1937: It Can Happen Here

Black Legion (1937)
Directed by Archie Mayo
83 min.; U.S.A.; Black and White; Mono

The film I watched this week taught me something shocking but true about the place where I grew up. A history that involves a secret subversive organization and murder. Let me back up a bit...

I just started reading Michael E. Birdwell's book, Celluloid Soldiers: Warner Bros.'s Campaign against Nazism to aid my understanding of how events that led up to World War II also affected cinema. Birdwell describes how Warner Bros. used motion pictures to expose the rising threat of Nazism during a time when the other major studios, the State Department, the PCA, and the Hays office wanted Hollywood to avoid such topics in their films lest they create controversy at home and abroad, and threaten lucrative film export deals with countries such as Germany. Undeterred by this outside pressure, Warner Bros. changed focus and made a film about a fascist group inside the United States. I did some digging, and when I discovered that the film is based on a real terrorist group that operated in the mid 1930s in my home state, Michigan, and that members of that group committed a murder near my home town I had to see this film. Unfortunately, it's unavailable on DVD. But, as luck would have it, I had DVR'd it when Turner Classic Movies broadcast it months ago (because it stars one of my favs, Humphrey Bogart) and then forgot all about it. I finally took a look at it this week.

Black Legion (1937) is the story of Frank Taylor (Humphrey Bogart), a devoted husband and father who works as a drill press operator in a local factory. Despite having little education Frank expects his loyalty to his employer to be rewarded with a promotion to shop foreman when the job opens up. He plans to buy a new car, repair his home, give presents to his wife and son, but the promotion goes to Joe Dombrowski (Henry Brandon), a studious Polish American co-worker who designs a money-saving device for the company on his own time. Distraught and frustrated, he listens to the hate filled messages of a Father Coughlin type radio broadcast and rather than working out a way to secure a better future for himself and his family he comes to blame Dombrowski, who he considers to be less American than himself, for his problems. At the urging of a bigoted co-worker, Frank joins the Black Legion, a secret organization committed to protecting "100% Americans" from the competition and influence of "foreigners, Catholics and Communists." Frank swears an oath of obedience on pain of death to the sinister group in a chilling torchlit initiation ceremony. His first act as a Black Legionnaire is to take part in burning down the Dombrowskis' farm, forcing father and son out of town. With Joe out of the picture Frank gets the promotion he desires, but instead of protecting the American values he claims to cherish his membership in the Black Legion only leads him to commit more acts of terror, arson, and murder. Perhaps one of Humphrey Bogart's least remembered films, Black Legion deserves a second look because of its gritty portrayal of how an honest, hardworking family man is transformed into a killer by one of the pseudo-fascist organizations operating in the U.S. before World War II.

How did producer Robert Lord conceive this story? Despite an opening title card that claims the story and characters are fictitious anyone reading the newspapers in 1936-37 was well aware of the real Black Legion, a secret terror organization motivated by political, religious, and race prejudice, because the group was at the center of a murder trial widely covered by the national press. This real Black Legion was formed by a break-away faction of the Ku Klux Klan; it organized in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois in the 1930s. Made up of some 60,000 to 100,000 "native-born, white, Protestant, gentile American citizens" who vowed to keep the organization secret, perjure themselves when ordered to, vote as their leaders directed, endorse anti-immigrant, anti-Negro, anti-Catholic positions, and do everything in their power to aid in "the extermination of the anarchist, Communists, the Roman hierarchy and their abettors." Organized as a paramilitary group, they garbed themselves in black hoods and held midnight initiation rites in which recruits were forced to swear an oath "before God and the devil" at gunpoint. They planned the overthrow of the government at a time designated as "zero hour." The group also dedicated itself to policing community mores, flogging and lynching those who offended their sense of right and wrong. On 12 May 1936 Black Legion executioner Dayton Dean and sixteen other members of the cult kidnapped and killed Charles Poole, a relative by marriage of a Black Legionnaire, for allegedly beating his wife. A police investigation led to the arrest of Dean who turned states evidence, and eleven members of the Black Legion were convicted in connection with the murder of Poole. Under pressure from subsequent investigations into their activities the organization fell apart.

Despite the rich subject matter director Archie Mayo doesn't wow us with creative filmmaking. Of course the film I watched immediately previous to this one was Alfred Hitchcock's Sabotage (1936), so maybe my expectations are riding pretty high after being treated to a mix of avant-garde inspired techniques by the Master in that film. However, Mayo's lighter touch leaves plenty of room for rising star Humphrey Bogart to show us what he's capable of doing on the screen. Producer Hal Wallis envisioned Edward G. Robinson as the title character, but the star of such films as Little Caesar (1931) and The Hatchet Man (1931) was known for his ability to play characters of varied ethnicity on stage and screen; the producers looked for an actor more anglo-saxon, more supposedly "American" looking. Up and coming actor Humphrey Bogart fit the bill. Mayo was aware of Bogart's talent because he had directed the actor's big break, Petrified Forest (1936) in which Bogart plays a gangster holding Leslie Howard and Bette Davis hostage in a remote diner. Now in their second film together, Mayo and Bogart focus on his character's transformation from good natured family man to half-crazed killer. Switching between quiet brooding and emotional outbursts Bogart's dynamic performance has moments of real intensity—notably the scene in which Frank's friend Ed (Dick Foran) tells him that he's going to turn Frank into the police and a shorter scene in which Frank's attraction to a hate-filled radio broadcast immediately drives a wedge between himself and his young son (see photo right). Bogie is one of my favorite actors and even in this early starring role we can see why he'll become one of the great Hollywood stars.

