User Reviews

***SPOILERS*** Interesting take off from the the Stinebeck novel "Of Men & Mice" with the punch drunk ex-pug Billy Ketch, Mike Kellin, always kvetching, complaining in Yiddish, about what a raw deal he got for throwing a fight for mobster Gus Schwartz that ended up getting him a lifetime suspension from boxing. Still doing odd jobs for Gus Ketch is caught by Officer Burg trying to dump a body of a murdered hood, by Gus' mob, into the East River. It confronting Officer Burg Ketch belts him and knocks him cold ending up off the pier and going underwater to his watery grave.

It's back at the flop house that Ketch confides to his good friend and protector as well as room-mate Farmer, Will Kuluva, what he did as if it, the murder of a policeman, was nothing more to him then a ticket for speeding. Farmer knowing what kind of trouble his brain damaged friend is into tries to get him to skip town and wait until the heat, police, is off for him to come back. While all this is going on the NYPD in zeroing in on Ketch plants Det. James Hollarn, James Franciscus, at the dock gravel pit that both Ketch & Farmer work at. This if anything gets Ketch very angry in feeling that he's losing his good friend & protector, and possible lover, to Det. Hollaran who really has absolutely, as a friend lover or life partner, no interest in him at all!

***SPOILER*** It's when Farmer is forced by Det. Hollaron to rat out Ketch in order to have him turn himself in for the murder of Officer Burg and, by proving he's mentally challenged, get a light sentence in a mental institution not hard time in a state penitentiary that things turn deadly. This leads the deeply hurt and feeling betrayed Ketch to go bananas and attack Farmer fracturing his skull with a shovel, thus killing him, at then attacking Det. Hollaran, who by now blew his cover, in revenge for him stealing Framer away from him. It's a sad ending for Ketch with him now behind bars for life for double murder and having his best friend , Farmer, no longer around to talk and confide to. But with only the four walls that he's confined to bang his brain damaged head against.

A particularly poor episode of "Naked City", "The Sandman" (written by Louis Solomon, not dear Silliphant) might have made for an acceptable story had this series been produced circa 1925 as a silent film. Its story, heavily redolent of the "Of Mice and Men" formula, is pure attempted pathos and hits the screen with a thud.

Guest stars Mike Kellin and Will Kuluva make a good team (in a lost cause) as punchdrunk ex-fighter and his only pal who keeps humoring him to ill effect. Improbable story line has Kellin working on the docks digging sand alongside Kuluva, but doing special dirty work for the gangster who ended his boxing career by having Kellin take a dive years ago. Kuluva takes care of him as his roommate and keeps his pipe dreams of a comeback in the ring alive.

When Kellin accidentally kills a cop, our heroes whip into action, Franciscus going undercover, leading to a Silent Era climax of fighting in dangerous environs near the pier. The consistently maudlin tone of the show turns into bathos for a corny, downbeat ending.

The acting of the K's goes for nought, and the only takeaway from this segment is how exaggerated the new character played by Horace McMahon is in terms of outwardly seeming nasty to everybody -supposedly endearing (must have been given his success with the show) but a turnoff as far as I'm concerned.