A review of “Black Fury” now playing at the Strand must needs develop into a panegyric of Paul Muni who hits the bell once more in his portrayal of the thick-headed but jovial Hunky coal miner who inadvertently starts a strike. As an experiment in social drama, “Black Fury” is an exciting and gripping film giving Muni another opportunity to display his ability as a magnificent and vital factor.
As Joe Radek, Muni precipitates a split in the union between the radical and conservative factions. The distress of his fellow workers and their families in the months of idleness that follow, the brutal murder of his friend Mike, the loss of his own popularity in Coaltown produces a revolution in the slow-moving mind of Radek which evolves a plan to win a strike.
Barricading himself in the mine, Joe conducts a one-man strike, threatening to blow up the mine at the expense of his own life unless the company allows the miners to return to work on the terms of the Shalerville agreement. All efforts to dislodge him prove vain, and after a protracted siege as exciting as any police melodrama, the strike is won, Radek emerges a hero, his lost popularity restored as well as his girl, adequately played by the frail Karen Morley, and the villain—the policeman responsible for Mike’s death—opportunely arrested and charged with murder.
“Black Fury” is a stirring defense of the conservative viewpoint in the labor-employer relations. But one could, with but few changes, have made an equally stirring defense of the rebel union element, so that in my mind it remains a grand picture but not too serious a contribution to the sociological drama.
B. F.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
