This is one of those films where the characters have to explain what their character are like because that's easier than doing it through acting. This is despite the whole first half hour being devoted to an exceptionally dull back story meant to give us an insight into everyone.
It's pretty professionally put together and the acting is natural and realistic (even from Alice White) but you don't feel inclined to want to get to know these people. Since this picture only works if it tugs at your emotions, because you can't engage with the characters or care anything whatsoever for them, it fails badly. Chester Morris's 'Bud' simply isn't likeable because he's not been written as a believable credible person. His 'sister' played by Helen Twelvetrees is similarly unrealistic so when this sweet country girl suddenly becomes a saucy dancer in her new sugar-daddy gangster's nightclub you can't even be bothered to question the absurdity of it.
Director Kurt Neumann who will go on to great things, does his best with a poorly conceived story but because he doesn't let you engage with his characters, the result is sheer blandness. Even with ever increasingly seedy goings on, murder and self-sacrifice, astonishingly the excitement levels are zero. It's a grey and soulless film which you'll forget you've seen almost immediately.
