Loan Shark

The dreary existence of factory workers in cramped apartments with ugly wallpaper serves as the backdrop for Seymour Friedman’s Loan Shark, which opens in traditional noir fashion with a frightened man being chased through the night and pummeled in an alley. George Raft, whose mechanical acting often feels oddly comforting, plays ex-con Joe Gargan whom police ask to go undercover as a tire factory employee to infiltrate a gang of loan sharks preying on employees; Joe resists the assignment until his indebted brother-in-law Paul (Henry Slate) is murdered by the sharks. While “undercover,” Joe’s rough and tumble attitude appeals to boss Lou Donelli (Paul Stewart), who offers him a job on the inside. The story’s fairly straightforward, but the pace is fast and the action sequences (some of the best fistfights in noir) are well-executed, especially the final shootout in a theater. One character ends up, for all intents and purposes, ironed to death.