One Girls
Confession – 1953
Filmmaker
Hugo Haas unfolds his usual cautionary "old man-young woman" story in
One Girl's Confession. Perennial Haas leading lady Cleo Moore stars as Mary
Adams, whose first step on the road to ruin is a $25,000 robbery. Mary hides
the money, then confesses to the crime, secure in the belief that she can dig
up the loot upon her release from prison. A few years later, Mary is placed on
probation, whereupon she takes a waitressing job at the seaside eatery run by
Dragomie Damitrof (Haas). A chronic gambler, Damitrof is on the verge of losing
his café when Mary offers to loan him money. When Damitrof begins spending cash
like a sailor, Mary is convinced that he's located her hidden loot, whereupon
she hits him on the noggin and leaves him for dead. Deciding that the money is
too much trouble, Mary donates the rest of the loot to an orphanage and
confesses to Damitrof's murder.
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Night Editor
– 1946
Inspired by
the radio program of the same name, Night Editor features Charles D. Brown as
the editor of the New York Star. In flashback, the editor tells the tale of
police lieutenant William Gargan, who forsakes his happy home life for the love
of no-good society dame Janis Carter. Both Gargan and Carter begin cheating on
their respective spouses, and while on a romantic rendezvous the couple
witnesses a murder. They can't report the crime without revealing their own
infidelities, a dilemma which leads to blackmail, double-crossing and a second
murder attempt. A twist ending caps this snappy little 65-minute morality play.
The script of Night Editor was based on the story "Inside Story" by
Scott Littleton, previously dramatized on the Night Editor radio series.
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The Shadow on The Window
Stars: Philip Carey, Betty Garrett, John Drew Barrymore, Jerry Mathers
Stars: Philip Carey, Betty Garrett, John Drew Barrymore, Jerry Mathers
Musical comedy star Betty Garrett
goes dramatic big-time in the hostage drama Shadow on the Window. Betty plays
Linda Atlas, the mother of seven-year-old Petey Atlas (portrayed by Jerry
"The Beaver" Mathers). When Petey witnesses a murder committed by a
trio of juvenile delinquents, he wanders off in a state of shock. The three
punks (John Barrymore Jr., Corey Allen and Gerald Sarricini) kidnap Linda,
who's also witnessed their crime, holding her prisoner to keep the boy from
talking -- if and when he recovers. Meanwhile, the authorities launch a
frenzied manhunt in search of the catatonic boy, led by Petey's dad, police
officer Tony Atlas (Phil Carey).
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Crashout
Stars: William Bendix, Arthur Kennedy,William Talman, Marshall Thompson, Gloria Talbot
Stars: William Bendix, Arthur Kennedy,William Talman, Marshall Thompson, Gloria Talbot
Convict
Van Duff engineers a large-scale prison break; the six survivors hide out in a
forgotten mine working near the prison, then set out on a long, dangerous
journey by foot, car, train and truck to retrieve Duff's bank loot. En route,
as they touch the lives of "regular folks," each has his own
rendezvous with destiny.
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Gang War
Stars: Charles Bronson, Gloria Henry, John Douchette
Stars: Charles Bronson, Gloria Henry, John Douchette
In a seminal version of his Death
Wish characterization, Charles Bronson plays Alan Avery, a mild-manned L.A.
schoolteacher who elects to stay mum after witnessing a gangland slaying.
Forced to testify against the killers by the cops, Avery is turn terrorized by
the Mob, who subsequently bring about the death of Avery's pregnant wife Edie (Gloria
Henry). Meek and mild no longer, the outraged Avery embarks upon a one-man
vendetta against the villains. The climax occurs in the posh mansion of gang
boss Maxie Matthews (John Doucette)—who, as it turns out, isn't really worth
killing. Based on a novel by Ovid Demaris, Gang War was one of a group of
inexpensive second features released by 20th Century-Fox for the drive-in
crowd.
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Hitler's Children
Stars: Tim Holt, Bonita Granville, Kent Smith
Stars: Tim Holt, Bonita Granville, Kent Smith
This
modestly produced film version of Gregor
Ziemmer's book Education for
Death surprised everyone at RKO—and in the film industry—by becoming one
the biggest hits of 1943. The "children" invoked in the title are
borne on behalf of Adolf Hitler; according to the film, it is standard
operating procedure in Nazi Germany for young girls to willingly submit to
being impregnated by Aryan men (with or without the benefit of clergy) in order
to sustain the "Master Race." Those who refuse are ticketed for
sterilization, or worse. One of the holdouts is Bonita
Granville, a German girl raised and educated in America whose taste of
democracy has made her utterly resistant to Nazism. In the film's key scene,
the near-naked Bonita is publicly flogged for her defiance, whereupon Bonita's
lover, "good Nazi" Tim Holt,
suddenly has an awakening of conscience and stops the whipping. This act of
courage results in the executions of both Holt and Granville, but they
willingly go to their deaths rather than accede to Hitler's demands. It is true
enough that many people flocked to see Hitler's
Children because of the sensational, censor-provoking aspects of the film,
but equal numbers of filmgoers and critics also recognized the above-average
artistic contributions of director Edward Dmytryk
and scriptwriter Emmet
Lavery (both of whom received substantial cash bonuses for their work on
this film). Hitler's
Children was the second biggest moneymaker of RKO's 1943-44 season, only
slightly behind the Cary Grant
vehicle Mr.
Lucky.
