Nessieldwi Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

Bea Swanson This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Derrick Gibbons An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

utgard14 Private eye Michael Shayne must escort a special witness by train. It turns out to be more trouble than he bargained for. Fun entry in the Michael Shayne series. Lloyd Nolan's great, as usual. Lynn Bari is Shayne's ex, a lady reporter trying to snoop out a story. Clichéd character, sure, but Bari makes it work. Nice support from Edward Brophy, Don Costello, and Mary Beth Hughes. Ben Carter and Mantan Moreland provide comic relief. Lots of snappy patter in this one and a nice pace. I'm a sucker for trains so having most of this movie take place on one was a plus for me. All in all, it's one of the better Michael Shayne movies I've seen. Nothing extraordinary but a good B detective flick.

dougdoepke In terms of suspense and action, this is one of the weaker entries in the Shayne series. Most of the storyline is confined to a train ride carrying a secret witness to a west coast trial, who Shayne is supposed to protect from those who don't want her to appear. Unfortunately, not much use is made of the confined conditions to build suspense. Then too, we know early on the identity of the witness and who's on board to silence her, so there's not much mystery, either.Fortunately, there is a sparkling cast, led by the breezy Nolan, along with a brassy Hughes and a bumptious Bari. In fact, Bari and Hughes are natural personality rivals, setting off some delicious undercurrents. Then there's an unheralded threesome of black porters, who contribute humorously to the overall lightweight mood. Look also for Louis Jean Heydt, a familiar face from that era, who does well with a larger than usual role. All in all, it's an entertaining 70-minutes, but not up to the series' trademark mix of suspense plus humor.

donofthedial I just saw SLEEPERS WEST and it has little or no relation to a 'good film'. It's hilariously all over the map (haha) with completely improbable characters dropping in. The "farm woman" was a great example of that.There are long stretches of the short film where the actors are pretty much on their own simply filling the film out while trying to be charming. The Louis Jean Heydt and Mary Beth Hughes characters just ramble their sad stories and histories to each other for no real reason. Nolan and Bari stay in there and keep throwing punches from beginning to end. At least Bari and Hughes are pretty. The train setting is nice. Some of the other MS films have snappy cars. I think I saw a LaSalle in MS-PD.I ID'd 3 of the black actors, Ben, Mantan and Snowflake. They all were in so many films. And there was George Chandler as the rube with the car. He was head of the SAG once.Bari and Hughes were in ORCHESTRA WIVES together.That was one weird close up of LJH looking at MBH at one point.Really not much one can say. Nice, crisp B&W! :) Anyway, it is pointless to attack and impossible to defend these paper-thin 'mysteries'. They are very disposable and if they had never been filmed, the world would be pretty much the same.

F Gwynplaine MacIntyre 'Sleepers West' has a complicated pedigree. In the early '30s, pulp-magazine novelist Frederick Nebel wrote a detective story called 'Sleepers EAST'. The Fox studio bought the rights and filmed this in 1934, but the film 'Sleepers East' is spoilt by some boring romantic elements that dilute the mystery plot. In 1941, Fox remade the story ... changing the plot to make this film an appropriate entry in their 'Mike Shayne' series. They also retitled it 'Sleepers WEST'. The directional change is appropriate to a private-eye story, as westward is the most noir-ish direction: the progression towards sunset ... and death. (Compare this with Rodgers and Hart's 'All Points West', in which the main character dies at the end ... or Lucille Fletcher's radio script and Twilight Zone episode 'The Hitch-Hiker', in which Death and his victim are both heading west on the highway.)'Sleepers West' is a nice taut little B-picture, a splendid example of those second-feature low-budgeters that Hollywood did so well in the great studio era. Even the film's title pleasingly evokes the 1940s, when sleeping-cars ('sleepers') on American railway trains were commonplace. (On a British railway, 'sleepers' are the wooden ties that hold up the rails.) Movies that take place aboard moving railway trains are always enjoyable: the characters are hurtling along at top speed even if the plot goes off the rails.Lloyd Nolan had a mug that usually cast him as criminals, but here he's perfect as Mike Shayne, the hard-bitten yet incorruptible private eye. Shayne is escorting Helen Carlson from Denver to San Francisco, where she's to testify in court. Helen's testimony will free a man who's been falsely convicted of murder ... but her testimony will also expose a powerful corrupt politician. So, of course the train to Frisco is chock-full of passengers who want to kill Helen. As if Shayne hasn't enough troubles, there's also one of those stereotypical 1940s 'girl reporter' types (well-played by the vivacious Lynn Bari), who keeps getting in Shayne's way at inconvenient moments.There are lots of those great supporting roles that nostalgic movie-goers expect in 1940s films like this: I especially enjoyed the great Edward Brophy and the underrated (but prolific) character actor Harry Hayden. Unfortunately, another typical trait of 1940s Hollywood movies makes an unwelcome appearance here: the gratuitous Negro stereotype. In the days of Pullman sleeping-cars, there was a well-organised union of Pullman porters: all of them African-American men. It makes perfect sense that a black actor is cast as the porter in 'Sleepers West'. Regrettably, the role is played by Ben Carter: a plump, simpering, pop-eyed, high-pitched, effeminate black man whom I always find painful to watch on screen. Ben Carter's character portrayals were consistently much more annoying (and possibly more racist) than those of the notorious Stepin Fetchit ... though never quite so annoying as those of Edgar Connor, possibly the most offensive Negro actor in the (no pun intended) dark days of Hollywood stereotypes. Couldn't the railway porter in this movie have been depicted as an ordinary human being: a black man just trying to make an honest living, like pretty much everyone else?Despite that one cavil, I eagerly rate 'Sleepers West' 9 points out of 10. They don't make 'em like this any more!