Cop movies, some good, some bad

TCM's lineup this morning this morning and afternoon has a whole bunch of police movies, a common staple of filmdom since time immemorial. Quite a few of these are movies I haven't seen before, to be honest. The afternoon half of the lineup begins at 12:30 PM with the 1950s version of The Racket. That and the original silent version are both quite good in their own right.

That's followed at 2:15 PM by Bullets or Ballets, a mid-30s gangster movie I'm pretty certain I've seen before, but it would have been several years. It's gotten a DVD release, on multiple box sets. What I find interesting is that the Warner Bros. Gangster set lists for $59.95, but is on sale for rather different prices at Amazon and the TCM Shop. There's also a four-film TCM Edward G. Robinson set which is apparently not available at Amazon. The standalone DVD is out of print, but you can also stream it at Amazon.

3:45 PM sees Borderline, a Fred MacMurray film that's interesting and enjoyable even if there are better movies in the genre. Still, it's a good way to spend an hour and a half.

I can't say the same for Tear Gas Squad, which comes on at 5:15 PM. Dennis Morgan plays a singing cop. Ugh ugh ugh. And Stephen Bochco thought Cop Rock would be a good idea.

The last movie of the afternoon is Beast of the City at 6:30 PM. This is another of those movies that I think I've seen, but those early 1930s cop/gangster movies tend to blend together to the point that I'm not certain.