Law and Order + The Whole Town's Talking

The Toronto Film Society Weekend Double Feature

Law and Order (Edward L. Cahn, US 1932, 73 min., 35mm)

Frame Johnson, "the man who cleaned up Kansas," arrives in Tombstone ready to settle down and let someone else keep the peace. But the deliberate lawlessness of the Northrup brothers soon changes his mind and he agrees to wear the marshal's badge. Walter Huston (in a script adapted by his son John from the W.R. Burnett novel Saint Johnson) gives a wonderfully understated performance as Frame in this early telling of Wyatt Earp and the Clanton-McLaury gang, culminating in a finely edited gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

The Whole Town's Talking (John Ford, US 1935, 93 min., 35mm)

This is a surprising little film with Edward G. Robinson playing dual roles as a timid bank clerk who is mistaken for a notorious and vicious gangster. Robinson handles both roles brilliantly, and John Ford's nuanced direction balances the darker aspects of the story with many humorous moments. Jean Arthur plays the love interest in this rarely seen masterpiece from the early-middle of Ford's long Hollywood career.