The Man Who Wouldn’t Talk ** (1940, Lloyd Nolan, Jean Rogers, Richard Clarke, Onslow Stevens, Eric Blore, Joan Valerie, Mae Marsh) – Classic Movie Review 13,157

The 1940 black and white mystery thriller film The Man Who Wouldn’t Talk stars Lloyd Nolan as a man with a mysterious past who is tried for murder after accidentally killing the key witness witness to his crime.

‘HEADLINES THUNDERED GUILTY! The State DEMANDED DEATH… But He Wouldn’t Tell!’

Director David Burton’s 1940 black and white mystery thriller film The Man Who Wouldn’t Talk is based on the ingenious play The Valiant by Holworthy Hall and Robert Middlemass, and stars Lloyd Nolan, Jean Rogers, Richard Clarke, Onslow Stevens, Eric Blore, Joan Valerie, and Mae Marsh.

The 20th Century Fox studio remakes Paul Muni’s 1929 film The Valiant, retitles it clumsily and assembles a fragrant B-movie cast for the tale of a man (Lloyd Nolan) with a mysterious past who is tried for murder after accidentally killing the key witness to his crime.

The man shoots dead a business leader, New York company CEO Frederick Keller (Onslow Stevens), and confesses to the killing, but refuses to say anything more than providing the name Joe Monday, an obviously false name so as not to harm his family, and resigns himself to death  in the electric chair.

If he were the victim, a development that turns out to be possible, he certainly wouldn’t be doing much talking.

This old thriller is short and watchable, and moderately entertaining, but it stays stubbornly ordinary throughout and is topped off with a frustrating denouement. Lloyd Nolan is in fine form, however, and the character actors appeal. There is a good attempt to make the talky stage material cinematic with realistic performances and film noir devices such as flashbacks.

And the play’s title? Joe Monday says he once heard a coward dies a thousand times. He’s quoting William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar: ‘A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once.’

The cast are Lloyd Nolan as Joe Monday, Jean Rogers as Alice Stetson, Richard Clarke as Steve Phillips, Onslow Stevens as Frederick Keller, Eric Blore as Horace Parker, Joan Valerie as Miss Norton, Mae Marsh as Mrs Stetson, Paul Stanton as Attorney Cluett, Douglas Wood as Walker, Irving Bacon as Paul Gillis, Lester Sharpe as Henri Picot, Harlan Briggs as Foreman in Jury, Elisabeth Risdon as Jury Member, Renie Riano as Lilly Wigham, Stanley Andrews, George Chandler, Ruth Clifford, Harry Hayden, Mantan Moreland, and Charles Trowbridge.

The Man Who Wouldn’t Talk is directed by David Burton, runs 74 minutes, is made and released by 20th Century Fox, is written by Robert Ellis, Helen Logan, Lester Ziffren, and Edward Ettinger, with Clark Andrews, Lou Breslow, David Burton and Owen Francis as uncredited contributing writers, based on a play by Holworthy Hall and Robert Middlemass, is shot in black and white by Virgil Miller, is produced by Sol M Wurtzel, is scored by Samuel Kaylin, and is designed by Richard Day.

Release date: January 23, 1940.

Paul Muni’s 1929 film The Valiant survives, but only just. William K Everson’s preservation copy, made while he was a member of 20th Century Fox’s publicity department in 1950s, was the only one known to exist. After it was restored at George Eastman House, Turner Classic Movies premiered it on TV on 14 December 2011.

American writer Harold Porter (19 September 1887 – 21 June 1936) published plays, verse, novels and short stories under the pen name of Holworthy Hall, taken from the dormitory for first-year students where he stayed at Harvard University.

American playwright and stage actor Robert Middlemass (September 3, 1883 – September 10, 1949) was a stage actor, and later a film character actor with more than 100 appearances, usually playing detectives or policemen. He also went to Harvard. His best known play is the one-act melodrama titled The Valiant, written with his college roommate Harold Porter. It is a favourite with amateur and local theatre groups and still performed today.

© Derek Winnert 2024 – Classic Movie Review 13,157

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