PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Inspector Hornleigh On Holiday 1939

Inspector Hornleigh On Holiday is the second of the trilogy of Inspector Hornleigh films. It came out in 1939 and Gordon Harker and Alastair Sim return as Inspector Hornleigh and Sergeant Bingham. The movie opens with the pair on the last days of their two weeks at the seaside. It's been cold, wet and miserable so a nice murder warms things up a bit. It turns out that the dead man isn't the dead man. So who is he? You can find out on YouTube.

I hadn't read any of the novels by Leo Grex, he also wrote under his real name, Leonard Gribble, and 6 other pseudonyms. I doubt I'm going to go looking for them at this stage. The movie was written by Sidney Gilliat, Frank Launder and JOC Orton. Walter Forde is the director. They all provide an entertaining story and some laughs.

Inspector Hornleigh 1938

Inspector Hornleigh is the first of the Inspector Hornleigh films, it came out in 1938, it was followed by two sequels. The character was created by John P Wynn, writing under the name Hans Wolfgang Priwin. for the BBC radio program Monday Night At Seven. It was one segment in the 50 minute long show and it ran from 1937 to 1940. The movie is written by Gerald Elliott, Richard Llewellyn and Bryan Edgar Wallace with Eugene Ford directing. They've made the radio series over and the movies are much more comedic. Gordon Harker plays Inspector Hornleigh and Alastair Sim plays Sergeant Bingham. It was Alastair that prompted me to pick up a copy of the trilogy but I have gotten to like Gordon quite a bit. They work well together, the actors, not the characters. The Inspector is a sharp cookie and the poor Sergeant is the comic relief machine. He's often out of his depth and easily bamboozled, especially by a pretty face.

The main plot concerns someone stealing the nation's budget for a sneaky peak before it's announced. Someone could make some money out of the knowledge. A man is found murdered in his room at a boarding house. The Inspector is called in, he soon finds a link to the man with the nation's budget. Our heroes interview some suspects and do some detecting. Eventually he solves the case.

There's murder and merriment, just like I like. I thought it was a good story, plenty of suspects and good dialog, I got a few laughs out of it. I bought the DVD that's available from Amazon, it's the same DVD available here as in the UK, it's not marked with any region code and there's nothing on the DVD or the printed case insert to tell you who put out the DVD. It's got a DVDr instead of a pressed DVD. The quality is fair to good, sound is good. The link in the title of the film  has all three films processed into a block. It's too bad as that's the best copy on YouTube. Worth a look for both comedy and mystery fans.

Strange People 1933

Strange People is a 1933 mystery film that was directed by Richard Thorpe. Jack Townley wrote the story and the screenplay. A group of people are all invited to a house one evening. They find that they are all part of the same jury that convicted a man for murder. There's a bit of business that shows the jury that they could easily have convicted an innocent man on circumstantial evidence. The man that brought them there wants them to sign a petition that might give the convicted man a reprieve. Then the man "murdered" in the bit of business turns out to be really dead. Who dunnit? The police arrive and there's plenty of action as they investigate. I found a copy at the Internet Archive, it's the same as the copy on YouTube. I've put it in a link above. I enjoyed it. I might watch it again but who knows.

Those Were The Days 1934

Those Were The Days is a 1934 Will Hay film that is part of The British Film series from Network. I hadn't seen it before and as I'm interested in getting all of Will's films I ordered one. I paid $6.12 less than a month ago and it's now $7.24 from the Amazon Global Store. That's Amazon US selling stuff that's shipped from Amazon UK. Sometimes it's cheaper to go through the AUS site but usually I wind up looking there because AUK isn't shipping that DVD to the US. Without proof, it seems that there are more titles that ship to the US than not, I rarely find one listed as not available for shipping to the US, usually an Amazon partner will sell it and ship it from their location.

Those Were The Days is a farce that started out as a play called The Magistrate. It was written by Arthur Wing Pinero. Four writers: Jack Jordan, Frank Launder, Frank Miller and Fred Thompson, worked on getting it to the screen. I'm a big fan of Frank Launder and seek out his films. I suspect most of the 21 films he wrote before this one are going to be hard to find on DVD. I actually have seen Josser In The Army and didn't care that much for it, mostly because of the main star of the picture Ernest Lotinga, he didn't appeal to me.

