User Reviews

***SPOILERS***Freelance photographer Mike Kovac, Charles Bronson, didn't know what to expect when he got a phone call from protection racket boss Glenn Markey, Barry Kroeger, to get his butt over to the downtown Irish Theater for the story, or photo, of his life. Not knowing exactly what to expect Kovac is then held at gunpoint By a masked Markey and his top enforcer Carver, Robert Carricart, who then work over businessman Sam Bartlett, Bill Erwin, and is forced to photograph Bartlett as he's gunned down by them! Kovac is then told by Markey to have the photograph of Bartlett published in the local newspaper to show anyone else who's not paying him off that he means business! Markey couldn't have been more ridicules in practically fingering himself despite his flimsy mask, that didn't at all disguise his identity, in Bartlett's murder! It the NYPD stepping in on the case in the person of the not that on the ball Lieut. Abrams, Robert Ellenstein, who made what was already a bad situation even worse! Lieut. Abrams has a story published in the newspapers that there's an eye witness in the Bartlett murder which doesn't take that much of an effort for Markey to deduce, since he was there with him at the murder scene, that the eye witness was non other then Mike Kovac himself!

***SPOILERS*** Markey who wasn't all that bright to begin with soon comes up with this brainstorm of an idea to kidnap Kovac's father Alton, Ludwig Stossel, to keep Mike for testifying against him! This moron of a hood, Markey, gets even farther into his brainless stupidity in not only holding, after kidnapping him, Alton hostage but planning to murder him,together with his son Mike, even if Kovac agrees to keep his mouth shut!

It's when Kovac starts to come to his senses by taking things into his own, and taking them out of the incompetent NYPD's, hands and goes it alone that he gets results! In not only saving his pop's life but putting that full of himself creep Glenn Markey in his place, a jail cell, by calling Markey's bluff and not giving into his demands! Which in the end would have meant certain death for him and his father Alton if he did!

A fine film noir opening sets up "The Warning", with a tip from a phone booth bringing Mike out on a raining night to park in front of a movie theater where a creep running a local protection racket has Mike forced to photograph his victim, as he shoots a recalcitrant merchant for not knuckling under. Mike contacts the cops but refuses to help nab the murderer, until his dad (Ludwig Stossel, the series' co-star) emphasizes it's his duty.

This is a basic story of the regular guy forced by his sense of morality (and don't forget, daddy's insistence, which ends up putting dad in jeopardy too) to do the right thing. Bronson's casting works fine, and it's no coincidence that he behaved strongly (too strongly) in a (quite different) variation on this family situation decades later in his vigilantism of his iconic role starring in "Death Wish".

Mike Kovac is forced to take a photo of a man while he is gunned down.

The police tells Kovac that the dead man was standing up to protection racketeer Glenn Markey.

Markey wanted to make an example of the dead man to frighten the others.

The police want Kovac to flush out Markey who always stays one step ahead of the law.

Kovac is not keen on the idea. When talks to his father Anton, he changes his mind.

Kovac should had known better than listen to his father who seems to have a death wish. Anton is kidnapped by Markey's men.

He knows that the police are useless. So Kovac takes matters to his own hands to free his father.

Bronson gets involved in some action taking on the baddies. The police are late in on the action. Anton learns a hard lesson, leave the vigilantism to someone else.

"Mike Kovac" (Charles Bronson) gets an anonymous tip to be at a certain corner at 10 p.m. if wants to get a really interesting photograph. Not thrilled about this kind of situation, he still goes because this is what he does for a living and he has to take some chances. It's almost impossible for a good photographer to pass up a great photo.

Anyway, not to get detailed and spoil anything, Mike gets involved in some extortion racket by a hood named "Glenn Markey" (Berry Kroeger, who was in a number of the film noirs in the '40s). The New York police want to flush this guy out and use Kovac as bait. Mike is a no-go on that idea but his dad "Anton" (Ludwig Stossel) convinces him it's the right thing to do.

Complications arise from that idea, big-time and Kovacs has to get the bad guy and rescue his father at the same time, all the while hoping the cops don't mess it up. Mike is convinced he knows how to handle things better than they do.

By the way, speaking of cops-and-robbers, the guest actor, Robert Ellenstein, who main lawman "Lt. Abrams" is a dead ringer for actor Herschel Bernardi, who starred with Craig Stevens in "Peter Gunn."