PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Ellery Queen's Penthouse Mystery 1941

Ellery Queen's Penthouse Mystery was the 4th of the Ellery Queen movies and the second from Republic Pictures. It came out in 1941 and it's based on the 1939 Ellery Queen play The Three Scratches. It's got a screenplay by Eric Taylor and the director is James P Hogan. Eric wrote around 50 movies in a career that started in 1936 and ended when he died in 1952. He was only 55 but before he croaked it he wrote several entertaining Universal horror films like The Black Cat, The Ghost Of Frankenstein, Phantom Of The Opera and Son Of Dracula. He wrote 6 more Ellery Queen movies, a couple of Dick Tracy movies and some starring The Crime Doctor. James started as a director in 1920 and he directed some of the Bulldog Drummond pictures and The Mad Ghoul. He died in 1943 at the age of 53.

Ralph Bellamy and Margaret Lindsay are back as Ellery and his secretary Nikki Porter. Anna May Wong is a woman with some jewels, she's to sell them and use the money for Chinese famine relief. Of course, crooks are after them. There's all the usual running about and yakking. The story moves along and the crooks get caught. Cast has a few of my old favorites: James Burke, Charles Lane, Russell Hicks and Mantan Moreland. I'd watch it again sometime.

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The First Of The Few is a 1942 British film that was called Spitfire in the US. I couldn't find any good poster images for the British title, I had to settle for the one on the left. The original story is by Henry C James and Katherine Strueby, the screenplay is by Miles Malleson and Anatole de Grunwald, the director is Leslie Howard. It was Leslie's last role as an actor, he died the following year, the plane he was in was shot down by the German Luftwaffe.

Leslie is RJ Mitchell, the man who designed the Spitfire fighter plane. He'd been designing planes since the early 20s and they won a lot of speed records. He was first guy to use one wing instead of the two that were popular at the time. The company he worked at didn't agree and he left them. They hired him back later and then they were bought out by a bigger company who wanted Mitchell as their head designer. The head of that company knew that the future needed men like Mitchell.

David Niven plays RJ's test pilot and Rosamund John plays RJ's wife. The trio visit Germany just after Hitler has taken control, the pro-war rhetoric convinces RJ he must build a war plane that's better than anything. He works too hard, gets sick and dies. It's all melodramatic in the movie, it's like he worked himself to death for the sake of the country.

In real life RJ got cancer in 1934, he slowed down some and totally stopped working in 1936, he died the following year. They don't even mention cancer in the film. Still, good work out of Leslie, David and the rest of the cast. I liked most of the film, a little too much melodrama mixed in with scientist working to solve a problem, but I was still glad to see it. I'd prefer a film like The Dam Busters to this.

Berlin Express is a 1948 American film that was partially shot in the ruins of Frankfort and Berlin in 1948. Curt Siodmak wrote the story, Harold Medford wrote the screenplay and Jacques Tourneur directed.

Robert Ryan is an American agricultural expert, Paul Lukas is a German peace activist Dr Bernhardt, Merle Oberon is a French woman who's Bernhardt's secretary, Charles Korvin is a Frenchman, Robert Coote is a British teacher and Roman Toporow is a Russian officer. They all meet on a train from Frankfort to Berlin. Bernhardt is blown up on the train but we find out it's really an agent who was killed, Bernhardt is in disguise. Bernhardt is only safe for a few minutes, he's kidnapped by the Nazi underground after the train arrives in Berlin.

Merle convinces Robert, Charles, Robert and Roman to help her find Bernhardt. They set out to find the guy. We know he's being held by a fanatical brew-master who wants the Reich to rise again. The investigation takes them around the city, there's an incredible amount of rubble and destruction, yet people continue on. A good few of them are still looking backward to the glorious Nazi past that's slipped out of their fingers. You can't be sure who to trust.

It's a bit pseudo-documentary style with a narrator filling us in on what we are seeing. The cast is great, the script is great, the rubble is great. Happy to add this to the small pile of Jacques Tourneur films I would want to watch again.

Michael Shayne - The Complete PRC Mystery Collection

Classic Flix from Lincoln California packed the 5 Michael Shayne films starring Hugh Beaumont in a one disc set called Michael Shayne - The Complete PRC Mystery Collection. They are all short, 60 to 68 minutes, and black and white, so they don't look that bad. I don't think Classic Flix spent a whole lot of restoring the films but they are all watchable.

