Dramas

This is a cute political comedy starring Frank Morgan of Wizard of Oz fame. It was directed by Roy Rowland and produced by Robert Sisk from an original screenplay by Isobel Lennart and William Kozlenko.

Charles Laughton plays Edward C. Wilson Esq, who despite his title, is the town character. His drunken debauchery puts him at odds with Mr. Gray, the resident in charge of the welcome islands. It also puts him at odds with the other Europeans, especially Martha Jordan, the local missionary. Martha and “Mr. Ted” become an unlikely pair as they face a typhoid epidemic that has taken over the islands.

Edmund O’Brien, Joan Fontaine and Ida Lupino star in this drama. Ida Lupino directs. You’d have to be good to be a woman in 1953 and direct a film. Ida was the best. This film has been almost ignored by the viewers and it’s one of the best ones here.

The Society of the Black Dragons sends Bela Lugosi (Dr. Melcher) to transform 6 japanese into indentical likenesses of American industrialists forming a 5th column. This is at the behest of the Nazis.

Martin Sheen plays a priest who must enforce the church doctrine that the Mass should be said in native languages. The monks of a remote monastery disagree and think that the Mass should remain prayed in Latin.

The Golden Eye is a 1948 American film directed by William Beaudine and starring Roland Winters in his fourth appearance as Charlie Chan. The film is also known as Charlie Chan in Texas (Belgian English title) and Charlie Chan in the Golden Eye (American poster title).

Charles Bronson plays Joe Martin. Joe has a jaded past, but has settled down and become a fisherman married to Liv Ullman. Some of his old army buddies look him up and want him to smuggle heroin in his fishing boat. Joe isn’t too happy about this. This is a suspense film and has a lot of good car chase scenes.

Chester Morris and Thelma Todd star in this 1931 film about a football coach who became a stock broker, but didn’t have the heart for stealing from widows and orphans. To ease his conscience, while still making a ton of money, he becomes a high seas pirate.

Jose Ferrer received the Academy Award for Best Actor for his starring performance as Cyrano de Bergerac. Mala Powers played Roxane, and William Prince portrayed Christian de Neuvillette.

Dick Tracy made four feature films at Radio Pictures. Dick Tracy (this film) was followed by Dick Tracy vs. Cueball in 1946, both with Morgan Conway as Tracy. Ralph Byrd returned for the last two features, both released in 1947: Dick Tracy’s Dilemma and Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome. Gruesome is probably the best known of the four, with the villain portrayed by Boris Karloff.

I liked this movie. Hedy Lamar plays fashion editor Madeleine Damien who’s social life has given her a questionable reputation. Finally she succumbs to the pressures of work and a tarnished image and suffers an emotional breakdown. She seeks professional help from a kindly psychiatrist who recommends a complete change in lifestyle.

Nick Allen comes to the rescue when a gun moll Jo Elliot gets hassled on the street. Spudsy, Red and Jo take it on the lam and Nick ends up going along. They get stranded because of car trouble and end up staying with old, blind Pop Regan. After weeks with Pop Regan, all of them seem to like the rural lifestyle better and start to think about going straight.

Set in Europe during World War I, the plot focuses on the tragic romance between Frederick Henry (Gary Cooper), an American ambulance driver serving in the Italian Army, and English Red Cross nurse Catherine Barkley (Helen Hayes).

A woman enters a book store to find out she has travelled 25 years into the past. Four Star Playhouse was a repertoire theater, often with Charles Boyer, Ida Lupino, Joan Fontaine and David Niven as stars.

Four Star Playhouse is a television anthology series that ran from 1952 to 1956. The original premise was that Charles Boyer, Ida Lupino, David Niven and Dick Powell would take turns starring in episodes. However, several other performers took the lead from time to time, including Ronald Colman and Joan Fontaine.<

Four Star Playhouse is a television anthology series that ran from 1952 to 1956. The original premise was that Charles Boyer, Ida Lupino, David Niven and Dick Powell would take turns starring in episodes. However, several other performers took the lead from time to time, including Ronald Colman and Joan Fontaine

Passengers in a bus crash relive the experience through flash backs.

This is a 1972 made for TV movie about a police woman named Christie You’re Under arrest Sugah Love. This movie is should have Aqua Net and polyester commercials.

Anne Baxter and Ralph Bellamy star in this movie about a restless woman and the gay, upper class society around her.

When orphaned Jimmy Mason is taken in by his Aunt Emma and Uncle Henry, he meets their boarder Matt Kelly, who impresses the young man with his boastful swagger and alleged political connections, although in reality he’s a bootlegger.

It’s another film noir directed by Ida Lupino. Two hunting buddies who pick up a mysterious hitchhiker. It was based on a story by screenwriter Daniel Mainwaring, who was blacklisted for being a communist.

Hard bitten San Francisco industrialist Walter Williams’s two-timing wife and her lover plot to do her husband in, but instead the boyfriend gets killed and mistaken for.

Jigsaw is a 1949 film noir made by Tower Pictures and distributed by United Artists. It was directed by Fletcher Markle and produced by Edward J. Danziger and Harry Lee Danziger from a screenplay by Vincent McConnor and Fletcher Markle from a story by John Roeburt.

Judge Priest depicting life in Kentucky after the Civil War and Reconstruction Period.
It still shows the stereotypes and prejudices which existed at that time in a somewhat humorous manner.