The film concludes with the Black Legionnaires on trial for murder. Here a reasoned argument is made by the presiding judge (Samuel Hinds) to reaffirm the established order of things temporarily disrupted by the events of the story. I was reminded of Frank Capra's drama Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) which reaffirms the order of things in a similar fashion, clearing Gary Cooper's name so he can return to his humble life in a small town. Things are obviously more serious in Black Legion (unlike Deeds, Frank isn't going back to home and family) but we understand that the judge's speech to Frank Taylor and his villainous cohorts is a message intended for all of us. Mayo achieves this effect by framing the judge's soliloquy in a commanding low camera angle close-up, imbuing the character with wisdom and allowing him to address the audience all but directly (see photo left). We might also perceive this speech as Warner Bros.'s own anti-fascist message: by taking away, through the use of force, the basic human rights guaranteed by the Bill of Rights of the Constitution the Black Legion and groups like them endanger the liberty of all of us. A familiar enough lesson, but one that deserves to be heard again.

I've not been able to find out how the film performed at the box office. What I can say is that the film probably wasn't a blockbuster because if it was we'd have heard more about it or at least seen it on the various lists of "top earners" that film magazines, web sites and, yes, we bloggers too adore. It was not listed in the New York Critics poll of top films for 1937 nor in the top ten list in the New York Times. However, it was given top ten recognition by the National Board of Review among other social dramas like They Won't Forget (1937) and The Life of Emile Zola (1937). Frank S. Nugent, critic for the Times praised Warner Bros. for having the courage to release such a realistic and unflattering portrait of an American hate group adding, "the picture merits an attentive audience; I hope its message reaches that type of mind to which the Michigan organization's aims appealed."

I should note that Warners did not necessarily innovate the idea to make a film about homegrown style of fascism. Paramount distributed independent producer Walter Wanger's film about a paramilitary group modeled on the pro-Nazi Silver Shirt Legion in The President Vanishes (1935). A Black Legion-like organization is profiled in the Columbia picture, Legion of Terror (1936). William Randolf Hearst financed a film about a dictatorial U.S. president in Gabriel Over the White House (1933). MGM arranged to adapt Sinclair Lewis' semi-satirical antifascist novel It Can't Happen Here, but dropped the project at the urging of PCA chief Joseph Breen. Based on descriptions and reviews, these movies reveal the studios' awareness and concern about an American style of fascism taking root in the mid-to-late 1930s. Ever heard of these films? Neither had I until recently. Strangely, not one of these movies appears to be available on DVD. That's a shame because this is a fascinating period of U.S. and film history that cries out for more examination (I'm planning an omnibus review of all of these so if you can point me to sources for these movies please leave a comment or e-mail me).

Black Legion has a personal significance for me that has nothing to do with Bogart's performance or Warner Bros.'s desire to sound a warning about fascism. Inspired by the film, I've been tracking down information about the real Black Legion's operations in Michigan and what I'm discovering is pretty disturbing. For instance, when police arrested Dean for the murder of Charles Poole he not only confessed to that crime, but also revealed other Black Legion plots and murders including a thrill killing that took place just a couple of miles from my childhood home! I suddenly feel a bit like Jeffrey Beaumont stumbling upon that ear in the grass in Blue Velvet (1986), something nasty underlying the nice little community in which I was raised; I'm attracted to learn more, but repulsed at the same time. But, here's the thing that really bothers me: I grew up less than fifty miles from where the Legion trials took place in a small community where one of the murders was actually perpetrated, and yet I've never heard about any of this before. This history wasn't taught in school. There are no local myths about it (and we had stories about every creepy looking old house and backwoods drive, believe me). I asked my father about the real Black Legion and he didn't remember anything about of it either. When you grow up in a small town you think that you know all there is to know about it. A seventy year old movie told me something shocking but true about the place where I grew up, and I feel somehow differently about that place now. Sometimes films are history.

References

Peter H. Amann, "Vigilante Fascism: The Black Legion as an American Hybrid," Comparative Studies in Society and History 25.3 (July 1983): 490-524.

Michael E. Birdwell, Celluloid Soldiers: Warner Bros.'s Campaign Against Nazism (New York: New York UP, 1999).

Frank S. Nugent, "The Screen," New York Times (18 January 1937) 21.

"Warner Bros Film Grosses 1921-51: the William Schaefer Ledger," Historical Journal of Film, Radio, and Television 15.1 (March 1995): 55-73.

This essay written by Thom Ryan
© 2007 Thom Ryan Some rights reserved

Comments

[Brian]

I don't suppose you've seen Gabriel Over the White House, Thom? My recollection of it is that the sort of fascism it presents is not explicitly connected with racial superiority whatsoever, but rather with a strong move toward authoritarianism backed by divine guidance. And that the film presents such a move very sympathetically.

Great piece, well worth the wait. I'd never heard of this film before, as far as I know.

[Thom]

Brian - Thanks for info about Gabriel. I haven't seen it yet. Mike has a solid review of it at his site. Birdwell describes both that film and The President Vanishes as being sympathetic to fascist or psuedo-fascist alternatives, or at least could be construed as sympathetic by an audience. I want to see all of the films listed above to better understand how Hollywood approached the subject of fascism in various ways before WWII.

[Jacqueline T Lynch]

Wonderful post. This is a really terrific essay on The Black Legion, especially in the personal emotions of the back story for you. Fascinating material. Thanks.

[Thom]

Jacqueline - Thank you for the considerate feedback. It means a great deal to me because I tried a slightly different approach with this post. It's helpful to know when I'm on the right track.

[mike]

Gabriel's brand of fascism has nothing to do with race. I guess I should have been more clear about that in my review. It's more what Brian says--authoritarianism backed by God, which was (the film posited) what was needed to save the US and the world. And the God part is implied--we never see the titular angel, but some characters suggest that the main character's shift from party hack president to crusader must have been divinely ordained.

[Thom]

Thanks Mike.