Review of Roar of the Press

Comedy mixes quite agreeably with murder in this attractively photographed (Harry Neumann) and breezily directed (Phil Rosen) "B" from good old low-budget Monogram – not close-to-zero budget PRC as mentioned by one reviewer. True, the screenplay by Albert Duffy (from a story by Alfred Block) is no Pulitzer Prize-winner, but I found the newspaper scenes with taskmaster Jed Prouty quite entertaining and I wondered how Jean Parker was going to play out her sexual frustration in 1941's super-tight censorship era. I thought she handled this aspect extremely well. Just watch the expression on her face at times! In my opinion, she was absolutely brilliant and fully deserved her top billing. She was dressed in style too. My guess is that she selected her own clothes. Certainly she outclassed the rest of the femme brigade, including Suzanne Kaaren, Evalyn Knapp, Betty Compson and Dorothy Lee. Always reliable Paul Fix has a small part as a loyal-to-his-country thief, and the keen-eyed will spot Charles King in a blink-and-you'll-miss-him role as a police lieutenant. Byron Foulger, Jack Perrin, Dennis Moore and Lynton Brent are in there too. Yes, by "B" standards, it's an admirable cast line-up. True, the spies-in-our-midst plot is a bit weak, but it adds to the annoyance that the Jean Parker character experiences, namely that her newly acquired husband is sent off on a chase that could have been handled equally well (and maybe better!) by Jack Cheatham, Pat Gleason and company. Available on a very good Grapevine DVD coupled with Double Cross (also 1941).