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Having destroyed his career as a newspaper reporter in New York when he got drunk on the job, Andy Bryant (Walter Byron) finds himself on the West Coast and looking for work. It is how he comes to meet Doris Corbin (Lila Lee) the own of "The Dispatch" a newspaper she inherited and now is in such a bad way due to the owner of rival rag "The Herald" that she is on the verge of giving up and selling it to him. But Bryant convinces Corbin to put him in charge and soon he has breathed new life in to the failing paper. But Corbin is not always happy with the stories which Bryant publishes and when she pulls one of his exposes he quits leading him in to trouble with some of the gangsters he had been writing about.
"Exposure" is a curious little movie, a sort of slice of life behind the scenes of a newspaper movie. The first curious thing about it is that Lila Lee gets star billing but in truth Walter Byron is the star with the story revolving around his character most of the time. It isn't a bad thing as whilst Lila Lee was a pleasant actress it is Walter Byron's character that has the closest thing to depth.
That brings me to the next curious thing as whilst this is a movie which is seemingly about life at a newspaper there is a moralistic side to this drama with Andy's drinking continually being brought up with it insinuated at one point that it is Andy sabotaging his own career because he can't handle the success whilst at another point it suggests the stress of the job may be the reason. It also goes as far to say that once a drunk always a drunk although it doesn't use those exact words.
The trouble is that "Exposure" is not exactly the most enthralling of movies and it sort of plods along, building to that drama with the gangsters and between Bryant and Corbin but even then it is remarkably flat.
What this all boils down to is that "Exposure" is right down the middle, not great but not terrible. But for those with an interest in old cinema and the actors of the past this has some merit with it featuring Lila Lee and Walter Byron.
