Young Mexican-American lawyer Johnny Ramirez (Paul Muni) is disbarred after punching out a lawyer who beat him in court! Embittered, he heads to Mexico where he goes to work in a border town casino. There Johnny falls for a stuck-up socialite (Margaret Lindsay) while he becomes the object of infatuation for the boss' crazy wife (Bette Davis).Good WB drama with broad but enjoyable performances from Muni and Davis. Margaret Lindsay is always lovely. Nice supporting cast includes Eugene Palette, Robert Barrat, and Samuel S. Hinds. Well-intentioned social messages seem slightly embarrassing today. And yes, the movie is politically incorrect, for those who are bothered by that. Elements of this story were later used in the superior They Drive By Night with George Raft and Humphrey Bogart. A good movie, especially for Bette Davis fans.

Amusing movie here that almost paints everyone with a broad stroke of brush. Paul Muni plays a Mexican (!!) lawyer trying to make it in law in the Mexican part of LA, but loses his first case badly, not because of his mishandling of the law , but also, as the judge states, he's got that Mexican savage blood in him! He returns to Mexico to become the second hand of a successful casino. The manager's wife (played by Bette Davis) can't stop making goo-goo eyes at him, even killing her husband to get her our of the way. Soon he falls in love, no not with Davis, but with the original client he was prosecuting against in LA, this makes Davis go insane, while the client lady is still calling Muni a "savage". This is pretty ridiculous. but it's fun wondering where on earth this is going to go next. It does take a while to get going though.

This movie has most everything bad the other reviews claim, and that's why I like it. It's almost burlesque. Yes, Muni overacts (and gets the accent wrong, which is odd, since Muni was known for his scrupulous preparation). Even as the taciturn Juarez, Muni overacts his underacting. It may be his wonderful voice, but there's something about his persona that makes the emoting appealing. That said, I think Edward G. Robinson would have been better in the part. As for Bette Davis, for the whole movie, her character seems to be on or coming down from cocaine. There's a solo scene where she looks like someone who's just done a line, and you watch as the drug begins to work on her. Mad scenes were a Davis specialty and she gives one to Muni like she did to Leslie Howard in Of Human Bondage, except here she's like someone screaming at her pusher who's cut her off. Of course, in the movie, the drug is lust.Anyway, I don't think the subject here is race so much as class. The moral of the story is the old one, that a step up is not necessarily a step for the better. Rich people can be stinkers, so why would you want to buy into them? Muni made another movie of this "city mouse, country mouse" fable, The Good Earth. Robinson made many, but unlike Robinson's characters, Muni's (except for Scarface) were able to escape in one piece.

It is interesting to see how a reputation that was once high can tumble to later generations - somewhat unfairly. Paul Muni was not a poor actor. In his best work (SCARFACE, JUAREZ, LIFE OF LOUIS PASTEUR, WE ARE NOT ALONE) his work remains quite substantial in it's effectiveness - he was no mean actor. But when he got hammy....then the knives are our for him. One example is Joseph Elsner (Chopin's music teacher and friend in A SONG TO REMEMBER). Another is Johnny Ramirez in BORDERTOWN.One can make an excuse for Muni playing a Mexican hero like Benito Juarez. In the 1930s Warner Baxter played the Cisco Kid and Joaichim Murietta and Wallace Beery was a memorable Pancho Villa. But these figures were presented as heroes - there was a degree of sympathy in these personalities. There was supposed to be similar sympathy for Ramirez, but Muni really blew it apart in the opening of the film.Johnny has just become a lawyer - and has just hung his license up. He gets a client (Manuel Diego - Arthur Stone) whose truck was destroyed in a car accident caused by a limousine driven by a drunken socialite (Dale Elwell - Margaret Lindsey). Johnny willingly takes the case, but he is a terrible lawyer (and, to tell the truth, anyone seeing this performance would think Muni is a terrible actor - the scene in the court is the worst overacting). Johnny not only loses to the professional competence of Elwell's attorney, but the disgusted judge tells him that he is going to request that the state bar association take back Johnny's license. He is disbarred and humiliated. But he subsequently starts working for Charlie Roarke (Eugene Palette), a jolly and good natured man who has a roadhouse with gambling.The plot is that Roarke's wife Marie (Bette Davis) meets Johnny, and falls for him (not hard - he's a romantic Mexican, and look at jolly but short, fat, and old Chalie). But Johnny is not interested. He's loyal to Charlie, and he's met Dale again. At first she makes fun of the ex-lawyer, but she starts enjoying "slumming" with him. But he's more serious.Marie suddenly gets the idea of getting rid of Charlie. When they return home from a party, he's totally drunk. They are in the garage of their home, and she realizes that if she leaves the gasoline motor on and closes the door on Charlie - well, it's goodbye Charlie! So it works out, and now she thinks that Johnny will be easy to get. But he's not...and in a moment of anger she confesses the murder and says that Johnny was her co-conspirator.You may sense several points here: 1935 was the year Thelma Todd died in a still mysterious death connected to her having carbon monoxide poisoning in her closed car garage like Palette did. I don't know which of the two events proceeded the other. Secondly, the situation between Davis and Muni is a model for the similar relationship of Ida Lupino and George Raft in THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT. In fact the death of Palette is a model for the same death for Alan Hale Sr. in the latter film. And the denouement in the trial court is identical too.SPOILERS COMING UP! Both Davis and Lupino suffer mental collapses on the witness stands, revealing their own guilt but accidentally saving Muni and Raft. Raft is able to pick up the pieces with Ann Sheridan in THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT. Muni is less lucky. Running from him when he reveals his desire to marry her, Lindsay is run down and killed by a car. The effect is overdone by Muni looking so horrified one wonders if he is actually witnessing the sinking of the Titanic! Or maybe he was thinking about his really bad performance in this film.