Thomas Bently is the director. Most of Thomas's films were silent, he started directing in 1912 and worked until 1941. I haven't seen much of his other work. I know I've seen his 1937 film Murder At The Baskervilles with Arthur Wontner as Sherlock Holmes and I did like his 1934 crime film The Scotland Yard Mystery.

In Those Were The Days Will is a strict magistrate who has a son that's a bit of a tearaway. Will's married to a wife with a secret, she lied about her age and her 15 year old son is really 20. John Mills plays the son. He gets Will to go with him to the music hall where we see some of the acts of the era. Nice that some of these acts got committed to film so people can see what passed for entertainment at the time.

There's plenty of noise as more of the family show up at the music hall. A fight breaks out and the mom and her sister are arrested. They get sentenced to 7 days in the pokey by Will. He didn't recognize them as they were heavily veiled. They won't have to serve any time as the whole story comes out in the end. It's a good reminder not to lie to your spouse, it always seems to catch up to people at the most inopportune time. I enjoyed it and would watch it again.

The Arsenal Stadium Murder 1939

The Arsenal Stadium Murder is a 1939 British film that mixes soccer and murder with some humor. Leonard Reginald Gribble wrote the original story, Thorold Dickinson and Alan Hyman did the adaptation, Patrick Kirwan and Donald Bull wrote the screenplay, and Thorold Dickinson did the directing. Leslie Banks is Inspector Anthony Slade, he's called into investigate the suspicious death of a soccer player at the Arsenal Stadium. Ian McLean plays Sgt Clinton, his assistant. There's an awful lot of football, soccer to the Yanks, before the murder happens, we do get to met some of the players, management and other folks too. Slade is a bit eccentric, he keeps a bunch of hats in the backseat of his car, he wears a different one depending on the situation. He races about, dragging the poor confused Clinton behind him, visiting the various suspects. A story emerges, revealing the various connections between the players and their friends and co-workers. There's another murder and that gives Slade an idea about who is the murderer. It all works out. I had a good mystery with a bit of a laugh.

Will Hay - The Gainsborough Pictures Films

Will Hay worked for Gainsborough Pictures from 1935 to 1939 and they made 9 pictures. Will had made three pictures with Elstree Studios in 1934, Those Were The Days, Radio Parade of 1935 and Dandy Dick. I have seen the middle picture and have ordered the other two. There are 5 more films after the Gainsborough films and I'll get to those when I get copies of them.

Gainsborough started making films in 1924 and continued through 1950. In the 1920s they merged with Gaumont British, in the 1940s they were taken over by The Rank Organization, in 1950 they were shut down. If you're a classic film fan you might have come across some of their titles. Most of these seem to be owned by Studiocanal today.

Gainsborough had some name directors working for them, I know some of them, James Whale, Alfred Hitchcock, Walter Forde, Michael Powell, William Beaudine, Marcel Varnel, Raoul Walsh, Val Guest, Bernard Knowles, Ralph Smart, Terence Fisher, and Carol Reed.

VCI puts out the Will Hay Gainsborough films in 4 DVD sets. The first three volumes have 2 films per disc and the 4th volume has three films on one disc. There's a £12.99 British set that puts each film on it's own DVD but I haven't got that to compare. The VCI copies look fine for old 30s films. I got the VCI discs at Hamilton Books for $17.80 plus about a buck forty shipping (part of a larger order).

Boys Will Be Boys 1935 ◊ Directed by William Beaudine, written by Robert Edmunds, Will Hay and JB Morton.

Will Hay had become somewhat famous for his schoolmaster character in the 1920s, he even did a Royal Command Performance in 1925 before King George V and Queen Mary. He's a bumbling character who gets things wrong.

In BWBB Will plays a teacher at a prison who applies for the job of headmaster at a public school called Narkover. That's where JB Morton comes in, Beachcomber is his novel and his Narkover characters are what the characters in the film are based on. I'd never heard of that book and like so many books that get made into movies, I'll never read it at this stage.

The school is like St Trinian's for boys, bad boys, they gamble, piss about and cause trouble. Will kind of fits in, he likes to gamble and he's a bit of a boob. There's a valuable stolen necklace to spice things up. It gets worked into the climactic rugby match where the baddies are caught.

I found it fun. There's plenty of roughhousing, funny faces and comic bits, sprinkled with plenty of jokes.

Where There's A Will 1936 ◊ Directed by William Beaudine, story by Leslie Arliss and Sidney Gilliat, screenplay by Will Hay, Robert Edmunds and William Beaudine.

