James Cruze revived the western genre and presented audiences with the first western epic in the spectacular 1923 film The Covered Wagon, chronicling the largest wagon train to ever cross the valley of the Platte River. The film takes place in 1848, when two wagon trains -- one led by Jesse Wingate (Charles Ogle), the other by Will Banion (J. ...
The Paramount team of Richard Dix and Lois Wilson starred in this top-notch silent western in which a Native American is the protagonist. The early silent era devoted many films to the depiction of American Indians, but that trend had not carried over into the screen's third decade, where Indians almost always played villains or were merely ...
Despite stiff competition like Poor Little Rich Girl and Heidi, Bright Eyes is arguably the best of Shirley Temple's 1930s vehicles. The little curly-top is cast as Shirley Blake, daughter of Mary Blake (Lois Wilson), the widowed housemaid of snooty J. Wellington and Anita Smythe (Theodore Von Eltz and Dorothy Christy). Though continually ...
At first concentrating exclusively on westerns and serials, up-and-coming Mascot Pictures began branching out in the early 1930s with such lavish star vehicles as Laughing at Life. Victor McLaglen is in his element as a devil-may-care globetrotting adventurer named McHale. After risking his neck in WWI, the restless McHale heads to Mexico for more ...
This bottom-barrel quickie is elevated by its cast, comprised chiefly of old silent-film favorites. Ralph Graves stars as private eye Clay Holt, perennial "friendly enemy" of police lieutenant McGinniss (James Burke). Time and time again, McGinniss is forced to rely on Holt's expertise to crack a difficult case, leading to a never-ending stream of ...
Born to Gamble was one of the more palatable efforts of M.H. Hoffman's poverty-row Liberty Films. The four protagonists are brothers who are "cursed" by their family's gambling bug. All four try to overcome the urge to speculate: only one, the youngest, is successful. Onslow Stevens plays both the lucky brother and his 19th-century riverboat ...
Evidently inspired by Paramount's screwball comedy Three Cornered Moon, Chesterfield-Invincible Studio's In the Money is actually more entertaining than its costlier predecessor. The main characters are members of a zany, perpetually improvident family, all of whom take polite little bows as they're introduced to the audience by narrator-co-star ...
This remarkable early-talkie "disaster" flick was the first directorial effort of Felix E. Feist. An enormous tidal wave destroys New York City and most of the Eastern seaboard -- and that's only the beginning of the picture! The rest of the film deals with the aftermath of the deluge. Hero Martin (Sidney Blackmer), certain that his wife Helen ...
In this crime thriller, a suicidal writer is saved by a helpful newspaper editor who gives her a much-needed job. Later she finds herself entangled in a plot to smuggle Chinese laborers into the country. She follows up on the many clues and ends up in the middle of Chinatown where she is eventually able get her story. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie ...
This first film version of George Kelly's stage comedy The Show Off stars former Keystone Kop Ford Sterling in the title role. Though he's only a thirty-dollar-a-week clerk, Aubrey Piper (Sterling) is an incorrigible braggart, brimming full of grandiose get-rich-quick schemes. Quickly ingratiating himself with the family of his fiancee Amy Fisher ...
A genuine oddity, Life Returns was originally filmed by Universal Pictures in 1935. The story, concerning the efforts by researchers Onslow Stevens and Lois Wilson to find a means to briefly bring dead animals back to life for research purposes, was built around the actual accomplishments of Dr. Robert E. Cornish of the University of California ...
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