There had been an earlier series of 7 Michael Shane movies, with Lloyd Nolan, for 20th Century-Fox. Four of them are available in a DVD set. I have that to watch sometime soon. I hope I can find the other three films. I need to look around on the internet I guess. After 20th dropped the series, Producers Releasing Corporation picked it up, they did 5 films with Hugh Beaumont. Brett Halliday wrote the novels, I've read 2 or 3 over the years but he wasn't a novelist I kept up with. The movies are loosely based on the novels or characters.

Murder Is My Business 1946 Screenplay Fred Myton, director Sam Newfield, producer Sigmund Neufeld. Sam and Sigmund were brothers. Sam is considered one of the most prolific directors in Hollywood. He started directing in 1926 and he has 277 credits on the IMDb, his career ended in 1964 when he passed away at age 64. His output is mostly low budget films, shot quickly for little money, but some are entertaining. A number of them turn up in those public domain multi film DVD packs. I've seen a bunch of his Westerns and can't complain, they're B pictures but totally watchable. Same with the Mike Shayne pictures.

Hugh plays Michael, Cheryl Walker plays his secretary and romantic interest Phyllis Hamilton, Lyle Talbot plays a brother, Ralph Dunn plays an annoyed cop and George Meeker plays a gigolo. Virginia Christine has a small part, she would later play Mrs Olson in the Folger's Coffee Ads.

Michael comes to the aid of a pal who's been accused of murdering a rich woman. Her family are pretty suspect and Mike works on them. Ralph Dunn is the annoyed police detective Pete Rafferty, he's sure he's going to pin something on that crooked PI someday.

Hugh's Shayne is a peanut eating laid back sort of guy who plays pretty loosely with the law. He's not ashamed to hold back some evidence or steal something from the scene of the murder. He gets the job done and in record time. It's a pretty casual film that was fun to watch. Onto the next.

Larceny in Her Heart 1946 Screenplay Raymond L Schrock, director Sam Newfield, producer Sigmund Neufeld. Sigmund produced 146 pictures and directed 12 shorts.

Mike gets hired by a man to find his missing daughter, he does, she's in an asylum. Mike goes undercover as a patient to find her. Cheryl Walker returns as Mike's secretary as does Ralph Dunn as Detective Rafferty. Paul Bryar joins Mike's gang as Tim Rourke, a reporter for the local paper. Nothing outstanding but still entertaining. It kept me interested and it's short so they don't waste any time.

Blonde for a Day 1946Screenplay Fred Myton, director Sam Newfield, producer Sigmund Neufeld.

Kathryn Adams plays Michael's secretary. In real life she was Hugh Beaumont's wife. They married in 1942 and she retired from acting. She returned for this one picture. They were married until 1974 when they divorced. Cy Kendall takes over the role of Detective Pet Rafferty, Paul Bryar returns as the news paper guy Tim Rourke.

Michael's moved to San Francisco for some unknown to us reason but he returns when reporter pal Tim is shot. He in the hospital, near death. A gambling syndicate is behind it all and Mike's got his hands full punching those guys. There's a fair bit of rough housing in the series and most of the fights are fair to good. Same with everything in the series really. Still they are watchable pot boilers that have a good sense of humor. That can stretch a budget pretty well, in the right hands. I enjoyed this one too.

Three on a Ticket 1947 Screenplay Fred Myton, director Sam Newfield, producer Sigmund Neufeld. Cheryl Walker is back as Hugh's secretary, same with Ralph Dunn and Paul Bryar.

A PI Hugh used to know drops dead in Hugh's office, Hugh skims 10 Gs and a small piece of cardboard off the dead guy. He beats it, leaving Cheryl to call the cops. A woman asks Hugh to bump off her husband. Crooks looking for that piece of cardboard come a knocking, they knock Hugh out. He's used to it and it doesn't stop him from solving the case. He's nice and he dumps the credit to his long suffering police pal Rafferty. Another one I enjoyed.

