Sherry Scott (Humphrey Bogart) is a no nonsense manager of a radio station that has been struggling to get listeners as of late. His boss Reynolds (Robert Middlemass) has an idea he feels will bring in audiences en mass, broadcast a true crime story serialized based on a murder that happened years ago where a woman killed her husband but was found justified in the crime. The idea seems innocent enough at first but, unfortunately, the woman in the story, Gloria Pembrook, is still around under a new name, Martha Carstairs (Helen MacKellar). With the story being dredged up on air, Martha is shaken and upset. She has a grown daughter named Edith (Beverly Roberts) with her second husband who is engaged to be married and knows nothing about her mother’s past. Finding out would devastate her and could also possibly endanger the engagement.
Complicating things, a man Martha and her husband, Jim (Henry O’Neill), assumes is a clergyman turns out to be a reporter. When they confide the truth of Martha’s past to him he sells the story to the radio station where it goes out on the air. The parents of Edith’s fiancée want to call off the engagement. Martha pleads with Reynolds at the radio station to cease broadcasting the story, not for her sake but for Edith’s but the story is bringing in too much revenue for him to even consider it. Sherry Scott on the other hand is getting disillusioned with the coldness of his bosses response but, at first refuses to act, not wanting to jeopardize his retirement and Jim loses his job when his work chooses to avoid controversy. All of this begins to push Martha to the breaking point.
The concept of this story is intriguing but it bogs down in an overwhelming sense of mean spiritedness that it never quite overcomes. The film is titled Two Against The World and it is an apt title. While it isn’t quite just two, after all we have Edith and her supportive fiancée in the fray, it does feel like everyone else in the film is cynical and cold hearted, putting the almighty dollar over all else, including their humanity. This is softened a little by the increasingly jaded Sherry Scott but even he is cold to the Carstair’s situation until late in the game. Reynolds is rattled when he sees what his actions are causing, yet he remains determined to press forward anyway.
What all these events lead up to is some of the most harrowing scenes of despair ever committed to cinema. It is meant to anger and it succeeds there. But it rarely tempers the despair with any light. This leaves the film feeling unbalanced and lacking any real fun in the viewing. This does succeed in putting us in the head of Martha, however. It is a deeply unpleasant experience that may turn audiences off to the whole film.
This is not a film made for its entertainment value. It is meant to be thought provoking and to stir up strong emotions. It succeeds on both counts. It is deeply unpleasant and doesn’t pull any punches. It also doesn’t play out the way a traditional film would. It was based on a play from 1930 that in turn was made into the film, Five Star Finale, the following year starring Edward G. Robinson. Two Against the World is much shorter than the former film but manages to avoid feeling rushed. However, it lacks the screen time needed to flesh out some of the key supporting characters in a way to avoid them coming across as mere caricatures. Had we enough background behind Reynolds’s to understand him beyond just a need for more money we might have been more invested in both sides of the coin and not feel manipulated into a one-sided affair. We don’t necessarily need to sympathize with him but we should be able to see some sort of humanity in him. This film is more interested in painting in broad strokes, though, and because of that it falls short of any real strength.
Bogart does a good job here at conveying both sides of the equation. At first he is as cold as his boss. But as things disintegrate he softens and feels compassion for Martha and her situation. We understand his motivations. His job and a retirement are on the line and at first he feels the need to prioritize that. However, he learns that sometimes charity and humanity need to come first over cold hard realities. The only real weakness to this characterization is how long it takes to get there.
At less than an hour in length it is just long enough to tell the story and nothing more. While there is something to be said about trimming all the fat, a great deal more can be said about leaving some of it to enhance the flavor. A film can be too lean, leaving out important character moments in favor of a short runtime. That is the case here. The film runs less than an hour and it feels it. Instead of getting a well rounded story about the dangers of putting business ahead of humanity, we get a one sided narrative of an unfeeling antagonist brow beating a family to death for the sake of ratings. It is pessimistic to the extreme and misses an opportunity to tell a truly compelling story.
Release Date: July 11, 1936
Running Time: 64 minutes
Starring: Helen MacKellar, Henry O’Neill, Humphrey Bogart
Directed by: William C. McGann
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