Acensbart
Excellent but underrated film
Griff Lees
Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.
Ava-Grace Willis
Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.
utgard14
En route to a boys camp for the summer, our favorite juvenile delinquents find themselves stranded overnight at a crooked judge's house. There they battle racketeers and the usual old dark house tropes. This is former Dead End Kid (and future leader of the gang) Leo Gorcey's first entry in the East Side Kids series (also the first for his brother David). As such it feels like much more of a proper start to the series than the first film did. Returning from the first one is Dave O'Brien as Knuckles, the reformed gangster acting as the boys' guardian. It's a forgettable movie in every way. At this point Gorcey hadn't yet developed his malapropism-spouting character and he doesn't have Huntz Hall, either, and he was always best with Huntz. Plus the Kids, regardless of which version, did this material better in several other pictures.
SanteeFats
Okay this is a typical Kids format. Troubled youth one step from reform school get a second chance. This one sees them get offered reform school or a country camp. They chose the camp naturally. There is a crooked judge going to trial for corruption and embezzlement and the mob is trying to off him. His male secretary is in on the deal and tries to facilitate the judges demise. There is the young niece whose estate is being embezzled from. We have the adult chaperone Knuckles who is an almost executed for a murder he didn't do by guess who this judge!! While the boys are on their way to the camp the judge, niece, secretary, and a bodyguard are on their way to his country house. The judges party needs a lift and as you might expect get one from the boys et al. When they get to the judges house they reluctantly get an invite to stay the night. Things pick up from here. Ghosts in the cemetery, a scary housekeeper, frightening notes and occurrences, and the usual secret passages. Though this is a murder mystery it also has some very funny moments from the Kids. There are a couple of uncomfortable scenes by today's standards concerning the black Kid. There is watermelon served as dessert only to him and he does get called boy once. All in all though this is a really funny but predictable movie except for who turns out to be the killer. I will leave that for you to discover.
accidentaldays
Boys of the City has relatively good production values and the story and props are creepy enough to make it suspenseful and exciting.Unlike Ghosts on the Loose, most of the "gang" gets talking time.But let's cut to the chase. There are twists and turns and there is a mansion-wide hunt for Miss Louise and a mysterious stalker who roams the house.Something I want to Know: when the "gang" and Knuckles and the Asst. D.A. split up to search the grounds, where is Buster and Skinny? They just disappear until the chase.I enjoyed this tremendously and renew its acquaintance every once and then. It is not to the level of Spooks Run Wild, but it's a very close second.
classicsoncall
The East Side Kids had a couple of films going by "Spooks Run Wild" and "Ghosts on the Loose", but this one seems even better suited to a ghost story than the other two. It's got some atmospheric creepy sets, a long dungeon like room, and someone even dons the white sheets unlike the aforementioned films. What hampers the story though is some really shoddy writing and a make it up as you go sensibility that just about kills any interest in the story once it's under way. For me, this was not one of the better East Side Kids efforts.It starts out with a familiar premise; get the boys out of the city to keep them out of trouble, under the watchful eye of Danny's (Bobby Jordan) big brother Knuckles (Dave O'Brien). The core group this time out includes Muggs (Leo Gorcey) and Scruno (Sunshine Sammy Morrison), with a little help from Peewee (Donald Haines) and Skinny (Frankie Burke). Burke looks every bit the young Jimmy Cagney here, maybe even more so than he did as the young Rocky Sullivan in "Angels With Dirty Faces".If you're not used to it, the racial connotations to Scruno's character get a workout in the film to the point of embarrassment. In the bouncy car ride to the country, he complains of getting bruised 'black and blue'; at Briarcliff Manor, he's the only one served a huge slice of watermelon and he fairly dives right into it. Scruno takes it all in stride as in all of his appearances, also making the most of the bug eyed stereotype whenever something remotely scary might happen.The surprise of the film for me was Minerva Urecal, she's really got the sinister housekeeper act nailed in this outing. The next time you see Cloris Leachman in "Young Frankenstein", she's doing Minerva's Agatha character from this film, I would bet on it.Once things get going, the film gets some mileage out of the old sliding bookcase trick and the occasional sound of sinister organ music. The murder mystery itself is handled a bit sloppy, especially when the unknown character under the Manor turns out to be from the District Attorney's office. The revelation that Judge Parker's bodyguard was a member of the Maury Gang who wanted him rubbed out seemed a bit curious after the fact. Didn't anyone have an idea what Maury's guys might have looked like? Best line of the film this time around goes to Leo Gorcey - "Say, what's the Thin Man got that I ain't got?"
