More on the line of the early Dead End kids than "Boy's Town" (or "Wild Boys of the Road" if you want to go back further), it's an okay Republic programmer about a pre-teen (Tommy Ryan) sent to reform school, then suddenly adopted by single reporter Bruce Cabot who covered the crime set up by Tommy's father. Along with Cabot's pal Horace McMahon and sob sister Beverly Roberts (after all, there's always got to be a dame involved in this sort of squash), he manages to win him over, but in reality, he's just trying to get Ryan to identify others involved in the crime, the gang led by Ben Welden.
A decent short enough programmer that has Ryan begging for the viewer's heart (he even gets to sing in his high pitched pre-puberty voice), filling up time with sentiment in addition to the crime elements. Not really as gritty as it should have been, and Ryan is forced way too fast to come to love the adults taking care of him and reforming. MacMahon gets the best lines as an Allan Jenkins type mug. Performances though are convincing even if the script is often "for the boids".
A decent short enough programmer that has Ryan begging for the viewer's heart (he even gets to sing in his high pitched pre-puberty voice), filling up time with sentiment in addition to the crime elements. Not really as gritty as it should have been, and Ryan is forced way too fast to come to love the adults taking care of him and reforming. MacMahon gets the best lines as an Allan Jenkins type mug. Performances though are convincing even if the script is often "for the boids".
