Not without interest though this is one of the lesser Hart films. Turn William S. Hart into a city cop, a cloth cap workman or Aztec Indian, and he loses his legendary westerner impact.
Troops, "men who had faced Boche steel" are disembarking at San Francisco after WW1 and among them is Hart as Sgt. Square Kelly of the 91st, one time burglar, and his officer friend who happens to be the son of the Police Lieutenant who had encountered our hero in his professional capacity.
Switch is Bill's white hair mother happens to be a cop hating Irish criminal matriarch who is all set for him to re-join Tom Santchi's gang. However the Lieutenant offers Bill a spot on the force. Santschi's ward Anne Little (co-star with Broncho Billy Anderson) slips him a note urging the straight and narrow.
When the tension between Hart's up bringing and his new righteous way of life has been settled, it's kind of lame. Instead of an Old Testament God, it's the hallowed US Army that stirs Bill's reverence here.
The Bay City setting is an effective background, also used in Hart's THE NARROW TRAIL but Lambert Hillyer's script and direction don't make this one of his star's best efforts. Cameraman Joe August, on the other hand, covers himself with glory, capturing Hart in the streetscapes and filming the shoot out in the dark room illuminated by muzzle flashes - is this the first time we see that? It turns up again again in George Bancroft's superior The MIGHTY ten years later, which this film intriguingly anticipates.
