LINDA LAIT,Biblio.com
Beast of the City
1932532<p><strong>FIRST EDITION. Octavo Publishers red black-stamped cloth top-edge stained red 218pp 2. Frontispiece from the film featuring the lovely Jean Harlow. A very good copy in a bright dust wrapper which exhibits very little wear or chipping. Theres been minor professional repairs to the rear hinge as it was starting to crack and strain. Otherwise this is a very collectible copy and notoriously scarce in the ORIGINAL publishers Dust-wrapper not a facsimile with the striking image of Jean Harlow. The Beast of the City 1932 is a gritty pre-Code MGM crime drama about a ruthless police captain Jim Fitzpatrick Walter Huston who wages a violent war on organized crime in Prohibition-era Chicago clashing with mob boss Sam Belmonte Jean Hersholt and his girlfriend Daisy Jean Harlow. The film is known for its brutal violence cynical tone and a famously shocking ending exploring themes of vigilantism and the blurred lines between law and crime and features a young Mickey Rooney in an early role. Its also the film which convinced MGM production chief Irving Thalberg to buy out Harlows contract from Howard Hughes for $30000. In addition to W.R. Burnett penning the screenplay he was also assisted by Ben Hecht uncredited and John Lee Mahim. W.R. Burnett called it "one of the best crime pictures of all. Hersholt was a greasy offensive Capone. Really good." He felt it was well directed although Charles Brabin was English. "Everything about it was wrong. Making an American hoodlum picture giving it to an Englishman. Wed have a story conference and hed go to sleep right in your face McGilligan Patrick; Mate Ken 1986. "W.R. Burnett: The Outsider.</strong></p> Grosset & Dunlap hardcover
Reginald C. Williams Rare Books · États-Unis950,00 $US≈ 803,80 €
