2hotFeature one of my absolute favorites!

Janae Milner Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Tyreece Hulme One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

Brenda The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

zardoz-13 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer usually dealt with glossy subjects, but the studio got down and dirty with "Tell It to the Marines" director George W. Hill's gangster saga "The Secret Six," with Wallace Beery, Clark Gable, Jean Harlow, Lewis Stone, and Johnny Mack Brown. Incidentally, scenarist Francis Marion, one of the top-paid female scripters in the business, was none other than Hill's wife. She wrote some snappy, tough-guy dialogue in this exercise in testosterone between mobsters, the media, and the law. This dated but atmospheric tale of crime and corruption takes place in the gangland capital of America: Chicago. This crime doesn't pay melodrama casts beefy Beery as a hog-killer in a Chicago livestock yards.Briefly, we see a blue-collar Beery wielding a sledge as he kills hogs that we cannot seek off-camera. Nicknamed 'Slaughterhouse,' Louis Scorpio (Wallace Beery of "Treasure Island") changes his vocations and becomes bootlegger when mobster Johnny Franks (Ralph Bellamy of "The Professionals") recruits him for his mob on the principal that there is more money in bootlegging that hog-killing. Johnny Franks looks like a carbon copy of Al Capone with the brim of his fedora curled up on one side and a scar on his chin. This marked Bellamy's cinematic debut. Anyway, Scorpio signs on, and he learns that greedy Johnny would sell out his best friends to keep from being killed. Although Johnny is the figure-head of the gang, the real leader is their mouthpiece, Richard Newton - Attorney at Law (Lewis Stone of "The Big House"), who buys and sells juries. The natty Newton knows how to use the law not only to keep Scorpio out of the clink but also make a pile of dough for himself, too. One night, Johnny, Scorpio, and Nick Mizoski - the Gouger (Paul Hurst of "Slave Ship") muscle in on the territory of rival racketeer Joe Colimo (John Miljan of "The Lone Ranger and the Lost City of Gold"), and they shoot it out with Colimo's gang. During the fracas, Colimo's younger brother Ivan (Oscar Rudolph) dies in a hail of gunfire. Earlier, Colimo did his best to keep Ivan out of the rackets, but the lure of 'easy money' was too much for poor Ivan. Colimo follows Johnny back across town and confronts him. All Colimo wants is the identity of his younger brother's killer. Treacherous Johnny Franks, who gunned down the younger Colimo, informs the elder Colimo that Scorpio killed Ivan. Hill staged the gunfight in the dark after somebody doused the lights and machine guns rattled and roared. Earlier, Johnny had told Scorpio to go down to Pier 14 and wait on him. Later, as Scorpio is dutifully waiting for Johnny, a group of gangsters riddles the area with a fusillade of bullets where Scorpio is standing, and Scorpio catches a slug in the arm. Scorpio returns to headquarters where he finds Newton and Johnny. Scorpio guns down Johnny Franks in the back without warning, and Scorpio takes over the gang.Two chummy Chicago reporters, Carl Luckner (Clark Gable of "China Seas") and Joe Rogers (Johnny Mack Brown of "Bad Man from Red Butte") are rivals for a blond on Scorpio's payroll, Anne Courtland (Jean Harlow of "The Public Enemy"), and Joe gets her, but dumps her when he learns that Scorpio leaned on her to please him. We don't get to see much of the police. Mainly, "The Secret Six" concentrates on the rackets and the efforts of newspaper reporter Luckner, who has been taking Scorpio's bribes, but clandestinely funneling the loot to law and order projects. Weirdly enough, the eponymous group, the Secret Six, are unveiled later in the film. These guys all wear black masks and they have pooled their resources to see that Scorpio is prosecuted for his crimes. Indeed, the Secret Six are pretty secret, like future Lone Rangers, and eventually, they manage to land Scorpio in jail. At one point, to make up for his bad judgment in allowing Scorpio to influence his newspaper coverage, Rogers tries to steal Scorpio's gun. This is a mildly tense scene when Rogers sneaks into Scorpio's headquarters and burgles him for his firearm. Rogers is hoping that ballistics tests will show that the bullets that killed Johnny Franks were fired from Scorpio's gun. Unfortunately, Scorpio's henchmen catch up with Rogers and mow him down in the subway. Hill uses darkness again to mask the violence. Ultimately, Carl exercises a bigger role in the downfall of Scorpio, but Newton gets Scorpio off the hook until the Secret Six come up with warrants involving income tax evasion.Make no mistake, "The Secret Six" is a good movie, but it lacks the raw-edged violence that characterized similar gangster classics such as "The Public Enemy" and "Little Caesar" over at Warner Brothers. Warner Brothers always made the best gangster sagas. "The Secret Six" would have been better if Wallace Beery's hoodlum had been a peripheral role rather than the lead. Indeed, Ralph Bellamy's ruthless character Johnny Franks would have made a better mobster chieftain. Gable gives a stellar performance as does Bellamy. Jean Harlow gives a good account of herself as the blond who sings at Scorpio's trial. "The Secret Six" would have been far better had the film dealt in greater detail with the titular group of good guys. The overall slackness in Marion's script is another weakness. Production values, however, are top-notch.

