LUCKY JORDAN: Blu-ray (Paramount, 1942) Kino Lorber

Alan Ladd’s hat trick to superstardom was director, Frank Tuttle’s Lucky Jordan – a fascinating ‘mutt’ of a motion picture, released hot on the heels of Ladd’s one/two knock-out punch at the box office with This Gun for Hire and The Glass Key (all three movies made and released in 1942). Of these three, Lucky Jordan is decidedly the lightweight. To suggest Ladd’s swift ascendence into the top echelons of Hollywood royalty had been assured is to forget he had already appeared ‘uncredited’ in 46 movies ranging from the distinguished Citizen Kane (1941) to the laughably bad, Brother Rat and a Baby (1940). Lucky Jordan is an interesting pic, chiefly because it attempts, with varying degrees of precision and success, to amalgamate the genres of the crime/thriller, the military flick, the classic screwball, and the rom/com. Ladd runs this gamut with limited acting range, carrying over his steely-eyed persona from the aforementioned ‘Gun’ and ‘Glass Key’ – a tough guy, determined to mask his proverbial heart of gold under an only intermittently convincing veneer of ruthlessness. Lucky Jordan is based on ‘Prelude to Glory’ - an original screenplay by Charles Leonard, about a gangster who joins the army. Having seen the promise in Ladd as their potential bell-ringer for the next decade, Paramount bought Leonard’s little ditty in March 1942, assigning staff writers, Karl Tunberg and Darrell Ware to iron out the kinks.  For this flick, Ladd would receive his first ‘above the title’ star billing, appearing opposite costar, Helen Walker as WAC officer, Jill Evans (a role originally intended for Paulette Goddard). Walker, then considered a ‘new find’ for the studio, was signed to a lucrative film contract based on her previous year’s success in a Broadway play – ‘Jason’.

Despite its somewhat uneven pace and awkward blend of genres and situations, Lucky Jordan would go on to break the all-time box office record held at New York’s famed Rialto movie palace. Ladd, highly superstitious that his fledgling fame would suddenly evaporate, clung to a briefcase he had previously toted in This Gun for Hire, considering it his ‘good luck’ charm.  Perhaps there was something to this, as Lucky Jordan was hardly up to snuff artistically and, of the 3 movies to catapult Ladd into movie-land’s stratosphere, it retrospectively remains the weakest and the weirdest. The picture opens with an attempt on Jordon’s life – his ‘second in command, Slip Moran (Sheldon Leonard) setting up the hit, foiled when Jordon sends his double, Eddie (Russell Hoyt) out first to take the bullet meant for him. So far, so good, as it would appear we are in for another gangster pic with gats and molls to crest our appetites. But then Jordan gets drafted into the army. In the Buck Privates segment of our story, Jordan demands of his attorney, Ernest Higgins (Lloyd Corrigan) that he find an angle to get him out of serving. To this end, Higgins laughably hires an old rummy, Annie (Mabel Paige) to play the part of Jordan’s indigent ma’. The ruse fails, however, and Annie briefly tries to blackmail Jordan for more money, even after he is forced to accept his commission.

Given his plushily padded past, Jordan and ‘boot camp’ do not get on. Higgins somehow arranges for Jordan to merely hang out at the canteen playing pool, where he meets WAC officer, Jill Evans and quickly develops a yen to win her over as his girl. Instead, she reports his delinquency to the base colonel who promptly has Jordan thrown in the stockade. The wily Jordan does not remain there for very long, stealing an army engineer’s car and making a break for freedom. Alas, liberty is short-lived. Jordan is accosted by two goons in a Cadillac, who hightail it to safety when Jill stumbles upon their assault. Forcing Jill to accompany Jordan back to Manhattan, Jill instead retaliates by tossing out a briefcase in Jordan’s possession, containing top secret military documents stolen by the army engineer, and meant for his spurious contacts in the Nazi underground. Jordan then learns from Moran that a spy ring is offering $50,000 for the discarded briefcase. Unaware his actions are unpatriotic, rather after this sizable payout, Jordan returns to the spot where Jill chucked the briefcase and recovers it, ordering Moran to set up a time and place with the spy syndicate for the hot exchange. Instead, Jordan is ambushed by the same thugs who beat him unconscious and take back their ill-gotten gains.

