
Edward Arnold
Van Heflin
CinematographyHarold Rosson
Edited byAlbert Akst
Music by Bronislau Kaper
Distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date
  • December 9, 1941 (1941-12-09)(Los Angeles)
Running time
107 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$651,000 [1]
Box office$2,586,000 [1]

Johnny Eager is a 1941 film noir directed by Mervyn LeRoy and starring Robert Taylor, Lana Turner and Van Heflin. Heflin won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. [2] The film was one of many spoofed in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982).

Contents

Plot

Johnny Eager masquerades as a taxi driver for his gullible parole officer, A. J. Verne, but in reality, he is the ruthless head of a powerful gambling syndicate. Verne introduces him to socialite Lisbeth "Liz" Bard, a sociology student. Johnny and Liz are attracted to each other, but then he discovers that she is the stepdaughter of his longtime nemesis, John Benson Farrell. As a crusading prosecutor, Farrell was responsible for sending Johnny to prison, and now as the district attorney, he has gotten an injunction preventing Johnny's expensive dog racing track from opening.

Johnny decides to use Liz as leverage against her stepfather. When she comes to see him, he has Julio, one of his underlings, burst in and pretend to try to kill him. During the faked struggle, Julio drops his gun. Lisbeth picks it up and shoots Julio when he seems to have the upper hand. Johnny then hustles her out of the room before she can realize that the gun is full of blanks and Julio's blood is actually ketchup. Later, Johnny threatens to expose her as a murderer unless Farrell removes the injunction. Farrell gives in.

Johnny is depicted as a man without a conscience. When childhood friend Lew Rankin gets fed up with his subordinate role in the gang and starts plotting against him, Johnny murders him without the slightest qualm. He lies to his devoted girlfriend Garnet to get her to go to Florida while he romances Liz. Mae, a prior girlfriend, asks him to help get her incorruptible policeman husband transferred back to his old precinct because his long bus commute is straining their marriage. Johnny not only lies, claiming he no longer has any influence, he also hides the fact that he got the man transferred in the first place because he would not look the other way. When Jimmy Courtney, Liz's high society former boyfriend, becomes alarmed because Liz is going to pieces due to a guilty conscience, he offers Johnny all his money to leave the country and take Liz with him. Johnny cannot figure out his "angle", why he would do such a selfless thing. In fact, the only soft spot Johnny seems to have is for his intellectual, alcoholic right-hand man, Jeff Hartnett, and even he is not sure why. Jeff has an insight, telling his boss that "even Johnny Eager has to have one friend."

However, when Johnny learns that Liz intends to turn herself in, he discovers the meaning of love for the first time in his life. He confesses to her that he staged the whole incident, but she does not believe him. To prove his claim, he decides to produce a live Julio, but Julio has defected to Johnny's dissatisfied partner, Bill Halligan. Johnny manages to bring Julio (at gunpoint) to Liz, but in the process he shoves Johnny and runs away. Johnny forces Liz and Courtney to flee to safety before the gunfight with Halligan and his men. Eager kills Halligan and Julio, but as he attempts to flee, he is spotted by a policeman disembarking from a bus, and is shot down. Jeff arrives and embraces Johnny as he finally dies.

The policeman, in a twist of fate, turns out to be Mae's husband.

Cast

Reception

Box office

According to MGM records, the film earned $1,596,000 in the U.S. and Canada and $990,000 in other markets, resulting in a profit of $1,110,000. [1] [3]

Critical response

The New York Times film critic called the film "a tight tale of underworld terror that drives hard—even in the clinches", and although not a "serious drama...as pure melodrama 'Johnny Eager' moves at a turbulent tempo...Mr. Taylor and Miss Turner strike sparks in their distraught love affair. Van Heflin provides a sardonic portrait of Johnny's Boswell, full of long words and fancy quotations." [4]

Emanuel Levy was less enthused, complaining that the plot "fails to make any sense." [5] However, he complimented Van Heflin for "stealing every scene he is in". [5]

