Directed by Budd Boetticher
Boetticher’s last film before beginning production on the fateful Arruza finds him working in broader registers than his previous films. The rise of Prohibition-era mobster Legs Diamond plays like a spoof of gangster cool: Diamond woos a woman, wins a dance contest and pulls a jewel heist all on a single day. It’s a narcissistic come on that makes this smooth operator’s crash all the more shocking, a ruthless individualist left twisting in the wind.
Warner Bros. Producer: Milton Sperling. Screenwriter: Joseph Landon. Cinematographer: Lucien Ballard. Editor: Folmar Blangsted. Cast: Ray Danton, Karen Steele, Elaine Stewart, Jesse White, Simon Oakland.
16mm, b/w, 103 min.
