Black & White World

The Saint Strikes Back (1939)

Usually I can enjoy these little B serial movies for what they are—I don’t expect much from them, knowing that they were churned out in quick time for little money.  They’re usually about as good as whoever the lead is, and since I had fun with the first batch of Falcon movies, I thought the Saint movies, also starring George Sanders, should be at least as good.

Unfortunately it’s really poorly-written.  Sanders does his best with the material, but mostly he is called upon to spew long monologues that are nothing more than exposition—explaining who everyone is, what they want, and how they intend to get it.  He has a LOT of dialogue; of the 64 minute running time I’d say Sanders is talking for about 45 minutes of it.  I’m pretty sure I saw him reading off cue cards in at least one scene, but I frankly can’t blame him for that—they probably shot the movie in a week or two, and no one could possibly remember reams and reams of exposition like that.

Usually I’m pleased when a film comes in at just over an hour, but this is definitely a case where they could have taken more time to set up the plot at the beginning.  Then they could have let the action dictate the pace rather than how fast Sanders could spit out all his words (which was pretty admirably fast, but it’s more or less like having a book read to you, rather than watching a movie).