T-Men (1947)

Directed by Anthony Mann; produced by Aubrey Schenck

The U.S. Treasury Department learns that a successful counterfeiting gang, and their successful counterfeit money, is based on having the right kind of paper on which to print bills. Two agents (Dennis O’Keefe, Alfred Ryder) are dispatched to the west coast to find the gang, infiltrate it, and break it up. But the criminals are smart, using the same methods as government law enforcement – background checks, surveillance, strong security – and attacking them from within may prove not only impossible, but deadly.

T-Men tries to go the route many British crime and war films of the era travelled, using the semi-documentary style that brought extra realism to the movies. Though the British didn’t have a monopoly on the sub-genre, T-Men’s use of it is flawed, and contributes to a mediocre result.

The movie starts out with a prologue given by Elmer Lincoln Irey, real-life head of all the Treasury Department’s investigation branches for four years before his retirement in 1941. This is no doubt intended to give extra authority to the words read during the prologue. Unfortunately, they are clearly ‘read’, Irey’s eyes rarely lifting from the papers in front of him. This detracts from, rather than builds on, the realism.

The bulk of the story is adequate. The infiltration of the gang, starting as far away as Detroit, is given plenty of time, though one wonders about the much-vaunted methods of the criminals in not properly vetting the new crooks who are looking for places in the gang. As well, when one of the agents’ fake identity is revealed, there should have been more suspicion falling on the other; he continued to be accepted, though warily.

The performances are very good (aside from Irey’s), with a number of veteran film noir actors at play here. Aside from O’Keefe, Charles McGraw plays the gang’s main thug, with a brain as well as muscle; Wallace Ford has a good role as a crook on the margins of the counterfeiters’ mob, who has schemes above his abilities, and June Lockhart has a very small role as the wife of one of the good guys.

Not a bad picture over all, T-Men nonetheless falls short of being more than routine. It benefits from Mann’s direction (as most of Mann’s movies do), which provides some tense scenes. But T-Men doesn’t stick to the semi-documentary style it starts with; as drama it doesn’t break any new ground, and the old ground it travels over is rather plain.