Will is a solicitor, he's got a failing practice, some baddie tricks him into the use of his office to rob the bank. The office is right over the bank. The police come and Will is right in the middle of their investigation, getting in the way.

It made me laugh and I'd seen it before. Most of these films are pretty much the same sort of thing. Plenty of jokes and a fair bit of physical comedy. Mistaken identity or assumptions are made. Things are broken. It's usually pretty laid back stuff with occasional bits of really great timing.

Windbag The Sailor 1936 ◊ Robert Stevenson wrote the original story with Leslie Arliss. Robert would go on to be the only director that got an Best Director Oscar nomination for directing a Disney movie. That movie was Mary Poppins, it was also selected to go into the Library of Congress collection. Robert started directing in 1932 and I've seen a few of his earlier movies. After a stint in TV he started directing Disney films in 1957 with Johnny Tremaine. He followed with Old Yeller, Darby O'Gill And The Little People and 17 of the best of the Disney live action films.  Leslie is also a writer - director and his list of work is fairly good. The screenplay was written by Marriott Edgar, Stafford Dickens and Will Hay. The director is William Beaudine.

Will brags about his sailing experience in the pub but once he's put in charge of a ship it's chaos. He's joined by Moore Marriott and Graham Moffatt for the first time. They would make a half a dozen pictures together. Will was picked by the shipping company because of his lack of experience. They've sent him out in a poorly maintained ship, hoping it will sink so they can collect the insurance. There's plenty of noise, running about and nautical humor. There are even some south sea islanders to get in trouble with. Luckily, the battery powered radio helps out. Of course the ship doesn't sink, Will's incompetence brings it home, and the crooks are unmasked. There's usually a happy ending for Will and pals.

Good Morning, Boys 1937 ◊ Marcel Varnel is the director of this one, it was his first for Will, he would go onto direct 8 more movies for Will and several for George Formby. Anthony Kimmins wrote the original story. Val Guest, Leslie Arliss and Marriott Edgar wrote the screenplay.

Will's head of a school for bad boys. He's pretty lax and the boys are pretty wild. There's a plot with some crooks planning to steal the Mona Lisa, one crook is the father of a son at the school. he plans to use his son's field trip to France as a cover. There's another sub-plot about getting Will fired for being incompetant.

Graham Moffatt is one of the students, Charles Hawtrey is another, Clive Dunn has a small part, and Marcel Varnel plays a guard at the Louvre. Alfie director Lewis Gilbert, 17 when the picture came out, plays one of the students. His career started with a part in Dick Turpin in 1934 and his last credit was directing the 2002 movie Before You Go. He passed away last year at the age of 97.

It's a chaotic film with plenty of stuff happening. I got some laughs and I was glad to upgrade these Will Hay films, the downloads off of the internet were just too fuzzy.

Oh, Mr Porter 1937 ◊ Frank Launder wrote the original story for the movie. He's one of the two guys responsible for the original St Trinian's films, along with Sidney Gilliat. The screenplay was written by JOC Orton, Val Guest and Marriott Edgar. Marcel Varnel is the director. Here's a picture of the main cast and the director. 

Left to right in the picture, we've got Graham Moffatt, Moore Marriott, Will Hay and Marcel Varnel. Some of the main cast are in other comedies I've seen, Dennis Wyndham, Dave O'Toole, Sebastian Smith, Agnes Lauchlan and Percy Walsh, but I'm not that familiar with them. I wouldn't recognize them without help.

The three guys above I've seen plenty. Sadly, Will wasn't too keen on the other two and he made it known. I've read that he thought they got more attention than him, especially the old man. He still had two more pictures to make with them.

In Oh, Mr Porter Will plays a bumbling railway employee who gets a promotion because of a rich relative, she puts the fix in with the head of the railroad and Will is sent to the tiny Northern Irish town of Buggleskelly, it's on the border with the Irish Free State. The station is remote and said to be haunted. Will finds Graham and Moore working at the station. Well, I say working, they're a couple of layabouts who steal anything they can get their hands on. Will tries to smarten them up a bit. He wants to make the line more profitable and make an impression with the head of the company. His plans go awry. Things get worse when Will and the boys run into some gun smugglers, they're running guns to the Irish Free State. The hapless trio do well to get out of that mess.

