Two Against the World aka One Fatal Hour- Review

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Two Against the World aka One Fatal Hour
Beverly Roberts as Alma Ross & Bogie as Sherry Scott	B -grade but modestly effective morality tale about the devastating effects gutter journalism can have on people lives, and the entertainment media's willingness to put money over morality. Sherry Scott (played by Bogie) is a radio station manager who prides himself on providing high quality programming for his audience, however the audience numbers have been falling lately, and in the face of this the station owner Bertram Reynolds (played by Robert Middlemass) talks him into dropping his usually good standards and catering to a more low brow audience. Reynolds suggests a program about a sensational murder case that occured 20 years earlier, in which a young woman (played by Helen MacKellar) killed a man, but was aquitted as having done it in self defence. Scott, to the disgust his faithful secretary (Beverly Roberts as Alma Ross) who thinks the whole thing is horribly immoral and nothing short of a public "crucifixion", sends off his investigative team, a cloyingly creepy Dr. Leavenworth (played by Harry Hayden) and a bimbo-ish Cora Latimer (played by Claire Dodd), to put the dubious production together.
When the creepy Dr Leavenworth tracks down the woman, who is now happily married with a young daughter (played by Linda Perry) who is also about to wed, he deceives her and her husband (played by Henry O'Neill) into giving him their trust and through this deceipt gains intimate information that could destroy both them and their young daughter's future. From here on we witness a terrible chain of events which throws the family into devastating turmoil and puts Sherry Scott in a terrible moral place. All players give good performances. Other appearances of note are Hobart Cavanaugh as Tippy Mantus, Carlyle Moore Jr. as the young daughter's fiance, and Douglas Wood and Virginia Brissac as the future parent in-laws. There are two cuts of this film, a longer 64 minute version which is very hard to come by, and a shorter 56 minute version (the subject of this review). The 56 minute cut is played on Turner Classic Movies and bears an alternative title, One Fatal Hour. I suspect that the 64 minute cut would have a slightly more 'fleshed out' storyline. For instance in the shorter version there is a barely explored romantic sub-plot between Sherry Scott and his secretary Alma Ross, which I understand is given considerably more scope in the 64 minute cut.

Shot in Black & White. 1.33:1 Aspect Ratio. Not released on home video at this time.