I'm used to the cast in much lighter fare. Ronald Reagan was impressive enough as the crusading D.A., Ginger Rogers was incredibly convincing in every single scene, and light and lively Doris Day did not sing a note. While her character could seem a bit dimwitted at times, her portrayal was on the mark and very believable, given the attitudes and beliefs of the small town in which she resided. Steve Cochran was also good, as her husband, and the bedroom scene wherein he tries to seduce sister-in-law Rogers is very suggestive for its time, though seemingly heavily edited. Nobody could play a thick headed womanizing weasel like Cochran could.
Ginger Rogers witnesses a lynching by the Klan. When two of the men remove their hoods, she recognizes one of them as her brother-in-law, husband to her pregnant sister, played by Doris Day. Reagan is the honest DA intent on getting to the bottom of the lynching - the guy who was lynched was a reporter doing investigative journalism, jailed on a trumped up DUI. The heads of the local Klan are worried about all of this, not because of their nocturnal activities, but because they have been using the Klansmen and bilking them of their money for dues, insignia, etc. Grifters using the naivete and prejudices of a mob of rubes to enrich themselves? Suddenly this film is getting quite timely.
The film as a whole has a very dark element throughout, fittingly, but surprising for its time. Bringing the Ku Klux Klan to the forefront of American cinema in pre-civil rights days, handled as well as it is here, makes for a very interesting, gripping and entertaining film.
So many actors of Hollywood's Golden Age were typecast in familiar roles, but seeing these stars sink their teeth into a well-written screenplay and a deftly directed movie is a real treat.
Ginger Rogers witnesses a lynching by the Klan. When two of the men remove their hoods, she recognizes one of them as her brother-in-law, husband to her pregnant sister, played by Doris Day. Reagan is the honest DA intent on getting to the bottom of the lynching - the guy who was lynched was a reporter doing investigative journalism, jailed on a trumped up DUI. The heads of the local Klan are worried about all of this, not because of their nocturnal activities, but because they have been using the Klansmen and bilking them of their money for dues, insignia, etc. Grifters using the naivete and prejudices of a mob of rubes to enrich themselves? Suddenly this film is getting quite timely.
The film as a whole has a very dark element throughout, fittingly, but surprising for its time. Bringing the Ku Klux Klan to the forefront of American cinema in pre-civil rights days, handled as well as it is here, makes for a very interesting, gripping and entertaining film.
So many actors of Hollywood's Golden Age were typecast in familiar roles, but seeing these stars sink their teeth into a well-written screenplay and a deftly directed movie is a real treat.