The Lineup

The Lineup (Don Siegel, 1958) Don Siegel directed this film version of the television show he directed the pilot for—itself the TV version of a radio drama police procedural in the same milieu as "Dragnet" only set in San Francisco (the series was syndicated as "San Francisco Beat").* 

You can tell that Siegel could care less about the police in this one because, except for a frenetic action sequence at the top of the film that leaves two men dead, the movie doesn't take on any life until the arrival of the two Miami "business-men," Dancer (Eli Wallach) and his mentor, Julian (Robert Keith), who come to town to do a job for a drug-ring with an anonymous leader ("The Man") with the plan to get out of town fast once the job is done. One gets a whiff of The Killers (which Siegel was on the line to direct in its 1946 version and that he would eventually do another version of the story in 1964) with most of the film's attention-span being with the hoods.

Warner Anderson and Marshall Reed are the only hold-overs from the series. But, their scenes are so minimal, they may as well not even be in the movie, but just part of the guys in cars who've got guns and are tailing the bad-guys, waiting for the eventual shoot-out. We meet Dancer and Julian on the plane to the Bay City, where Dancer is reading a book on how to improve his vocabulary. Julian thinks that Dancer has a big future in their line of business—he just has to learn to control his temper and his violent instincts. What he only sees occasionally is the paranoia that constantly dogs Dancer (Julian thinks he's just being thorough, looking for traps that will stand in their way), a product of an inferiority complex and not wanting to admit the fact that he's a bit dim.

Dancer and Julian make it to the shabby little motel outside San Francisco where they're soon met by their driver for the job, Sandy McLain (Richard Jaeckel), who's a little too eager to be of help, asking too many questions and getting on Dancer's bad side. It doesn't help that the kid's a bit reckless and doesn't think anything of drawing from a flask while on the job. 

At police headquarters, Inspectors Guthrie and Quine (Emile Meyer) do a little digging and find out a bit more about the incident at the airport that got two officers killed: questioning the owner of the valise that one of the getaway drivers had stolen, they find it belongs to Philip Dressler (Raymond Bailey) a well-to-do collector of antiques, just returned from Asia. But, an inspection of the pieces he bought from a street-vendor shows he got more than he bargained for: the statue is filled with heroin. They confiscate the drugs and return the statue (now filled with powdered sugar) to Dressler and start an investigation of innocent others who may have just returned from Asia, not suspecting that they are mules for the drug-trade.

They're a couple steps behind Dancer and Julien, who find that getting the heroin is not an easy thing to do without collateral damage...at least, when Dancer is the point-man. One grab results in a shoot-out at the pier, another provokes a murder in a steam-room, and the other, turns into a hostage situation when Dancer and Julien take a mother and child hostage after finding out that the heroin has been destroyed...in a rather unique manner. Their failure to produce the last bag of heroin demands an explanation...and a hitherto unheard-of meeting with the usually anonymous "The Man" (Vaughn Taylor), whose air of superiority and disdain can't be a good mix with Dancer's own insecurities.

The kidnapping puts the SFPD on an APB and it allows director Siegel to do what he does best—a chase scene through San Francisco. It will be a treat for appreciators of these types of scenes and those with a sense of history to see it played out on the under-construction Embarcadero, with Siegel's efficiency and surgeon-like editing ramping up the tension until the last bullet is fired.

The result is a top-notch noir...in sunny daylight. Eli Wallach was not fond of the film during shooting, as he thought he'd taken a step down after making his film debut working with Elia Kazan on Baby Doll, where filming was more measured, slower, and had more concentration on acting as if it were a stage feature, as opposed to Siegel's quick set-ups and emphasis on pace. You had to be quick on your feet with Siegel, and although there was less "prestige" to this feature, it holds up as a nifty thriller with an edge, something that never goes out of style.

* Yes, it's not just current times where they make movie versions of TV-shows: they'd made movies of "Dragnet" and "Batman" ("The Man from U.N.C.L.E." had a neat trick where they'd edit episodes together to distribute to foreign markets). The Line-up could increase the filming budget somewhat to bring more value to screen (but not much).