Robert J. Maxwell Anthony Mann's "T Men" begins the way every war movie had begun for the previous seven years. The war had stopped in 1945 but the genre had been established and lived on. Behind the opening martial theme of the credits, there is one of those announcements about the film being dedicated to all the unsung heroes, etc. There is a guiding narration by Reed Hadley, similar to those in "Guadalcanal Diary" and "The House on 92nd Street." Then, in case we missed the point, there is a spoken introduction by some high level Treasury official who tells us all about the many branches and the valuable work done by his department. He mentioned the US Coast Guard last, and after a moment's hesitation. I found this offensive. The Coast Guard should have come first. I spent four years of my youth puking over the side of one or another cutter in the Pacific. True, we never saved anybody but we once brushed against a two-hundred foot whale. I guess that taught HIM a lesson.Dennis O'Keefe and Alfred Ryder are the two agents assigned to a case in which somebody is doing a splendid job of counterfeiting ten dollar bills and revenue stamps. (The minute I saw Ryder, nice guy, good side kick, married, I figured he wasn't long for this world.) They travel to Detroit (which still looked quite livable) and insinuate themselves into a gang. They soon pick up references to a big wig named "The Schemer" who lives in Los Angeles.And O'Keefe pursues him there with few clues. Because The Schemer is known to be fond of steam baths, O'Keefe spends hours in ten different steam baths before finding his man. Los Angeles had two million people at the time and it's hard to believe there were at least ten steam baths in the city. The only steam bath I've seen, outside of San Francisco, was in Butte, Montana, which had a sizable Finnish population at the time. So, yes, I'm dubious about all those steam baths in L.A.Steam baths aside, there are a couple of good things about this movie. For 1947 it's unusually violent. That's not necessarily a good thing but it does make it different from a run-of-the-mill case history. Mann's direction is distinctive too. He shoots from odd angles and once in a while, including floor level, there may be a startling shot with a pair of eyes in the foreground, a figure in medium shot behind, and still a third figure behind him. The photography by John Alton is very well done, perhaps the most accomplished element in the film. All of the above are improvements on the performance of the colorless Dennis O'Keefe, though some of the support does very well. Here is Charles McGraw with his gravel voice and face sculpted out of granite, looking like the kind of guy you don't want to meet in an alley.

Dalbert Pringle Filmed in a no-nonsense, semi-documentary style, 1947's T-Men vividly tells the tale of 2 undercover agents from the American Treasury Department in Washington, DC, who risk life and limb in order to infiltrate a ruthlessly clever organization of currency counterfeiters who have operations in both Detroit and Los Angeles.Moving from one flea-bag hotel to the next, agents O'Brien and Genaro diligently track down "The Schemer", a valued member of the Van Tucci mob, who eventually leads our heroes to Mr. Big.Filled with plenty of hard-hitting action and deadly double-crosses, T-Men is a gritty, hard-edged Crime/Drama that's sure to please any fan of Film Noir.Filmed in stark b&w, T-Men had a running time of 92 minutes.

MisterWhiplash T-Men might be one of the great film-noirs of the period- certainly a high point for Anthony Mann who already has Raw Deal as one of the masterpieces of the period- if only for one fatal flaw: the narration. While it would probably work well enough in a pulp magazine or wherever a story like this would turn up in print (it seems just about made for it, though despite the presence of the "real" treasury department officials it's fictional), the narrator, who comes off like an even more dead-pan version (and of course less subtly satirical) of the VO in the Killing, disrupts the flow of the story where it could be just excellent without it. Little things pop up that could be filmed just was well, finding out the clues and the details and not overrun with the ham-fisted voice of authority. If it was even done in shorter bits interspersed, fine. But as it is, it's the only big letdown of the movie, making it dated (at least more than usual).And yet, this doesn't detract from what should be a must-see for those who want to immerse themselves in a creative visual style. The team-up of Mann and his DP John Alcott was a match made in shadow-heaven, and their collaboration brings out such a strong style that it's hard to look away. This, plus the performances from Dennis O'Keefe, Wallace Ford, Charles McGrayw, make it a firecracker of a thriller, involving a story of two federal treasury agents out for a big sting with a nest of counterfeiters in Los Angeles and Detroit. When Man directs certain scenes, they pop like you want one of these 'old-school' hard boiled flicks to go. The violence actually isn't very cheap either, at least for the period, and it's a big bang where another director might've gone for the limp whimper. The villains are tough, but like any good soldier undercover the hand is always a little slicker, one step ahead. When it's at its best, T-Men is like the super-cool grandfather to the likes of the Departed.If only for the preachiness, and that stupid voice (who, apparently for good reason, is uncredited), I'd recommend it as whole-heartedly as Raw Deal. As it stands, it's still very good, with the kinds of double-crosses and moments of tension (i.e. the lead-up to the Schemer's demise) that rank with the finest the genre has. Bottom line, you're bound to find one or two of the compositions in T-Men right smack-dab in the examples of textbook film-noir lighting and design: maximum impact of B-movie reaching art. 8.5/10

MartinHafer This film is rather reminiscent of the excellent Alan Ladd Noir film, APPOINTMENT WITH DANGER (about a postal inspector infiltrating a murderous gang). In this case, the undercover work is done by two Treasury agents--Dennis O'Keefe and Alfred Ryder. I really liked these two as leads because despite being far from household names, the acting was excellent and believable. Also, true to Noir, they weren't exactly handsome guys--more like a tough average man instead of the usual non-Noir heroes.O'Keefe and Ryder play undercover agents who are trying to infiltrate a gang of counterfeiters. It's dangerous work and they can't just arrest people because they have no idea who is in charge. Throughout the film, tough bad guys (such as Charles McGraw) and unflinching but realistic violence is present--as well as an excellent level of suspense. Unlike some Noir films, this one pulls no punches nor does it give way to sentimentality. This is a seldom-seen but exceptional film for lovers of the genre.By the way, I had one minor complain and that was the terrible narration. My score for the film, because of this, is knocked from an 8 to 7. When the film began, a Treasury official gave an introduction that was VERY stilted and he simply couldn't read his lines well. Then, throughout the film, a different narrator spoke on occasion and just wasn't necessary to the film--it was a minor distraction.