They Drive By Night (1940)

Joe Fabrini: "If we go over a cliff, wake me up."

By Raoul Walsh
With George Raft, Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart

After watching The Desperate Hours (1953) I took a quick look around the IMDb section and saw They Drive By Night and decided to watch it.

Joe and Paul Fabrini are two brothers who struggle to making a living on small fruits transporting truck jobs. They stop at cafés and know all the other drivers. One night on the road, they pick up a hitchhiker, Cassie, who just served them at a café earlier the same evening. She left her job because her boss was harassing her. Joe decides to help her out and rents her a room until she can find work. The two soon fall in love with each other.

One night as they follow a truck of some friends they see the truck go left and right off the road and assume that the driver fell asleep. The brothers quickly pull next to the truck to try and wake the driver up but the truck veers off the corner of the road and falls over a cliff. Shaken by the accident, Paul goes back to his wife Pearl, but can't sleep all night. Joe on the other hand is decided to make more money and he buys lemons of his own and they manage to make a good profit out of it, paying out all the debts and loans they had. On the way back, Paul suggests that they stop but instead Joe makes him drive, eager to deliver and make more money. Paul falls asleep at the wheel and in the aftermath they will lose more than their truck...

They Drive by Night reminded me of Le salaire de la peur (1953) at first because of the truck drivers atmosphere and brotherhood as well as the danger they are ready to face for money. However, the movie takes a really sharp turn, figuratively, half way through and switches to a more psychological crime thriller after the accident. I was surprised at first because I really enjoyed the trucks and the road by night. The second half of the film is more reminiscent of the classics in its crime of passion with a femme fatale. Ida Lupino excels in this role and she gives the most memorable performance of the movie.

Even though they are totally different movies, the settings of the second half reminded me of Sabrina (1954), maybe mostly because of the garage scene, but also because of it's love triangle, or most accurately the lack of the third angle in that love. I feel there could have been some more developments about the relationship between the two brothers after the accident what started has a great bond and work relationship simply vanished where it should have become even more interesting because of the role each of them played in the accident and the price they paid for it. I think the same could be said about Cassie who was developed fairly extensively in the first and almost vanished for most the second half of the movie.

All this made me feel like watched an uneven movie or maybe two movies in one. Fortunately, both parts were good but I would have enjoyed more links between them. I guess the ending was a little expected.

I liked: The truck drivers atmosphere, the road and its dangers.

I disliked: Uneven, almost bipolar. Did not explore the psychological aspects enough.

71/100
It felt a little like watching two movies at once, but at least they are both exploring interesting topics.