ksimkutch While undeniably entertaining "The Secret Six" does suffer from a rather messy screenplay courtesy of Frances Marion that makes the audience feel as though they are random passersby who picked up a few bits and pieces from some strangers' conversation. The plot which treads on familiar ground as it regards the rise and fall of a gangster (Wallace Beery) whose rise commends as his criminal friend (Ralph Bellamy) brings him in front of a crooked drunken attorney (Lewis Stone) who is also the brains behind a large underworld bootlegging operation. Later on as our main crook nicknamed "Slaughterhouse" begins to climb up the ranks within this gang of low lives by backstabbing pretty much anyone that stands in his way for the top. Two investigative reporters (Clark Gable and Johnny Mack Brown) decide to stop him from getting there with the help of an employee (Jean Harlow) who works at a restaurant operated by the bootleggers as their front. This is all quite easy to follow despite plenty of lousy dialogue (which the phrase "oh yeah?" makes about 30% of) but it's the final execution itself that's confusing. The movie starts off with us following "Slaughterhouse" for better or worse but then when those two male Nancy Drews show up the picture shifts gear and they become our main protagonists afterwards there's hardly any glimpse of him unless one of these guys is hanging about.Despite all of that "The Secret Six" does manage to provide lots of entertainment mainly thanks to it's colorful players - Beery is one mean bum, Bellamy fits surprisingly well is this dreary setting, Gable while he doesn't really have all that much to do except spit out his iffy good guy dialogue still manages to give a good show the same goes for Brown, Harlow's character seems like the biggest casualty here since there are little glimpses into her personalty but not much else.Marjorie Rambeau, Paul Hurst, John Miljan, DeWitt Jennings, and Murray Kinnell deliver highly stellar performances in their supporting roles but there's no doubt that my absolute favorite of the bunch was Lewis Stone he was simply tops. Of course one can't forget the masterful direction by George Hill. All in all very enjoyable could have been a classic if it wasn't for it's so-below-so writing.

classicsoncall Maybe I'm looking at this the wrong way but I don't think the Secret Six had very much to do with the story. Quite late in the picture the masked tribunal is introduced as the greatest force for law and order in the country, formed to go up against the power of gangsters run amok. Once they come on the scene though they're gone just as quickly. Oh well, the title sounded cool anyway.For all it's inconsistencies and outright gaffes though, this was a pretty entertaining picture. An opening scene shows 'Slaughterhouse' Scorpio (Wallace Beery) plying his trade by using a sledgehammer, presumably to whack a side of beef to death. Shortly after, he's shown leaving the plant with one of his buddies, and they're both dressed in suits and ties! Think about that one for a minute.I'm not saying it's impossible, but the way Scorpio made his way up the ranks of the mob world seemed pretty peculiar to me, especially since his IQ seemed to place him at the lower end of the scale. I cracked up when he took out gang member Johnny Franks (Ralph Bellamy) with a burst of machine gun fire and when the camera panned back to him he was holding a revolver! Better yet, when reporter Hank Rogers (Johnny Mack Brown) filed his story with The Tribune, he stated that Franks had three bullets in his back. How did he know? Say, did you catch the signage at Franks Steak House after Scorpio took over - 'Eighteenth Amendment Strictly Observed"! Just like a bootlegger to flaunt his support of Prohibition. I wouldn't have minded trying his twenty five cent chili though, I bet it was pretty good.Well forget about the screwball stuff for a minute, this film has a cast list that would be the envy of most films of the era. Besides those already mentioned you have Lewis Stone, Jean Harlow, and Clark Gable, and they're just some of the supporting players. This might be the earliest picture I've seen Clark Gable in and it was uncanny how much he resembled a young George Clooney - check it out. Or if you're watching a Clooney flick, maybe he looks like a young Clark Gable - it works both ways.As an early gangster flick, this MGM picture doesn't quite measure up to the ones Warner Brothers put out the same year 1931 - "Little Caesar" and "The Public Enemy", but I'd still recommend a viewing to see all the principals at work. You have to see the look on Scorpio's face when he knows he'll get the chair for his misdeeds, it's enough to write Grandma and Aunt Emma home about.

frankfob In the '30s, Warner Bros. specialized in gritty, violent urban crime dramas, and no studio did them better. This tough-as-nails gangster film is, surprisingly enough, from MGM, and compares favorably with the Warners product--in fact, it comes out ahead in several respects. The cast is terrific--with Wallace Beery, Jean Harlow, Ralph Bellamy and Clark Gable, to name a few--and George Hill's direction is as energetic and forceful as any of the directors at Warners. Another bonus is the well-known MGM gloss; it may have been just a B picture, but a "B" at MGM was as good as, and often better than, an "A" at other studios. Although this is one of Gable's earlier performances, his star quality is unmistakable--he explodes onto the screen, his good looks and charm in full force. Ralph Bellamy, whose career was spent mostly playing good-natured second leads, does a top-notch job as a two-timing, scheming gang leader who gets his just desserts after a double-cross. Even Wallace Beery manages to rein in his tendency to ham it up and contributes a solid job as the murderous "Slaughterhouse" Scorpio, who takes over Bellamy's gang. Lewis Stone as a corrupt lawyer who actually runs the gang shows what a good job he could do when given a part he could sink his teeth into, and Jean Harlow proved that she wasn't just another pretty face (and great body); she really shines in the last part of the film, especially during the courtroom scenes. This is a first-rate picture, with sharp writing, tough, no-nonsense direction and superior performances from all concerned. Don't miss it.