It's widely said that this is Will's best picture. It was included in the British Film Institute's 360 Classic Feature Films list. I've seen it 4 or 5 times now and it's one of my favs of Will's films. There's plenty of jokes, slapstick, hitting and stunts. I know I'll watch it again someday.

Convict 99 1938 ◊ Cyril Campion wrote the story, Ralph Smart and Jack Davis Jr wrote the adaptation, Val Guest and Marriott Edgar wrote the scenario, Marcel Varnel directed. Fans of Danger Man and Secret Agent might recognize Ralph's name. He was a writer, director and producer on several other great British TV shows, The Adventures Of Sir Lancelot, The Adventures Of Robin Hood, The Buccaneers, William Tell, The Invisible Man and The Champions. He directed a few films but I haven't ever come across them.

Will plays an incompetent headmaster at St Michael's School. He's sacked and applies for another job. Will gets into the wrong office when called in for an interview, no one notices and he's given the job of governor at Blakedown Prison. He has a few drinks on the way to what he thinks is a school and winds up behind bars. It's thought he's an escaped prisoner, convict 99, and he's tossed into the prison population. Eventually someone figures out he's the new governor and Will sets about to make the place nicer for the inmates. A prisoner steals a blank check and makes off with the prison's bank account. Will gets up a team of criminals and gives chase. They catch the escapee and return the money to the bank.

I've seen this 3 times and each time I like it more. I still think that the great number of coincidences are really dumb but the individual scenes are often quite funny. Moore Marriott and Graham Moffatt still working Will's nerve and my funny bone. Googie Withers, Dennis Wyndham and Roddy McDowall are in the cast.

Hey! Hey! USA 1938 ◊ Marcel Varnel directed the script that was written by a huge gang, Marriott Edgar, Val Guest, JOC Orton, Ralph Spence, Jack Swain, and Howard Irving Young.

In Hey! Hey! USA Will plays a porter who's drugged by a crook and left in the crook's stateroom. Will wakes up at sea. He gets to the USA and winds up tutoring a millionaire's son. There's plot to kidnap the son and a second gang that wants to steal the ransom from the kidnappers.

Edgar Kennedy plays a gangster and Roddy McDowell has a small part playing a boy. I didn't find it as funny as the last couple of movies but I still had a laugh or two. I usually like Edgar Kennedy and this was no different.

Old Bones Of The River 1938 ◊ Marcel Varnel is directing and Marriott Edgar, Val Guest, and JOC Orton wrote the script.

Will is a teaching missionary in Africa. Moore Marriott and Graham Moffatt play a couple of boatmen on the river. There's trouble with the natives, a native returning from getting an education brings booze and guns with him. He's wanting revolution and independence and his brother, the Chief, is a fan of the British and just wants a peaceful time. Will winds up in the middle of it all. It's got a few laughs but the script is kind of dull and listless. There's also some racist stuff that's often typical of the times sadly. Leaves a bit of a bad taste in my mouth but I won't throw out the DVD. It's important to know what went before and work to better that.

Ask A Policeman 1938 ◊ Marcel Varnel directs, Sidney Gilliat wrote the story, Marriott Edgar and Val Guest wrote the screenplay, with an uncredited JOC Orton adding something in there.

It's the last time Will will appear with Moore Marriott and Graham Moffatt. They are the men who man the village of Turnbotham Round police station. They've had ten years with no arrests and the police are questioning the need for the station. Trouble is Will and the gang are really incompetent. They plan to stage a crime but uncover a real crime. Now they must deal with that and a phantom headless horseman.

It was more fun than the last couple of pictures and I had some laughs. Maybe it's Sidney's good story? It's too bad that the trio wouldn't work together anymore. Now I'm done that lot of films. I'll file the discs away until the next time.

The Black Sheep Of Whitehall 1942

The third Will Hay movie in the three film set is The Black Sheep Of Whitehall. It's a 1942 film that was co-directed by Will Hay and Basil Dearden. Angus MacPhail and John Dighton are responsible for the story and screenplay. John would go on to write Kind Hearts And Coronets, The Happiest Days Of Our Lives, The Man In The Ice Cream Suit, Who Goes There!, and Roman Holiday to name a few I've seen. Angus wrote the screenplay to The Ghost Train starring Arthur Askey and the Hitchcock film Spellbound. I've seen very little of his other work.

