Manpower

Manpower (1941)

Raft and Robinson are at the brawling point!

Hank McHenry and Johnny Marshall work as power company linesmen. Hank is injured in an accident and subsequently promoted to foreman of the gang. Tensions start to show in the road crew as rivalry between Hank and Johnny increases.

Date of release
1941-08-09
TMDB
6.5 / 10 (19)
Runtime
1h 44m
Genres
Crime, Drama
Director
Raoul Walsh

Casting

Interesting facts

Manpower is a 1941 American crime melodrama directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Edward G. Robinson, Marlene Dietrich, and George Raft. The picture was written by Richard Macaulay and Jerry Wald, and the supporting cast features Alan Hale, Frank McHugh, Eve Arden, Barton MacLane, Ward Bond and Walter Catlett.

Production

Working titles for the film were "Handle with Care", "Hard to Get", and "Hard to Handle". Production took place from late March to mid-May 1941.

Humphrey Bogart had been considered for Robinson's role, but Raft refused to make the film with Bogart as his co-star; Broderick Crawford was also considered for Robinson's part. Victor McLaglen was also considered to play Robinson's role.

Raft chose to make Manpower over the remake of the 1931 pre-Code version of Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon, partly because it was a choice between untried first-time director John Huston and Walsh, the veteran director of Raft's 1933 hit The Bowery, plus Raft reasoned that a Hays Code-era remake may not be able to live up to its pre-Code predecessor, so the career-catapulting role of Sam Spade went to Bogart instead.

The script is one of many reworkings of the plotline for a 1932 Robinson movie called Tiger Shark, in which Robinson played essentially the same part, only as a tuna fisherman rather than an electric power lineman.

Mark Hellinger was intended to produce the film, but had a falling-out with executive producer Hal Wallis. Hellinger is credited as "Associate Producer".

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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