Determined to reclaim the briefcase, and also save face as an underworld heavy hitter in his own right, Jordan tracks the spies to a botanical preserve on Long Island. He learns that Moran is in cahoots with another traitor - Kilpatrick (Miles Mander) who is also working for the Nazis. With deftness and some luck (hence, his namesake), Jordan manages to steal back the confidential documents. In reply, Kilpatrick seals off the exits to the preserve. Jordan conceals the papers and tucks an explanatory note inside a man's (George Meader) rolled-up umbrella. Meanwhile, Jill – determined to expose Jordan, and thoroughly unaware he is in grave danger, leads Kilpatrick and his goons straight to him, believing Kilpatrick is a government agent. Only after Jordan’s recapture does Jill learn the truth. For her efforts, she is also taken hostage along with Jordan, whom the Nazis’ chief, Herr Kesselman (John Wengraf), intends to interrogate under the threat of torture. Jordan invents a tall tale concerning where he supposedly hid the papers to clear the room of its search party. But after he and Kesselman are left alone, Jordan manages to wrangle away Kesselman’s gun. Now, Jordan is determined to turn over the documents to the FBI out of a newfound sense of patriotism. Mercifully, the real FBI arrive and arrest the lot. Jill assumes Jordan will get a medal for his heroism. Instead, he is returned to the stockades to serve out the remainder of his punishment.

Lucky Jordan is a fast-paced oddity, expertly photographed in B&W by cinematographer, John F. Seitz. It carries the artistic ballast of Ladd’s two aforementioned ‘thrillers’ from this same year, but plays pretty fast and loose with taking any of its espionage seriously. As a result, the action sequences come off with more disposably comedic bravado than adventure. Ladd’s athleticism is on full display as he skulks around the botanical gardens and leaps into action against his Nazi transgressors. But the awkwardly playful chemistry between Ladd and Helen Walker (who comes across as a roadshow Alexis Smith) goes nowhere fast.  Despite its feather-weight appeal, Lucky Jordan is an unobtrusive entertainment at best. It lacks the sting of excitement and danger, and, really founders in its romantic angle with Walker’s antiseptic wit getting in the way of Jill’s supposedly burgeoning affections for Jordan – a guy she barely knows, and will likely never see again once his army tenure finishes. At 5 feet, 6 inches, Ladd was one of the industry’s more diminutive stars – a troubling aspect for Hollywood’s he-men that Paramount cleverly concealed throughout his reign, often by having Ladd perform his more intimate scenes while standing on a box, or by having his costars work their magic while standing in a trench. Ladd’s more fine-boned features made him a ‘pretty boy’ heartthrob. But his acting chops gave him stature and ballast. And, in the final analysis, the combination of this class and guts made Alan Ladd a truly memorable star for decades to follow, and generations since to reclaim as their male sex symbol with style.

Lucky Jordan arrives on Blu-ray via Kino Lorber in a fairly impressive 1080p transfer that only occasionally belies the movie’s 81 years. It’s gratifying to see Universal – the current custodians of Paramount’s deep catalog – has deigned to offer a better-than-average effort here. Much of Paramount’s deep catalog did not survive this late-fifties purge; Paramount’s exec’ brain trust then, selling off over 700 titles made at the studio between 1929 and 1949 to MCA, eventually to be amalgamated with Universal Pictures. There are no original camera negatives for much of this lost film legacy. So, what we have instead are print masters with boosted contrast, made for TV re-broadcast, subjected for decades to casual abuse, wear and tear. In this regard, Lucky Jordan is…well…rather lucky to have escaped this indignation. The elements here are relatively free of age-related artifacts and appear nicely contrasted with some good solid tonality, wed to ample amounts of fine detail and a light smattering of film grain looking very indigenous to its source. The audio is 2.0 DTS mono and adequate for this presentation, free of age-related hiss or pop. Kino Lorber has added a commentary by Samm Deighan that waffles a bit on detail, but overall is enjoyable besides. We also get a badly worn theatrical trailer. Bottom line: Lucky Jordan is mostly for Alan Ladd completionists. It’s only a so-so movie, given good, solid representation in hi-def. Judge and buy accordingly.

FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)

3

VIDEO/AUDIO

3.5

EXTRAS

1