Panamint You see, Bulldog Drummond and Dick Tracy (actually two aging actors who at one time or another played those roles) are working as "Radar Agents" of the government. I wonder if they had badges that said "Radar Agent"?"Our beams have all the roads covered" the head agent says, so we are reassured that radar can solve any crime. Everybody knows that radar beams aimed at all the streets catches criminals, right? So, ordinary crimes that would have been solved by regular means are solved by radar machines instead, presumably at a great waste of taxpayer dollars. And a black Chevrolet runs around town with a silly metal dome bolted to its roof. The director of this movie really did a lousy job, and the acting is poor except for Tom Neal who is convincing as a bad guy. Buxom Adele Jergens has the role of a blonde gang moll, but I still haven't figured out why her character is in the script at all. John Howard, as Radar Agent Travis, has exactly the same expression on his face throughout the whole film. I guess he thought "why bother" to smile, frown or emote at all. Absolutely nobody involved seems to care that they are in this film, but all they are asked to do is just read their lines and get in and out of cars. If you are a fan of any of the actors involved, or even a fan of Lippert Pictures (which made some far better movies than this), you should just skip "Radar Secret Service".

drystyx This is a Dragnet style show of cops and robbers, in this case G Men vs Dick Tacy style crooks who steal a radioactive element used for high tech energy or for warfare."Radar" is very overrated in its properties here. People from this era, that I knew of, never spoke this highly of Radar in its properties, so I don't think it was ever really as overrated as this movie makes it look.So much for the bad Science being a product of its generation. It was Mickey Mouse Science then, as well as today.However, since there are at least two heavily used comic relief characters in this movie, it isn't likely that it was ever meant to be "realistic". This was meant to be tongue in cheek, and a good time.The comedy would be better if the writing was better. The actors are actually pretty good, especially the comic relief ones, but their lines are not good, even for 1950.Still, this movie flows very well, and is easy to follow, making it much more entertaining than most modern action movies.One can look at it as "equal time" as well, a polar opposite of what the industry tries to use for propaganda today.Today, propaganda is very Republican, it's "don't mess with the mob" that makes most movies today, "unless you're Rambo". Most people don't have any illusions about being Rambo, so the modern movie is propaganda to keep organized and disorganized crime safe. Today's movie is meant to show that the mob is perfect.So, it's good to have "equal time" for a change, even if one has to go back over half a century, to find equal propaganda against mobs. It certainly is more interesting this way.

Gunn I can definitely understand why MST3K chose this film to mock. It seems it was aimed at kiddy matinees back in the 1950s. The dialog seems as if it was written by an eighth grader back then. This film along with 8 others is included in a set titled Forgotten Noir Vol. 4. Now I realize why that title! The second film in the set is "Counterspy Meets Scotland Yard" and this one is a few notches better and has a more familiar cast including Amanda 'Miss Kitty' Blake. As historical film documents of a simpler era they make sense. However, it is pretty difficult to keep a straight face while watching this film. I never watched ST3K but I can imagine they had a "field day" with this one. I will be reviewing more from this series as I view them.

GeneralB This movie seems to think radar is some super weapon that can do absolutely anything. I mean, it begins with quick scene on how radar was important in World War II. While this might seem fair enough, the movie takes radar's importance to ludicrous levels. When a truck is hijacked, the government uses radar to track it down. Radar mounted on a vehicle can apparently deliver TV quality images that follow the truck like a camera (I wonder why?). You can't say a bad thing about radar in this film. Don't worry, though. The guys from MST3K came to the rescue, and made it quite enjoyable (like they always do with bad movies) with their running commentary.