Variety reported "Johnny Eager is an underworld meller with a few new twists to the usual trappings, but by and large it's the familiar tale...of slick gangster vs innocent rich girl." [6] However, the reviewer praised all three leads, singling Van Heflin out as "outstanding". [6]

Related Research Articles

<i>Dead Men Dont Wear Plaid</i> 1982 film by Carl Reiner

Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid is a 1982 American neo-noir mystery comedy film directed, co-written by, and co-starring Carl Reiner and co-written by and starring Steve Martin. Co-starring Rachel Ward, the film is both a parody of and a homage to film noir and the pulp detective films of the 1940s. The title refers to Martin's character telling a story about a woman obsessed with plaid in a scene that was ultimately cut from the film.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lana Turner</span> American actress (1921–1995)

Julia Jean "Lana" Turner was an American actress. Over a career spanning nearly five decades, she achieved fame as both a pin-up model and a film actress, as well as for her highly publicized personal life. In the mid-1940s, she was one of the highest-paid American actresses and one of MGM's biggest stars, with her films earning more than $50 million for the studio during her 18-year contract with them. Turner is frequently cited as a popular culture icon of Hollywood glamour and a screen legend of classical Hollywood cinema. She was nominated for numerous awards.

<i>Interrupted Melody</i> 1955 film by Curtis Bernhardt

Interrupted Melody is a 1955 musical biopic film starring Eleanor Parker, Glenn Ford, Roger Moore, and Cecil Kellaway. Directed by Curtis Bernhardt, it was filmed in CinemaScope and Eastman Color, and produced for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer by Jack Cummings. With a screenplay by Lawrence, Sonya Levien, and William Ludwig, the operatic sequences were staged by Vladimir Rosing, and Eileen Farrell provided the singing voice for Parker. It tells the story of Australian soprano Marjorie Lawrence's rise to fame as an opera singer and her subsequent triumph over polio with her husband's help

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Van Heflin</span> American actor (1908–1971)

Emmett Evan "Van" Heflin Jr. was an American theatre, radio, and film actor. He played mostly character parts over the course of his film career, but during the 1940s had a string of roles as a leading man. Heflin won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Johnny Eager (1942). He also had memorable roles in Westerns such as Shane (1953), 3:10 to Yuma (1957), and Gunman's Walk (1958).

<i>Act of Violence</i> 1948 film by Fred Zinnemann

Act of Violence is a 1949 American film noir starring Van Heflin, Robert Ryan and featuring Janet Leigh, Mary Astor and Phyllis Thaxter.

<i>These Glamour Girls</i> 1939 film by S. Sylvan Simon

These Glamour Girls is a 1939 comedy-drama film directed by S. Sylvan Simon and starring Lew Ayres and Lana Turner, with Tom Brown, Jane Bryan, Richard Carlson, Anita Louise and Ann Rutherford in featured roles.

<i>Madame Bovary</i> (1949 film) 1949 film by Vincente Minnelli

Madame Bovary is a 1949 American romantic drama, a film adaptation of the classic 1857 novel of the same name by Gustave Flaubert. It stars Jennifer Jones, James Mason, Van Heflin, Louis Jourdan, Alf Kjellin, Gene Lockhart, Frank Allenby and Gladys Cooper.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Patricia Dane</span> American actress

Patricia Dane was an American film actress of the 1940s.

<i>States of Grace</i> 2005 American film

States of Grace is a 2005 drama film directed by Richard Dutcher and starring Lucas Fleischer, Jeffrey Scott Kelly, and J. J. Boone. It tells the story of two Mormon missionaries in Santa Monica, California. While it features none of the original main characters from God's Army, it is set in the same location and has some of the original secondary characters.

<i>Count Three and Pray</i> (film) 1955 film by George Sherman

Count Three and Pray is a 1955 American CinemaScope Western film directed by George Sherman and starring Van Heflin and Joanne Woodward in her first feature film. It was based on the story "Calico Pony" by Herb Meadow. It premiered in Woodward's home town, Greenville, South Carolina, at the Paris Theatre.

