X Marks the Spot

This 1944 black-and-white sound film, produced by the New Jersey Department of Motor Vehicles, is a melodramatic safety reel aimed at curbing reckless driving during WWII. It opens with Commissioner Arthur W. Magee at his desk, flanked by a typing secretary, delivering a somber prologue about wartime road safety—20,000 deaths likened to an empty stadium. The story follows Joe Doakes (Edmon Ryan), a careless New Jersey driver killed in a residential intersection crash involving his 1941 Nash. His ghost rises, guided by a gruff guardian angel (George Matthews, styled like a gangster in a robe) to a heavenly courtroom. Before a white-haired judge (Richard Gordo), the angel unrolls a scroll of Joe’s sins: tailgating, speeding (a hydroplaning slide through a wet intersection), cutting off drivers, and nearly hitting a boy in a school zone. Flashbacks show early road rage, a chaotic traffic jam with open car doors, and a drunk-driving headache. A surreal clock tallies state accidents every 20 minutes, ticking as Joe’s fate hangs. The judge frees his ghost to haunt as a conscience, then breaks the fourth wall, turning to the audience as “jury” to judge driving habits. Preachy yet gripping, with great ambulance shots and eerie night POVs, it’s a quirky wartime plea for responsibility.