Too Many Winners 1947 Screenplay John Sutherland, director William Beaudine, producer John Sutherland. William has even more credits on the IMDb than Sam Newfield. William started directing in 1915 and he directed 147 shorts before moving to feature films in 1922. He made over 30 silent films, over 150 talkies, and over 200 episodes of TV. He's one of my heroes of film.

Hugh plays Michael for the last time, Trudy Marshall plays Hugh's secretary for the first and last time, Ralph Dunn plays Rafferty for the last time.

All Mike's trouble in failing to go on vacation stems from the local horse racing track. Some crook has figured out how to counterfeit the betting tickets and the track is paying out way too much money. They hire Mike to look into it. The crooks aren't happy and send someone over to talk to Mike. There's the usual punching and dead bodies but Mike manages to pull his fat out of the fire and solve the case before Rafferty. He still gives Rafferty the newspaper credit. It was about as much fun as the rest and in the end I was glad to have picked up a copy. I'll watch these over again.

Dead Of Night 1945 Commentary and Documentary

I watched Dead Of Night again, this time with the commentary by Tim Lucas. He has a lot to say and most of it is interesting. He comes well prepared and it sure is nice to hear. There's a nice 75 minute documentary and people interviewed all seem to be fans of the movie, at least to same degree. They all agree on the important of the film in establishing a model for anthology films to come. The people on the commentary are Matthew Sweet, Kim Newman, Danny Leigh, Jonathan Romney, Keith M. Johnson, Reece Shearsmith and John Landis. Glad to have watched them.

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Up first a 1945 British horror movie called Dead Of Night. It's an Ealing Studio anthology film about a man arriving at a country house only to find he's been there in a dream. He tells the other guests about his dream and they discuss dreams, psychology and the supernatural in the framing story. Five of the guests tell their own stories in flashback scenes. There are 4 directors, Basil Dearden, Alberto Cavalcanti, Robert Hamer, Charles Crichton, with Angus MacPhail and John Baines writing the screenplay. Basil Dearden directed the framing story, Mervyn Johns plays the visiting man, others in the cast I knew include Roland Culver, Sally Ann Howes, Miles Malleson and Googie Withers.

The Hearse Driver is directed by Basil Dearden and it's based on a 1906 story called The Bus-Conductor by E F Benson. A race car driver has a dream about a hearse driver calling to him, telling him that there's room for one more on his hearse. Awake, he sees the same hearse driver conducting a bus, he avoids the bus only to see it crash.

The Christmas Party is directed by Albert Cavalcanti and based on a story by Angus MacPhail. Right after this Angus penned the 1945 Hitchcock film Spellbound. He also penned some Will Hay movies. Sally Ann Howes tells the story of a ghostly encounter at a children's Christmas party. This story was cut from the original US release. What dicks distributors are, huh. Lucky for us it has been restored for the Kino Lorber Blu-ray.

The Haunted Mirror is directed by Richard Hamer and based on a story by John Baines. A woman buys a haunted mirror for her husband. He's almost destroyed by it but she saves him.

The Golfer's Story is directed by Charles Crichton and based on the H G Wells story The Story Of The Inexperienced Ghost. It stars Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne, that's them above, playing characters much like their Charters and Caldicott characters from Alfred Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes. Besides the three other films they appeared in as C & C, the actors played similar characters in several other films over the years. It's a bit of a silly tale about two golfers. When one loses a game, he drowns himself in the club's lake, he then comes back to haunt the other golfer. This story was also cut from the original US release but it too has been restored.

The Ventriloquist's Dummy is directed by Alberto Cavalcanti and the story was written by John Baines. Michael Redgrave is a ventriloquist who is as crazy as he seems in the picture above. Stories about ventriloquist dummies hardly ever end well and this one is no different.

I enjoyed the movie and was glad to have picked it up. The film looks pretty good, not great, there are a few flaws that weren't fixed in the 4K restoration, at least it's complete. I'm looking forward to the Tim Lucas commentary and the 75 minute documentary Remembering Dead Of Night.

Our second feature is the 1989 horror film The Dead Pit. Brett Leonard is the director, he wrote the screenplay with Gimel Everett. It's Brett's first film, he would go on to direct The Lawnmower Man, Virtuosity, Man-Thing and a handful more. I've seen all three but don't have copies of any of them.

