T-Men (1947)

T-Men (Anthony Mann, 1947) "T-Men" stands for "Treasury Men" or agents for the Department of the Treasury. Before 9/11, they were just behind the FBI in terms of domestic crime investigation, dealing with tax fraud, counterfeiting, bootlegging, illegal arms, as well as housing the Secret Service. The ATF and the Service broke off in 2003 to be a part of Homeland Security, but at the time this film was made it was still all under one bureaucratic roof...and probably looking for some publicity.

Now, an FBI movie could get an A-list budget. But, T-Men was strictly a B-picture, consigned to the bottom half of what they used to call in the movies "a double-bill" (look it up, you kids), but it had the great good fortune to be directed by a young up-and-coming director named Anthony Mann, who'd made a name for himself directing low-budget films for RKO and Republic. Mann brought to the mix a brilliant cinematographer John Alton, and together, the two would craft some of the more interesting examples of "film-noir" in cinema.

But, Lordy, it doesn't start out well. After a brief introduction to the work of the Treasury Department by a stern announcer (who will serve as narrator for the film), there is an introduction by former Treasury Law Enforcement Head Elmer Lincoln Irey, who flatly introduces the film as a case-study from the annals of the Department. The only notable thing about the sequence is that it's filmed, not across at the former director, but at desk level looking slightly up, giving him a slightly more authoritative air—especially to audiences naturally looking up at a screen from theater seats. But, from there, the film takes a decidedly dark turn.

In a dark-Los Angeles-alley behind a stadium, there is a rendezvous in progress. A Treasury Agent is going to be meeting a snitch. But before he can reach him a figure comes out of the shadows (literally) and cuts the contact down. End of the road. End of the investigation. The Department needs to take another tack.

Two agents are called to Washington: Dennis O'Brien (Dennis O'Keefe) and Tony Genaro (Alfred Ryder), who are called upon to go undercover and infiltrate the gang of counterfeiters, who have been passing bills with a superior paper very similar in composition to that used in legitimate currency. They travel to Detroit posing as former members of a crime ring that have been subsequently killed, leaving no traces of contacts that might blow their cover. They manage to do enough research of their cover identities as "Vannie Harrigan" and "Tony Galvani" that they work themselves into a counterfeit liquor stamps business, getting a lead on an overseas smuggler of the paper, known as "The Schemer" (Wallace Ford). The two split up with O'Brien going back to Los Angeles tracking down The Schemer, while Genaro stays in Detroit and continues to make in-roads with the counterfeiters.

O'Brien manages to find The Schemer eventually, as he's a frequenter of turkish baths, and after several steams—"I think I lost eight pounds," he tells his superiors—he makes contact with the older hood and gains enough trust that he proposes a joint effort. If "Schemer" can provide the paper, he can provide engraving plates for currency far superior to what's making it into the streets. The Schemer, though, wants to make sure that O'Brien is legit and has two of the gang's enforcers, Moxie (Charles McGraw) and Brownie (Jack Overman) to work over the agent to try to determine why he's so interested in the business. O'Brien's failure to "crack" wins him and Genaro a visit to Schemer's boss "Shiv" Triano (John Wengraf), who is interested in the venture, but wants to run tests—O'Brien only turns over one of the plates and says he'll only deliver the other to Triano's boss, a shadowy figure that is never mentioned by name.

A chance encounter in San Francisco makes Schemer suspicious of Genaro, just as O'Brien gets to meet the next tier of command, Diana Simpson (Jane Randolph), who is suspicious of any betrayal. She orders a hit on both The Schemer and Genaro: The Schemer being roasted alive in a steam bath and Genaro shot in front of his partner, who can only stand and watch helplessly as Genaro implicates himself, taking suspicion off O'Brien, and is executed, gangland-style. 

But Genaro has been clever enough to leave O'Brien clues to where he can find The Schemer's coded notebook, which the agent turns over to his superiors, bringing them closer to cracking the case, even as O'Brien has to overcome greater suspicion, due to his closeness to Genaro.

He has one advantage, however, he still has the other engraving plate that the counterfeiters now want...very much. But, as he's being watched closely—too closely by the assassin, Moxie, he has to find a way to complete the transaction, with the added incentive of bringing the ring to justice and avenging his partner.

T-Men is filmed in that "semi-documentary" style popular in the 1940's whenever a studio wanted to lend an aura of verisimilitude to a story "based on a true story" (as they like to say these days) by using real locations whenever possible. However, no documentary, semi or otherwise, has been as artfully shot and lighted, here by Mann and his cinematographer John Alton, who make the photography as oppressive as it is beautiful, enveloping the government agents in precipitous angles, uncomfortably close close-ups, and an ever-encroaching darkness that seems to swallow them up in the frame. The danger is so visually palpable you can practically smell the sweat, with or without the benefit of steam-baths.

It's a fascinating portrait of professionals, good and bad, just "doing business" with a restraint of attitude in the "Dragnet" manner, but explodes into ferocity when the guns come out. In fact, there's an energy to the finale that almost has a supernatural "horror" quality to it, of implacable hate that pulses through the veins of wounded men, rather than blood. The darkness veils emotion throughout the movie—especially in the scene where O'Brien's hat-brim shadows his eyes after witnessing Genaro's murder—only the spare splashes and flashes of light betraying the character's inner thoughts and rages. Despite good restrained performances, there's almost no acting needed, when Mann and Alton are presenting all the drama in their choices of light and dark. T-Men is one of the greatest of film-noirs, of the forces of light trying to penetrate the darkness.