classicsoncall Interesting that Edward G. Robinson would be playing his non-gangster role almost like a gangster here. After shaking hands with shady Merrill Lambert (Edward Arnold) on a fifty-fifty newspaper deal, Bruce Corey (Robinson) takes the tabloid approach and runs his front page with garish headlines intended for shock value. I had a sit up and take notice moment when in a concession to modern times (for 1941), Corey claimed that there wasn't any privacy anymore! Holy smokes, can you see him dealing with the internet today? One has to chuckle a bit whenever one of The Mercury Mirror newspapers hits the stands and you catch the price tag - two cents for a single copy! Wow, there really was a time when talk was cheap. And if you were a regular customer, you always got 'the news before it happens'! You would think Corey's approach would backfire more often than not but he seemed to make it work for the most part.I liked that scene when Lambert offered to put up his entire half of the newspaper in a rigged card game with a marked deck. Apparently Corey had been around that block once before and called him out on it while holding a full house and asking for four cards. Plenty of chutzpah there, and a brilliant move to keep editorial control of the paper on his own terms.This wasn't the first time Robinson appeared in a film with a newspaper backdrop. He was also the editor of The Gazette in the 1931 movie "Five Star Final", remade five years later using a radio station backdrop to basically tell the same story, this time using Humphrey Bogart in the Robinson role. That one was "Two Against the World" from 1936, with the alternate title "One Fatal Hour". Both are recommended for fans of the principals, just as I would recommend this one for Robinson's effective play against Edward Arnold in an often tense story.With a finale that eerily previews the scene in the following year's "Casablanca", Bruce Corey high tails it out of town after his final encounter with Lambert, fully intending to return at some point down the road to face the music after putting away the racketeer. It all made sense to me until the scene faded with the saddened 'Croney' Cronin lamenting her boss's decision - why exactly would there have been a campfire in the middle of the airplane terminal? Hey, best line of the film that had nothing to do with the story - newspaper writer Mike Reynolds (Don Beddoe) commenting on his failed marriages: "My three honeymoons were the happiest time of my life"! Now that's a positive attitude.

LeonLouisRicci The First Act of this mish mashed Movie is a rapid-speak "Newspaper Man" cliché with a hyped up, frantic pace that reminds one of the Screwball Comedies. The Second Act is a darkly lit and appropriately seedy looking foray into the Underworld of the Roaring Twenties. The Third Act is a Soul Searching Melodrama with much Romance and overwhelming syrupy Music and sombre revelatory Redemption.The Second Act works the best. The shadowy Cinematography and the Good vs Evil confrontations are superb. There are some Philosophical exercises and suspenseful Scenes. It is here where the Acting ceases to be overplayed and the Characters and situations seem believable.There is never a sense in the Movie as a whole that this takes place in the 1920's. It is so void of Period, OK maybe the Cars, that it is quite the failure on the Makeup, Wardrobe, and Set Designers. It does give a hint at the Newspaper "Game", and the Post-World War One Sociological and Media changes, but not enough to make this anything more than a passable and pedestrian Entertainment with a surprising lack of insight or reflection on its Subject Matter.

Alex da Silva Edward G Robinson (Corey) returns from the war and is offered his old job back at the newspaper he used to work for. However, he has bigger ideas and wants to run his own newspaper now. The only way he can get financing to start his business is to come to a deal with gangster Edward Arnold (Lambert). They become 50/50 partners in the business - the unholy partners of the title. Robinson is one of these do-gooder types who wants to clean up the city and so, when Arnold - his financier and number 1 gangster in town - tells him to back off from a story, he disobeys him coz he wants to see justice done. What a knob-head. He is basically begging to be killed off. Whether he does get what's coming to him is up to fate.This is pretty predictable stuff with a corny ending. Robinson is good as always but Arnold is better. Thank God he is in the film. He has a sort of Raymond Burr deep voice and big thuggery frame and makes a good baddie. The rest of the cast are OK, although William T. Orr (Tommy) is slightly annoying at times. The film is not particularly good and there is no need to see it again. It finishes and then you sling it onto the junk pile - if you have any sense. Robinson's character is unconvincing and the final line is pure cheesiness. It's not a disaster but there's not a lot to say about it. Everyone has done better and it's a forgettable affair.

TAYLOR BOWIE This was a "new" one to me...I don't recall ever hearing or reading a thing about it. Touches of comedy and a terrific story, with wonderful scenes of Robinson and Edward Arnold turning in superb performances. Nice support from the likes of Marsha Hunt, Larraine Day, Don Beddoe and the very underrated DON COSTELLO, so memorable in "The Blue Dahlia." An interesting companion piece to LeRoy's 1931 "Five Star Final" which also starred Robinson. Superior writing and directing, but a twisty ending which comes over as contrived.