<i>The Three Musketeers</i> (1948 film) 1948 film by George Sidney

The Three Musketeers is a 1948 film directed by George Sidney, written by Robert Ardrey, and starring Gene Kelly and Lana Turner. It is a Technicolor adventure film adaptation of the classic 1844 novel The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas.

<i>The Penguin Pool Murder</i> 1932 film

The Penguin Pool Murder is a 1932 American pre-Code comedy/mystery film starring Edna May Oliver as Hildegarde Withers, a witness in a murder case at the New York Aquarium, with James Gleason as the police inspector in charge of the case, who investigates with her unwanted help, and Robert Armstrong as an attorney representing Mae Clarke, the wife of the victim. Oliver's appearance was the first film appearance of the character of Hildegarde Withers, the schoolteacher and sleuth based on the character from the 1931 novel The Penguin Pool Murder by Stuart Palmer. It is the first in a trilogy including Murder on the Blackboard, and Murder on a Honeymoon, in which Oliver and Gleason team up for the lead roles.

<i>Flight from Glory</i> 1937 film by Lew Landers

Flight from Glory is an American B movie about a run-down air cargo company in the Andes. It was directed by Lew Landers, and starred Chester Morris, Whitney Bourne, Onslow Stevens and Van Heflin. When released on August 20, 1937, Flight from Glory was considered one of the films that broke new ground in "pioneering airline sagas", comparing favorably to big-budget features such as 1936's Thirteen Hours by Air.

<i>Green Dolphin Street</i> (film) 1947 film by Victor Saville

Green Dolphin Street is a 1947 American historical drama disaster film directed by Victor Saville and starring Lana Turner, Van Heflin, and Donna Reed. It was produced by Carey Wilson. Based on the 1944 novel Green Dolphin Street by Elizabeth Goudge, it was released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

<i>Tomahawk</i> (film) 1951 film

Tomahawk is a 1951 American Western film directed by George Sherman and starring Van Heflin and Yvonne De Carlo. The film is loosely based on events that took place in Wyoming in 1866 to 1868 around Fort Phil Kearny on the Bozeman Trail such as the Fetterman Fight and Wagon Box Fight. In the UK, the film was released as The Battle of Powder River.

<i>Road to Happiness</i> 1942 film by Phil Rosen

Road to Happiness is a 1942 American film directed by Phil Rosen and starring John Boles and Mona Barrie. A bittersweet story of a family's road to happiness.

<i>Paper Bullets</i> 1941 film by Phil Rosen

Paper Bullets is a 1941 American film directed by Phil Rosen and starring Joan Woodbury. It was the first film produced by the King Brothers, launching their career.

Red Salute is a 1935 American comedy film directed by Sidney Lanfield and starring Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Young. Based on a story by Humphrey Pearson, the film is about the daughter of a US Army general who becomes involved with a suspected communist agitator.

<i>Safe in Hell</i> 1931 film

Safe in Hell is a 1931 American pre-Code melodrama directed by William A. Wellman and starring Dorothy Mackaill and Donald Cook, with featured performances by Morgan Wallace, Ralf Harolde, Nina Mae McKinney, Clarence Muse, and Noble Johnson. The screenplay by Joseph Jackson and Maude Fulton is based on a play by Houston Branch.

<i>Up in the Air</i> (1940 film) 1940 film

Up in the Air is a 1940 American comedy mystery film directed by Howard Bretherton and starring Frankie Darro, Marjorie Reynolds and Mantan Moreland. It was produced and released by Monogram Pictures. It was remade in 1945 as There Goes Kelly.

References

  1. 1 2 3 The Eddie Mannix Ledger, Los Angeles: Margaret Herrick Library, Center for Motion Picture Study.
  2. ↑ Johnny Eager at the American Film Institute Catalog .
  3. ↑ "101 Pix Gross in Millions" Variety 6 Jan 1943 p 58
  4. ↑ The New York Times, film review, February 20, 1942; accessed July 11. 2013.
  5. 1 2 Emanuel Levy. "Johnny Eager (1942)" . Retrieved February 26, 2010.
  6. 1 2 "Johnny Eager". Variety.com. January 1, 1941. Retrieved February 26, 2010.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.