The Racket (1928)
(Lewis Milestone, US 1928, 84 min., DCP)
Silent Tuesdays. Captain James “Mac” McQuigg is a straitlaced police officer keeping the peace on the streets of New York during Prohibition. Nick Scarsi is a major mob boss and bootlegger with a casual attitude toward violence and quick trigger finger. Mac arrests Scarsi and his men multiple times, but he can never get the charges to stick because the politicians are in the pocket of the gangsters. Still, Mac becomes enough of a nuisance that Nick gets him transferred to a district in “the sticks,” where he can’t do any more harm. But when Nick’s little brother gets into a hit-and-run accident in Mac’s precinct, conflict can’t be avoided. Live piano by Philip C. Carli.
Restored in 2016 by the Academy Film Archive, with elements provided by the Howard Hughes Corporation; the University of Nevada, Las Vegas College of Fine Arts, Department of Film; and the Howard Hughes Collection at the Academy Film Archive.