Dull and Talky Early Talkie that has an Insightful Idea About Slick Suited Business Types Actually Running the Mob. A Behind Closed Doors Peek at the Money Men and the Machine They Operate that Causes Harm and Pain for the Average Citizen.There is a Creepy Atmosphere of No Empathy. They Even Take Milk from the Mouths of Babes. Except for the Fresh Concept of Adding Machines Instead of Machine Guns there isn't Enough Here to Recommend. A Message Movie that is Mundane to Say the Least.Also, it is a Pre-Code Movie with Nothing that Would Not Pass Post-Code. Loretta Young Fans Might Want to Check In and See the Star in an Early Role. Walter Huston is Bland and it Certainly is a Role that Just About Anyone Could Play, and He Looks Bored.

Wow, did this movie start with a bang! There is a "businessmen's association" that offers protection for its members. This is actually a very thinly veiled cover for the mob. A business man is told he CAN'T do business with someone outside the organization. When he does, the consequences actually shocked me--the mob REAAALLY meant what they said! The head of this group of crooks is the well-dressed and well-mannered Walter Huston and when he's behind closed doors with his thugs, he instantly loses his sweet veneer. But to everyone outside this group, he's a respectable and well off gentleman. Even his well-bred daughter (Loretta Young) doesn't know--and it was easier to hide it from her as he had her educated in Europe. But, when he makes the mistake and tells her about his real business, she wants nothing to do with him and leaves to start a life on her own. She even goes so far as tell her fiancé, Dick Cheney (yes, that really is the character's name) that she cannot marry him--though I have no idea why she goes this far. Naturally, Dick won't hear of this and pursues her ardently.There's a lot more to the story than this, but sadly it never really amounted to very much. Huston got sick of the business and wanted to get out, but oddly, there was very little suspense or action--despite the action early in the film. And, oddly, Huston and Young reunited awfully easily. There WAS a shooting that occurred a bit later--but that occurred off-camera and the entire affair was amazingly muted and dull despite such a promising start. Overall, it turned out to be an amazingly tame dud.

Ruling Voice, The (1931) ** (out of 4) Disappointing crime-drama from Warner has Walter Huston playing a racketeer who will stop at nothing to get as much power and money that he can. The daughter (Loretta Young) he hasn't seen in ten years comes home from Europe with a fiancé (David Manners) but when she learns what her father is really doing she turns her back on him. I'm a major fan of the three leads but sadly this melodrama is way too wordy and in the end it's a pretty boring film from start to finish. The biggest problem is the actual screenplay that doesn't offer very much except for tired dialogue that seems to keep coming and coming. Even the easiest of scenes contain way too much dialogue and the talking just keeps going to the point where you're ready to turn your hearing off just to get away from it. The screenplay is full of predictable things and not for a second will anyone believe the relationship between Huston and Young. There wasn't a single second where I actually believed that he would care about what she feels towards him. I mean, he hasn't bothered seeing her in ten years and all of the sudden he's just going to change his ways? Huston is decent in the role of the racketeer but no one is going to confuse this for one of his better performances. He does seem to be somewhat all over the place in terms of staggering away the set but I'm going to guess this has more to do with the director. Young is as beautiful as ever as this here was certainly a very high point in terms of those beautiful looks. Her performance hits all the right notes and she's wonderful in the sequence where she learns the truth about her father. Manners will always be best remembered for his role in the same year's Dracula but the more I see from him the more impressed I get. He perfectly fits the role of this nice guy trying to make money to marry Young. The film runs a rather short 72-minutes but you'd swear it was twice as long due to the non-stop talk and lack of any real action. Fans of the three leads might want to check it out if they plan to see everything they've done but others should stay clear.

A potentially interesting entry in Warner Brothers' series of crime dramas is weakened by an improbably wordy script, stagey performances -- Walter Huston, in this early role, seems to have no sense of where the camera is -- and an outright awful performance by Doris Kenyon, who, although fifth-billed, is actually the female lead.Despite the ethnic types that inhabit the better Warners crime dramas, the Irishmen and Italians, this one seems to be inhabited solely by WASPS who wear impeccable, old fashioned clothing.On the plus side, Loretta Young is in her luminously beautiful phase, an absolute pleasure to look at, although she isn't given much to do. David Manners is adequate as the juvenile lead and the idea of the story, how honest men can be driven to become criminals, is potentially interesting. But this movie doesn't live up to its potential.