STEP BY STEP

US, 1946, 62 minutes, Black-and-white.
Lawrence Tierney, Anne Jeffries, Lowell Gilmore, Myrna Dell, Harry Harvey, Addison Richards, George Cleveland.
Directed by Phil Rosen.

This is an enjoyable entertainment, just over an hour, produced by RKO with some quality, a spy drama at the end of World War II.

Lawrence Tierney, usually a villain, is a sympathetic hero this time, a Marine just returned from the war, encountering a woman swimming on the Malibu coastline, caught up in a mystery of her disappearance. She is secretary to a Senator, pretending to have experience because she needs a job. The Senator is involved in gathering information about the post war German fifth column in the United States. His contact has a list but finds he is being bugged so puts the list in his jacket.

When the Marine is locked out of his car, with his scene dog, Bazooka, he goes back to the house only to find it taken over by the Germans. It all becomes very complicated, especially as he is wearing only bathing trunks, when he is confronted by the leader of the criminals posing as the butler.

There are quite a lot of chases, after the Marine rescues the secretary and discovers that the Senator has been knocked out and is ill. This assumption is made that he and the secretary are collaborators and that they are the criminals. In the meantime, the criminals themselves try to make an escape but cannot find the list of German spies.

Both groups finish up at a motel run by a very genial old sea captain, played by George Cleveland in a very engaging way – who resists any temptation for a reward and helps the young couple, even in the chase where the car ends up in the sea.

Dangers galore. The Germans capture the couple and are about to put them in a leaky boat so it will be assumed that they died in the car crash into the sea.

However, honourably, the Marine had been dictating an explanation for the police and it is left behind only for the police to find it, verify everything and arrive just the right moment.

The couple had been posing as a eloping couple so what better ending than a wedding!

The film is directed by Phil Rosen, a veteran of this kind of entertaining short supporting feature.