The Beastie Boys once informed the public it was time to get ill, Bill Haley rocked around the clock and Ween told us they’d be our Johnny on the spot. Mind you, none of these have anything to do with 1947’s Johnny O’Clock, but I thought that would make for a pretty weird opening line for this essay.
Another song that comes to mind is “Smooth Criminal”, because that would be the way to describe Dick Powell in this noir. As the title character with the curious nomenclature, he may run an illegal casino, but he doesn’t gamble personality. He is a man that may not literally laugh in the face of death, but when his life is threatened by corrupt cop Jim Bannon, he flippantly asks, “Mind if I laugh in your face?”
He is unflappable, even as Lee J. Cobb’s incorruptible police detective looks to take him down. He even pays for the cop’s cigars in a hotel lobby with a few bills, of which he says, “Take it out of this. I make it fresh every morning.” Cobb had already been pursuing Powell, but he ramps up his efforts to turn the screws after Bannon is found dead. That cop’s girlfriend, played by Nina Foch, appeared to have committed suicide, when an autopsy reveals she had actually been poisoned. In addition to the known tensions between Powell and Bannon, Foch had been the coat check girl in his club.
A seemingly damning piece of evidence in the case is an expensive custom watch Foch had on her, one Ellen Drew had tried to gift Powell and which he had tried to return by way of Foch. Drew is a former flame of his, but he cut off all ties to her after she wed head gangster Thomas Gomez. She had the same watch made for Gomez, and it is telling only Powell’s is engraved on the back.
Even with Powell treating Drew cooly, there is still an interesting, and almost telepathic, report between the two. There’s an interesting bit where Gomez goes around his cavernous apartment, looking for the ideal place to put a drawing of himself some kid did in Mexico. Asked her opinion, Drew says nothing more than it looks like him. After Powell arrives later, Gomez asks the same from him and gets the same answer, resulting in this from the gangster: “Say, you two are good. You’ve been rehearsing.”
The characters all get great things to say in this, lines that are too clever to pass as realistic but which are pure catnip for noir fans. Consider these from Drew: “I choked on a piece of scotch”, and after dropping a glass, “I dropped it because I’m drunk. I drop a lot of glasses.” Cobb and Powell have the kind of banter which implies they could be friends if they weren’t on opposites side of the law, such as when the former finally brings in the latter for questioning: “I just need you to come to the station and answer some questions. According to our lawyer, you can either come voluntarily, or…” “Oh, quit your kidding. Let’s go.” Once in the station, Powell says of the many suspects gathered there, “You’ve been out fishing.” Cobb: “Yeah, in the sewers.”
Evelyn Keyes will come into the picture after Foch’s death, as she is the deceased’s sister. She will also be the love interest for Powell. Her performance grounds the movie in something closer to reality, even when some of the lines provided her by the script are a bit purple. Still, there is something bittersweet and beautiful about such dialogue as this: “Tell me things. Sweet and pretty things. I’ll close my eyes and make believe they’re true.”
Even minor character get interesting personality quirks and little bits of business to do. A waiter at an apparently shady restaurant immediately sets unordered shots in front of Powell and Keyes, telling the customers they are doing to need them. The couple order steaks, with Keyes specifying she’d like hers small. The waiter says, “They’re small.” Then there’s Foch’s gossipy neighbor whom Cobb has to deal with. She actually sneaks around him on the crime scene and reads the case notes.
Johnny O’Clock is that perfect kind of noir where you have a solid cast playing interesting roles for which they are given memorable things to say. I don’t even care that the title character has a name no person on Earth would ever have and he has that moniker for no apparent reason. It may not be reality, and it may not be a world I’d want to occupy, but it sure is more interesting than our humdrum day-to-day existences.