Lady Behave is a light hearted romantic comedy. Millionaire Neil Hamilton gets drunk at a stylish party and wakes up married! He bolts off to his lawyer to have the marriage annulled, but finds out his new bride is already married.

A young woman is about to be married. Her fiancées ex-wife shows up. She’s been missing for 7 years and has come home with a bad attitude. It’s not that she wants her husband, she just wants to make him miserable.

The Last Time I Saw Paris is a 1954 romantic drama made by MGM, loosely based on F. Scott Fitzgerald ‘s short story Babylon Revisited. It was directed by Richard Brooks and produced by Jack Cummings. The screenplay was by Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein and Richard Brooks.

With a happier ending than the Victorian novel of the same name, this Shirley Temple movie is about a little girl when she is left at a boarding house. Her father is thought to have been killed in the Boer War.

A Matter of Life and Death (1946) is a romantic fantasy film set in the Second World War by the British writer-director-producer team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. It was originally released in U.S. under the title Stairway to Heaven, which was derived from the film’s most prominent special effect: a broad escalator linking the Other World and Earth. Reversing the convention of The Wizard of Oz, the supernatural scenes are in black-and-white, while the ones on Earth are in Technicolor.

Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyckstar in this comedy about a political campaign This movie became a box office hit. It was nominated for an Academy Award for best original story (for Richard Connell and Robert Presnell Sr.).

Peter Lorre is two characters. He’s Moto and undercover as antiques shop keeper Kuroki. As Moto he tries to keep tabs on a band of international saboteurs who intend to blow up the French fleet as it enters the Suez Canal.

Penny Serenade (1941) is a film melodrama starring Irene Dunne, Cary Grant, Beulah Bondi, and Edgar Buchanan. It was directed by George Stevens and written by Martha Cheavens and Morrie Ryskind. It depicts the story of a loving couple who must overcome a series of adversity to keep their marriage and have a child raised.

Please Murder Me is a 1956 film starring Raymond Burr and Angela Landsbury. It’s a film noir with Burr playing a lawyer. It’s like a character he would reprise a year later as the famous Perry Mason. Looking at this, it must be a reason that he got the role. I can’t say too much about this film because anything I would say from here would be a spoiler. I really enjoyed it. I hope you do too.

New police officers find challenges as rookies on the force. This movie is also known as I take this oath.

It stars a singer, a US Postal Service Inspector, his brother the Treasury Agent (and romantic interest of the singer). It also has a near airplane crash, a flood, some Guinea Pigs, a little romance, crazy gadgets, a little crime-drama, some speed boats, and a little bit of music… and it has Bela Lugosi.

Joaquin Shannon confesses to a murder he didn’t commit. He gets a year in prison to start for manslaughter. It gets hard to be on good behavior.

Quicksand stars Mickey Rooney and Jeanie Cagney. Jeanie is a bad, bad girl that gets poor Jim in trouble with increasing regularity.

A mild banker and amateur painter is at a dinner honouring him for for twenty-five years of service in the bank for which he works. Enroute home he helps Kitty , an amoral femme fatale apparently being attacked by a man. Soon, he is enamoured of her, since his own domestic life is ruled by his bullying wife Adele (Rosalind Ivan), who idolises her former husband, a policeman drowned while trying to save a woman.

Sexton Blake has been described as the poor mans Sherlock Holmes. He’s an amateur detective pitting his wits against the well known villian player Tod Slaughter.

This is a pre-code film about some frivolous rich people, a young secretary, and the weird goings on in 1930. It stars Basil Rathbone and Constance Bennet.

Davey Fenwick leave for college on a scholarship. He hopes to return on day to help the coal miners with their unsafe working conditions. He falls in love with Jenny and marries her but realizes to late that she still loves her old boyfriend. This is a great movie.

Jim Davis (Jock Ewing from Dallas) plays a fictional railroad detective who roams the west chasing famous bad guys.

Martha Ivers tried to get away from her aunt. She and her friend Sam were caught by the police and returns. When Mrs. Ivers attacks Martha’s pet cat with her cane; Martha intervenes and accidentally kills her aunt. After this, the movie is a great film noir full of blackmail and intrigue..

Sponsored by Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Studio One was seen on CBS , from 1948 through 1958, under several variant titles: Studio One Summer Theatre, Studio One in Hollywood, Summer Theatre, Westinghouse Studio One and Westinghouse Summer Theatre. It was telecast in black-and-white only.

Holmes and Watson meet Inspector Lestrade on a train to Scotland, in which Lady Margaret Carstairs, the owner of a famous diamond, the Star of Rhodesia, and her son Roland are travelling. The owner has asked Holmes to guard the huge diamond, but soon Roland is murdered and the diamond stolen. Holmes must find the diamond and uncover the murderer, both of whom must still be on the train.

Tod Slaughter stars in this murder mystery. An innocent man is accused of murders committed by an underworld figure known as “The Tiger”.

This is Anna May Wong playing Lotus Flower who falls in love with an American. It’s silent. It’s the first movie printed to be used in a regular film projector and the 8th color movie ever made.

Chuck Connors as plays an over-the-top, slightly psychotic big-game hunter. He’s out for revenge on an army officer who he thinks got his brother killed.