MARY RYAN, DETECTIVE
US, 1949, 68 minutes, Black-and-white.
Marsha Hunt, John Litel, June Vincent, Harry Shannon, William Phillips, Katherine Warren, Victoria Horne.
Directed by Abby Berlin.
This is the kind of film that could have been a supporting feature series. However, this kind of entertainment was popular on radio and moving towards television.
The film opens with an elaborate jewel robbery involving two women and a little girl. One of the women is arrested by the police who then set in motion procedures for tracking the thieves. But, the commanding officer, John Litel, wants to find the authorities behind the thieves and their smuggling operation. He asks one of the detectives, who had interviewed the woman in the shop, to go undercover, Mary Ryan.
This involves her training as a thief, going to prison, sharing a cell with the other woman in the initial robbery, getting her confidence, being surly at first but then agreeable getting confidences including an address for an agency to get a job after she was released. This leads to playing a maid at a party, stealing a necklace from a fellow policewoman undercover. However, she is immediately whisked away for security and the police lose her.
Actually, her destination is quite interesting. An elderly couple who are in charge of the whole operation are actually legitimate Turkey raisers and distributors, concealing jewellery in the turkeys, wrapping furs as if they were turkeys, sending them out, some ordinary sales, some to collaborating fences. Mary Ryan is able to sustain her position undercover but sends out a message in one of the turkeys (leading to a humorous character who buys the turkey, comes to the police to get his reward and do his civic duty, but is continually ignored by all the authorities).
One of the gang is wounded when the police come across them in a fur warehouse, Mary having to select the better furs, the security guard tied up and she slapping him so that he will report this to police – as he does.
The gangs doctor is not available to remove the bullet from the wounded man and Mary Ryan does it, he being very grateful (and overhearing the boss and his wife talking about his possible death and not seeming to care). Eventually, the authorities get the message, hurry to the farm, are almost too late because the initial thief has escaped from jail and is taking refuge and recognises Mary Ryan. There is a shootout but Mary Ryan saves the day.
She had been promised a vacation after her work, a trip to the country – which she immediately turns down, preferring to go to a nightclub!
It might have made an interesting series of short films, the career of Mary Ryan, expertly played by Marsha Hunt, an interesting interpretation of investigation, by a woman, her methods and style.
