A Stranger in Town (1943)

Absolutely an outstanding movie. "A Stranger In Town" has laughs, fun moments, drama, tension and manages to keep it all lighthearted enough to make it an enjoyable movie for one and all. Frank Morgan (Wizard Of Oz 1939) is excellent as a vacationing Supreme Court Justice who stumbles into a corrupt town's government. Richard Carlson (Hold That Ghost 1941) is just as good as a small town lawyer trying to right a system gone wrong. The supporting cast is equally as entertaining (Jean Rogers, Porter Hall, Robert Barrat, etc...) in this great, great movie. While the director Roy Rowland (Dr. Seuss's The 5,000 Fingers Of Dr.T. 1953) is new to me, it is a marvelous job of direction on his part that also helps to make this an A movie for me.

A legal drama from 1943, A STRANGER IN TOWN is a low budget potboiler that offers a starring role for old-timer Frank Morgan, best known for playing the title role in THE WIZARD OF OZ. Here, he plays a genial judge who pays a visit to a youthful and crusading politician who has just become mayor and is busy battling corruption in his town.The twist is that Morgan's real identity is a secret, allowing him to observe proceedings from a place of safety. It's not a bad plot per se, but too much of the running time gets bogged down in a lengthy romance between the young characters, and Morgan doesn't have a great deal to do. It's a pity, as in the right hands this could have been something special.

When Washington DC Supreme Court Judge Frank Morgan takes a much needed vacation, he ends up in a seemingly quaint small city run by a ruthless mayor, corrupt judge and their menagerie of crooked businessmen. Morgan, keeping his identity secret, stirs up a young attorney (Richard Cromwell) to run for mayor and run these offensive control freaks into the town sewer. With the help of Morgan's pretty secretary (Jean Rogers), Carlson soon has the townspeople in an uproar and the powers-that-be quaking in their fat shoes.A delightful surprise, this is just what America needed in 1943 to remind them that clean-up starts at home, that Nazi's, Jap's and the Italians were not their only enemies, and that ultimately, it is the simple folk who will prevail, not Government officials with special interests in mind. This is a far cry from his usual roles for Morgan, not at all the fliberty-gibet he was in most films. He plays the role simply, doesn't strive for lovability, just plain honesty. One of the best films of 1943 (and perhaps the best film you've never heard of), "A Stranger in Town" is a perfect film for students of political science and rousing entertainment for everybody else. It is a message film that still resonates today.

Oddly, this film stars Frank Morgan as a Supreme Court justice! He's on vacation and runs afoul of a small town's corrupt administration. The crooked judge, mayor and their henchmen don't realize who Morgan is, so he's able to see first-hand their under-handed tactics. Because of their abuse of political power, Morgan decides to stick around and assist a naive young lawyer (Richard Carlson) in his bid to become mayor. At first, they are pretty much ignored, though in time, when the race for mayor seems tight, the old mayor unleashed a wave of dirty tricks--not realizing that Morgan holds the ultimate trump card.I had a hard time deciding whether to score this one a 7 or an 8. It was very good--particularly for a B-movie. Being a "B", it is a relatively short picture (only 67 minutes) but unlike many Bs it has excellent production values (especially the writing) and is very entertaining. About the only knock against it is that I thought the fight scenes were a bit too "slapsticky" and didn't exactly integrate well into the rest of the picture. Still, it's a dandy performance by Frank Morgan, as he's more restrained (i.e., less "hammy") than in most of his starring vehicles--well worth seeing and a lot of fun--as well as a decent civics lesson.