A senator, his secretary, a German spy ring, an ex-marine and his feisty little mutt, and an amiable codger converge to give us this peppy spy-comedy. This was before the spy spoof (James Bond, Austin Powers) which feature absurd, cartoonish heroes battling impossible threats. The STEP BY STEP genre, though its plausibility is still suspect, is more realistic in its characters and especially its threats, such as German spies. There actually WERE German spies.
Lawrence Tierney and Anne Jeffreys manage to meet and immediately get mixed up in the murder of a "government operative" who has come to give vital information to the senator Jeffreys works for. It doesn't matter that we're never told the nature of the information the spies are after; the movie is too short and the plot too simple for that. It's strictly a FOR FUN picture, with Lawrence Tierney less of a tough guy and more comical than usual. I mean, here's a guy who locks himself out of his woody, then later, accompanied by a bow-tie wearing cop (it was the Forties, just accept it), enters the senator's presence wearing nothing but swimming trunks!
The dog, Bazooka, has some pretty good moments. He's one of those 40's canine actors who are possessed of irritatingly and at the same time charmingly unrealistic smarts - such as instantly recognizing the hammer the spies throw at him as an instrument by which his master can break into the locked car.
John Hamilton plays the Captain, proprietor of the motel where Tierney and Jeffreys hide out. Funny when the loveable codger asks the couple for his radio amplifier tube back so he can listen to Dick Tracy.
STEP BY STEP succeeds as a FUN picture, but I can't help wondering how these quickies were originally presented. Double features? Because if I'd been part of the moviegoing public in 1946, I'd have wanted at least another short one to go along with SBS.
