An hysterical anti-communist screed dolled up in the drag of a police procedural, Walk East On Beacon simply isn't up to the task of alerting us to the dangers of a Fifth Column in our midst. Well filmed but weedily written (and based on a magazine article by the Dark Prince of the F.B.I., J. Edgar Hoover), the film stars Republican senator-in-waiting George Murphy as a G-Man hot on the heels of a Red sleeper cell. Murphy was never much of an actor, and here he's strictly in Jack Webb just-the-facts-ma'am territory. Location photography in Boston gives the film a boost, but overall Walk East On Beacon! can't match either the red hot emotional power of Pickup On South Street or the creepy intensity of My Son John, two other Red Menace films of the period.
Review of Walk East on Beacon!
