Alibi (1929 film)

Alibi is a 1929 American crime film directed by Roland West. The screenplay was written by West and C. Gardner Sullivan, who adapted the 1927 Broadway stage play, Nightstick, written by Elaine Sterne Carrington, J.C. Nugent, Elliott Nugent, and John Wray.
The movie is a crime drama starring Chester Morris, Harry Stubbs, Mae Busch, and Regis Toomey. Director West experimented a great deal with sound, music, and camera angles.
As a film published in 1929, it entered the public domain on January 1, 2025.

Plot

Joan Manning, the daughter of a police sergeant, secretly marries Chick Williams, a gangleader who convinces her that he is leading an honest life. Chick attends the theater with Joan and, at the intermission, sneaks away, committing a robbery during which a policeman is killed. Chick is suspected of the crime but is able to use Joan to substantiate his alibi. The police plant Danny McGann, an undercover agent, in Chick's gang; but he is discovered, and Chick murders him. Chick is later cornered by the police in his own home. Before they can arrest him, he flips the light switch, plunging the room into darkness. In the midst of the chaos, Chick escapes to the roof. He attempts to jump off to a nearby building, but stumbles on the landing, thus falling to his death.

Cast

Chester Morris as Chick Williams
Eleanor Griffith as Joan Manning Williams
Pat O’Malley as Detective Sgt. Tommy Glennon
Purnell Pratt as Police Sgt. Pete Manning
Regis Toomey as Danny McGann/Billy Morgan
Mae Busch as Daisy Thomas
Harry Stubbs as Buck Bachman
Irma Harrison as Toots
Elmer Ballard as Soft Malone, cab driver
James Bradbury Jr. as Blake, a crook
Ed Brady as George Stanislaus David
Kernan Cripps as Trask, the plainclothesman
Virginia *Flohri as the singer in the theater
Al Hill as Brown, a crook
DeWitt Jennings as Officer O'Brien

Reception

The film was nominated for three Academy Awards, including for Best Picture, Best Actor in a Leading Role and Best Art Direction.Time praised it as "more credible than most crook pictures," and The New York Times said it was "by far the best of the gangster films, and the fact that it is equipped with dialogue makes it all the more stirring." In a retrospective review, Bruce G. Hallenbeck said the film was "creaky by today's standards... still fun to watch."

Censorship

When Alibi was released in the United States, many states and cities in the United States had censor boards that could require cuts or other eliminations before the film could be shown. The Chicago Board of Censors banned the film, citing it for "immorality, criminality, and depravity." United Artists appealed the ban to circuit court, where the Board explained that the film had been banned because it ridiculed the police. After watching the film, Judge Harry Fisher, stating that "censorship is a form of tyranny at best, and abhorrent to ideals of the American people," issued an injunction allowing the film to be shown in an U.A. theater.