Call Northside 777 (DVD)

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It had been well over thirty years since I first caught "Call Northside 777" on television. I remember having liked it at the time (I believe it had been retitled "Calling Northside 777" for some odd reason), but maybe I've seen too many similarly themed movies since because it no longer struck me as being as interesting on a second go around.

In 1947, Dana Andrews starred in a film called "Boomerang" that explored a real-life crime in semidocumentary style. The movie started a trend, combining film noir and a super-realistic tone, with "Call Northside 777" following in 1948. Now, of course, such films are referred to as docu-noir and docudramas.

Then there's the plot of "Call Northside 777" to consider, about a newspaper reporter trying to prove a convicted criminal's innocence. The same story line has been used often, most recently by Clint Eastwood in 1999's "True Crime." So both the style and the plot of "Call Northside 777" have been around for years. I suspect that some of its luster has worn off for me.

This is not to say, however, that "Call Northside 777" is entirely boring or old hat. Quite the contrary, in fact, as the film has any number of positive attributes; just not enough for me to get too exited about. So, let's start with the film's plot and characters, and then work our way through its various plusses and minuses.

Like most semidocumentaries, this one is based, more or less, on a true story. We know this because it says so right up there on the screen at the beginning of the movie. The plot and characters were based on articles written by James P. McGuire, and the movie was filmed as much as possible in actual locations in Chicago, Illinois, and surrounding areas where the events depicted took place. Veteran filmmaker Henry Hathaway was selected to direct. Hathaway (1898-1985) had an amazingly long career in movies, starting with an appearance in 1917's "The Storm Woman" and concluding with "Hangup" in 1974. In between he directed such diverse classics as "The Lives of a Bengal Lancer," "Brigham Young--Frontiersman," "Kiss of Death," "Prince Valiant," "North to Alaska," and "True Grit."

In proper documentary fashion, "Call Northside 777" is narrated by somber-voiced Reed Hadley, who will be instantly recognizable to longtime movie fans for having done the voice-overs in countless similar films. In solemn, old-timey stentorian tones, Hadley tells us of the murder of a Chicago patrolman in 1932, the victim of a shooting in a speakeasy. Two men were identified as the killers, only one of whom, Frank Wiecek (Richard Conte), is the subject of the story. On the strength of one eyewitness testimony, he and the other man were convicted of the crime and committed to ninety-nine years in prison. Over eleven years went by, and all seemed to be forgotten.

Then, in 1944 a personal notice appears in the Chicago "Times." It reads, "$5,000 reward for killers of Officer Bundy on Dec. 9, 1932. Call Northside 777. Ask for Tillie Wiecek 12-7 p.m." The Editor of the "Times," Brian Kelly (Lee J. Cobb), sees the ad, and sensing a story assigns one of his best reporters, P. J. McNeal (James Stewart), to find out more about it.

P.J. McNeal is clearly the screen embodiment of James P. McGuire, and he goes out to investigate, hoping to find a good news angle and sell a few papers. McNeal is skeptical about the whole thing; he doesn't believe Wiecek is anything but guilty because not only was he found guilty in 1932 but his case had been reviewed by the Supreme Court and he was still found guilty. McNeal discovers that the person who placed the ad is Wiecek's mother, an old lady who has worked scrubbing floors the entire time her son has been in prison just to raise enough money to find someone who would step forward and exonerate her boy. McNeal is touched by the woman's love for her son, but he is not persuaded of his innocence.

Naturally, the more McNeal probes into the case, the more convinced he becomes that Wiecek may be innocent after all. And so it goes.

Stewart was by the late forties trying to shed his earlier naive, boy-next-door screen image by taking on more mature roles. Here he is a rock. There is not much of the "Aw shucks" hometown fellow about him, but there is little charisma left, either. He does exactly what the part calls on him to do and shows little of the old Stewart personality except toward the end of the movie when he suddenly takes on a "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" persona. At that point he goes on a crusade, and some of Stewart's old indomitable fighting spirit returns. Still, it takes a while coming.

"Godfather" fans will be delighted to see Richard Conte, "Don Barzini," in an early film role. I always loved him in the quintessential war movie, "A Walk in the Sun," several years before "Northside." Conte portrays the convicted killer as a soft-spoken gentleman, the very picture of kindness. It's hard to say how a jury would ever have condemned him, he's such a sweetheart. And as the newspaper editor, Lee J. Cobb is of the typical Perry White variety, all toughness and bluster. Cobb would soon find immortality as Willy Loman in the Broadway production of Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman" in 1949.