Waterfront Lady

As Los Angeles cops raid his illegal gambling yacht, owner Jim McFee shoots and kills his double-crossing watchman. To cover for his boss, one of McFee's employees, Ronny Hillyer, grabs the gun and dives overboard. While a police manhunt scours the waterfront, Hillyer hides out in a nearby houseboat, disguised as a sailor. He's in no hurry to skip town after meeting and falling in love with beautiful Joan O'Brien. The hunted man has more to worry about than the police - Joan's rival suitor is getting suspicious about Hillyer's true identity.

Although produced after the enforcement of the Hollywood censorship code, Waterfront Lady has the tough and raunchy spirit of an early '30s gangster melodrama ("My mother didn't leave me much," says moll Barbara Pepper, "but she left it in all the right places.") Aside from its stellar cast, the supervising editor for this Mascot production was future film noir director Joseph H. Lewis (Gun Crazy, The Big Combo).

This feature film from 1935 stars Anne Rutherford (at age 18) in her first leading role as Joan, a young performer trying to make ends meet singing at a lousy café. Joan's life takes a turn for the better, however, as she catches the eye of Ronny (Frank Albertson), a man on the run from the cops who takes up hiding in her father's boathouse. In order to repay a debt to his partner McFee, Ronny took the heat for a crime he did not commit. As his relationship with Jean flourishes, he can only hide his identity for so long, eventually admitting to his new love that he is a wanted man. Once Jean finds out, she convinces Ronny to turn himself in, but when he does so, he finds out that McFee has already told the truth. Will McFee's story be enough to save Jean's love, or is it already too late'