An evil and murderous doctor is killed by his co-worker who them covers it all up by sealing up the pit filled with dead bodies in the basement. Twenty years later the co-worker is head of the mental hospital. A young woman comes to stay at there just as there's an earthquake. It releases the evil doc and he starts killing again. That poor young woman has no memory and a connection to the evil doc. She joins with another patient and the head doctor to kill the crazy old evil twat.

There's plenty of running about and murdering, nothing really original in the story, and I was glad to get to the end. I wouldn't need to get me a copy.

Headline 1943

Headline is a 1943 thriller from The British Film series. It's based on the novel Reporter by Ken Attiwill, that was adapted by Ralph Gilbert Bettison, the screenplay is by Maise Sherman, and it's directed by John Harlow.

That's David Farrar and William Hartnell, they're rival newspaper reporters. David has a lady friend, a reporter played by Anne Crawford, but he's more wrapped up in his work. John Stuart plays the newspaper editor and Antoinette Cellier plays his wife. She visits a male friend, played by Anthony Hawtrey, and their visit gets interrupted by his old girlfriend. She pulls a gun, he takes it from her and shoots her dead. They run off but are seen by a witness. John puts David on the trail of the unknown woman little knowing it's his wife. William is on the same trail. Who's going to get there first? You can easily guess, I  bet.

It's a nice tight story that moves along briskly. It's only 75 minutes long so they don't waste any time. There's a nice mix of comedy and drama, the acting is good and I liked the characters. Glad to have seen it and another I'd plan to watch again.

Forgotten Noir Volume 8

Mr District Attorney came out in 1947, Robert B Sinclair is the director and it was written by Ian McLellan Hunter, Phillips Lord, Ben Markson and Sidney Marshall. The cast includes Dennis O'Keefe, Adolphe Menjou, Marguerite Chapman, Michael O'Shea, George Coulouris and Ralph Morgan.

Adolphe hires Dennis as an assistant DA. Dennis precedes to get involved with Marguerite who works for a crook. That's Dennis and Marguerite in the picture above. She really gets close to Steve so she can get hold of the evidence on her boss. The boss is her real love. While Dennis is out of country on assignment for a couple of months she marries her boss. Dennis quits and goes to work for the boss. Things get worse and worse before Steve realizes what an ass he turned out to be. Adolphe will give him a hand and things turn out much better for Steve than he deserves. Decent story with a fairly good cast. Nothing too special but still entertaining.

 

Ringside is a 1949 boxing film that falls short of noir for me. It's a boxing drama with some romance tossed in. Frank McDonald is the director, Daniel B Ullman wrote the story and Ron Ormond adapted it. Don "Red" Barry, Tom Brown, Sheila Ryan and Lyle Talbot are in the cast. Don is pianist who becomes a boxer to get money for an operation on the eyes of his young brother who was blinded boxing. It's mostly boxing, not that interesting to me. It wouldn't be one I'd bother with in the future. That'll save me 68 minutes.

Hi-Jacked is a 1950 trucking movie that was directed by Sam Newfield and written by Orville H Hampton, Fred Myton and Raymond L Schrock.

That's Jim Davis in the dark jacket, he's a truck driver who get hi-jacked on night. The trucking company supports him but the insurance guy is thinking Jim's criminal past might not be all in the past. Soon after he's set up by the crooks to haul some stolen goods. He's got to work pretty hard to save his ass. It's a pretty good story and I like Jim here. The only thing I got tired of was Sid Melton, he turns up in a lot of Robert Lippert pictures and often he's just annoying. Over all a fairly enjoyable picture I'd watch again.

Forgotten Noir Volume 5

Two OK movies in Forbidden Noir Volume 5, the first up on the disc is F.B.I. Girl. It's a 1951 crime film that was written by Dwight V Babcock and Richard Landau with William Berke directing. Dwight wrote original stories or screenplays for 2 dozen movies and over 3 dozen TV episodes. You might have seen The Mummy's Curse, House Of Dracula, House Of Horrors, The Brute Man or She-Wolf Of London. Not all great films but entertaining. Richard has a few less movies and even more TV scripts than Dwight. I know I've seen Secret Of The Whistler, Spaceways, The Quatermass Xperiment, The Black Hole and Lost Continent. I know I've seen even more of his TV writing. William directed 86 movies and I've seen a few of them.