Besides Will I only knew a couple in the cast: John Mills and Thora Hird. That's Will and John above. Will is a Professor at an unsuccessful correspondence school, John is his only student. Will is broke and John thinks he can get him a job at Whitehall. There Will gets mistaken for an economist and gets interviewed by the BBC. The real economist shows up, the viewers know he's a fake, put there by the Nazis, and somehow Will stumbles on the fifth columnists plot. Now he's got to get some proof and catch those baddies. I laughed several times and was happy to have picked it up. I'll be watching it again someday.

The Ghost Of St Michael's 1941

The Ghost of St Michael's is a 1941 Hill Hay comedy that's directed by Marcel Varnel. He's a Frenchman who started directing comedies on the Paris stage. He moved to New York in 1925 to direct on Broadway for the Shubert family. He made his way to Hollywood where he directed Chandu The Magician in 1932. He moved to England in 1934 where he would direct a lot of comedies for big stars like Will Hay, Arthur Askey and George Formby. He died in 1947.

Angus McPhail and John Dighton wrote the story and screenplay. They worked together and separately on many movies, some of which I've seen. Here they've got a murder mystery comedy with Will Hay as a teacher who gets sent to a school recently relocated to the Isle of Sky in Scotland. It's war time and the many young people were moved into the remote country to keep them from getting blown up in the cities. I liked the little miniature harbor and boat. No location shooting here, probably couldn't have gotten the gas to get them there.

The ghost of St Michael's returns after Will gets there and the Head Master is killed. That's Will with Charles Hawtrey and Claude Hubert above. Other than those three the rest of the cast were unfamiliar except for John Laurie. Some might know him from Dad's Army but he did a lot of films before that popular TV series. After the second Head Master is killed Will works out what is going on and eventually gets the baddies caught. There's some fun scenes and some OK jokes. Rapidly becoming one of my favorite Hay movies.

Josser In The Army 1932

I sure didn't care that much for Josser In The Army. It's a 1932 British war comedy, the story is by Herbert Sargent and Con West, Frank Launder wrote the screenplay and it was directed by Norman Lee. The DVD cover above has a mistake on it, listing the director as Marcel Varnel, the DVD I have does not have that wrong credit on the cover.

Mostly I didn't care that much for the Jimmy Josser character, he's played by Ernest Lotina. I didn't find him funny, more annoying, he put me off the whole movie. The slapstick is especially sloppy and contrived. Not going to be one I dip into again. This DVD came as part of a four pack of military movies from The British Film collection, it;s much cheaper than buying the individual films. They have several 4 packs of films, I've been rooting them out and ordering them. I should start a data base, they are over 300 films in the series, I can only keep a few in my head at a time.

Radio Parade Of 1935 1934

Radio Parade Of 1935 is a 1934 British movie and one that's not part of The British Film collection. It was released in the US as Radio Follies. Paul Perez, John Watt, Reginald Purdell, Jack Davis Jr and James Bunting wrote it and Arthur B Woods directed.

John Watt has four writing credits on the IMDb, the first is a 1933 TV movie. That's pretty darn early, huh. After RPO1935 John wrote Band Waggon starring Arthur Askey. His last film was Crook's Tour, he co-wrote with Max Kester. I'd seen the last two films and thought they were entertaining.

Paul Perez had a long film writing career, his first film was in 1927, he wrote the titles to a silent film called The Demi-Bride, his last film was the 1992 film The Last Of The Mohicans. Paul had been dead 8 years at that point and in reality his career ended in 1939. He worked on over 80 pictures in that short 12 years. TLOTM was based on his 1936 film of the same name. 

The only person in the cast that I knew was Will Hay, I'd seen a few of his pictures already. Many of them turn up on YouTube. I recently purchased 4 US DVD sets of 9 of his movies, they were issued in the UK as separate DVDs and a 9 DVD set. It's about £13 on Amazon UK. Radio Parade of 1935 is part of the 3 disc Will Hay Collection from Studiocanal. That company owns an incredible number of classic British films.

The story is set at a radio station with Will as the man in charge., He takes a chance on a goofy guy, in charge of the complaints department, to change up his station's programing to decrease complaints and increase ratings. There are mixed results but it mostly works out in the end. There are plenty of musical numbers, including two sequences filmed in Dufaycolor. There aren't as many good jokes as I would like but there are amazingly big sets. There's always a balance, though I wish there was more time with Will, he's only in the film a short bit. It's fun enough but it's not going to be my favorite Will Hay movie.