A sad story of a governor who murdered a man twenty years ago. Raymond Greenleaf plays the governor and he's managed to keep the secret so far. He fears a crime crackdown might lead to his getting fingerprinted and exposed. His pal, or sorts, Raymond Burr is a sleazy scumbag who is helping the gov get his fingerprints out of the FBI. He had a gal all primed and she fails, unfortunately Burr finds out after his goons have killed the woman. Since the woman worked for the FBI they take notice and put Cesar Romero on the job.

Audrey Trotter plays another woman at the FBI, Cesar uses her to get evidence on Burr. She's rumbled in the act and it's touch and go there. A nice solid story that moves along well. There's a good cast and they do the script right. A bit of film on a TV had a bit of the comedy styling by Tommy Noonan and Peter Marshall. Peter would do himself right and get out of comedy and get into hosting Hollywood Squares. All in all a nice entertaining film.

Tough Assignment is the second feature and it came out in 1949. Don "Red" Berry and Marjorie Steele are a newly married couple, they've just returned home from their honeymoon. They stop off to get some groceries only to find the man at the butcher's has been attacked by hoodlums. They inadvertently snap a pic of the thugs as they leave and the thugs follow them home to get the film. A bit of rough and tumble leaves the couple alive but annoyed.

Don gets the idea that there's something fishy at the butchers and he's thinking protection racket. None of the butcher's in town will talk to him but he finds out that the problem is a gang has been forcing the butcher's to buy their illegally harvested beef products. The rustler's have a ranch and a meat factory. Quite a set up and they aren't none too happy to have the newspapers doing a story on stolen beef. They send some thugs after the couple but they manage to get away in time. The rest of the movie has the reporters going undercover at the ranch. Don maneuvers the crooks right from the get go.

There's a bit of jeopardy and some fun characters. I liked Don and Marjorie, too bad she only made four films. Marc Lawrence, Steve Brody and Sid Melton are among the crooks. Fun to watch. Glad to have it.

Forgotten Noir Volume 2

Loan Shark 1952 Directed by Seymour Friedman with a Eugene Ling screenplay adapted from a story by Martin Rackin.

I'm not much of a George Raft fan, not for any reason, just I guy I never had much interest in. He's alright here as an ex-con who goes undercover for the cops. His brother-in-law is killed by loan sharks and he gets involved for some payback. George seems to old for the part but that's the way things go. Decent story and good cast. Worth seeing.

Arson Inc 1949 Arthur Caesar wrote the story which was adapted for the screenplay by Maurice Tombragel and William Berke directed.

Another undercover plot, this time a fireman goes undercover to investigate an arson ring. Good story and good actors. I liked it more than the other film but I would watch both of them again someday.

Night Boat To Dublin 1946

I picked up a copy of Night Boat To Dublin just because it's got Robert Newton in it and he's not playing a pirate. I haven't seen many of the movies he made when he wasn't playing Long John Silver. He's in the 1939 Hitchcock film Jamaica Inn. Robert's career started in 1924 and ended in 1956 when he passed away at age 50. He's in 41 movies and only 2 were Long John films. He died just after making the TV series The Adventures Of Long John Silver. I used to watch that series when I was a kid and grew to love the rascally Long John.

Night Boat To Dublin came out in 1946 and the screenplay was written by Lawrence Huntington and Robert Hall with Lawrence directing. Lawrence directed over 30 films but I think I've only seen one other. It's hard to find these older British films over here. The DVD of Night Boat To Dublin is from the UK. There's no edition out in the US.

Robert plays Captain David Grant, he's a spy who's on the trail of a traitor. The villain has kidnapped a Swedish atomic scientist. The fellow on the right is Captain Toby Hunter who's being played by Guy Middleton. They've got a lead on the villain called Faber and Captain Grant has a plan to infiltrate Faber's organization. He gets a clerk job in Faber's law office. Faber gets tricked into believing Grant is a AWOL soldier who stole some plans and he takes him on to help in his criminal activity. His first job for Grant is marry a young German woman. That's her below, holding Robert's hand. Don't worry, he'll be A-OK.

It all goes well until Faber's henchman fumbles onto Grant's deception. It's touch and go there for a while. I liked the script, the characters and the general production. I was glad to have picked it up. I'll want to watch it again.