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13 West Street
Leaning heavily on violence to ostensibly deliver a pacifist message, this standard drama by Philip Leacock looks at the problem of teen gangs from a slightly different angle -- these teens are all wealthy. Everything starts off when aerospace engineer Walt Sherill (Alan Ladd) is accosted and severely beaten by a group of young punks. The victimized man decides to hunt down the thugs on his own, at first just for curiosity and then increasingly for vengeance. His actions spark retaliatory measures, and before the credits roll, the body count is elevated by a few more victims in what amounts to nothing more than a blood feud. In the end, justice of the legal and politically correct sort makes a token appearance. 1962
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Atomic City
The city of the title is Los Alamos, where nuclear physicist Gene Barry lives and works. Terrorists kidnap Barry's son and demand that the physicist turn over the H-bomb formula. It's cat-and-mouse for a while, but when the FBI gets on the case, the criminals haven't got a chance. Outdated almost before its release, The Atomic City is still effective on a purely melodramatic level. There's a particularly tense climax played out along the mountain mesas surrounding Los Alamos. Stars: Gene Barry. 1952
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Do You Know This Voice?
Dan Duryea stars in this unsavory British melodrama as a seedy kidnapper who accidentally kills his child victim. The police pretend to be unaware of the murder in hopes of capturing Duryea when he comes to collect the ransom. He wriggles out of this trap, then finds he must contend with a nosy neighbor (Isa Miranda) who seems to know more about him than she's letting on. Duryea schemes to poison the woman, but the plan boomerangs and his own wife dies instead. Outside of Dan Duryea's bravura performance, Do You Know This Voice? has zero entertainment value. 1964
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My Name is Julia Ross
Cult figure and B-movie auteur Joseph H. Lewis directed this taut exercise in film noir. Julia Ross (Nina Foch), an American receiving medical treatment in London, finds herself short on money and takes a job as secretary for Mrs. Hughes (May Whitty), the matriarch of a large estate. Julie meets Mrs. Hughes' son Ralph (George Macready), a mysterious gentleman with a facial scar, shortly before eating lunch and falling into a deep sleep. When she awakes, she's in a different home with a high fence, and everyone around her insists that she's Ralph's wife, just home after a stay in a mental institution. Julia learns that she's being held captive by the family so that she can be murdered; the death will be made to look like a suicide and serve as a cover for the recent death of Ralph's real wife, whom he killed. A panicked Julia desperately tries to contact her boyfriend, Dennis (Roland Varno), one of the only people in England who might be able to help her. My Name Is Julia Ross was one of Lewis' first "prestige" productions; begun as a ten-day B-picture, studio heads were so impressed with the results that they expanded the scheduleve the picture more polish.
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23 Paces To Baker Street
Van Johnson portrays a blind American writer living in London. Blessed with an acute hearing sense, Johnson overhears a kidnapping plot but neither his friends nor the authorities believe him, chalking up his story as the product of a writer's imagination. Disgruntled, Johnson vows to scuttle the kidnapping himself — with the assistant of his fiancée Vera Miles. Despite his handicap, Johnson puts the pieces together using sounds as evidence and guidance. Ultimately Johnson finds his life in danger when he corners the criminal in a dark alley. 23 Paces to Baker Street was one of several ''50s 20th Century-Fox films shot on location in London to take advantage of Fox's "frozen funds" — money earned by the studio in England which by law could only be spent in that country.
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The Suspect
The Suspect is a well turned out period melodrama, with an excellent leading performance by Charles Laughton. He plays an amiable, hopelessly henpecked shopkeeper who yearns for the affections of pretty stenographer Ella Raines. When he is pushed to brink by wife Rosalind Ivan, Laughton kills her, making the death look like the result of a fall down the stairs. Detective Stanley Ridges, not altogether unsympathetic to Laughton, suspects foul play, but decides to bide his time and allow the suspect to trip himself up. Laughton is on the verge of getting off scot free when he makes the error of trying to stifle his blackmailing neighbor Henry Daniell. Based on the novel This Way Out by James Ronald, this is one of the most thoroughly satisfying American films of mercurial German director Robert Siodmak.
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Tag: The Assassination Game
Students at a college with obviously low graduation requirements spend their time and energy playing a game that involves mock assassinations with rubber-tipped darts fired from plastic guns. If you are shot, you are assassinated and out of the game and whoever remains alone at the end wins. When Gersh (Bruce Abbott), the odds-on favorite is about to do one of his opponents in, the hapless victim drops his dart gun, it misfires, and bonks a dart at Gersh - who is pushed over the edge, pulls out a real gun and kills his unfortunate opponent. Gersh drags the body to his room and stuffs it in his closet. Having killed once, the blood-thirsty student goes on a rampage, killing as many of these players as he can and stuffing them all in his closet. 1982
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Forbidden
Stars: Tony Curtis, Joanne Dru, Lyle Bottger
Stars: Tony Curtis, Joanne Dru, Lyle Bottger
Forbidden
bears traces of several earlier film noirs, with Tony Curtis filling the shoes
vacated by the likes of Alan Ladd, Dick Powell and Robert Mitchum. Curtis
acquits himself very nicely as a small-time hood sent to Macao by gangster Lyle
Bettger to locate Joanne Dru, the widow of another gangster. It will not spoil
the film to reveal here that Curtis and Dru fall in love as he escorts her
back. Nor is there any surprise in the revelation that hero and heroine decide
to dodge Bettger once they learn that they've both been set up for
extermination. Forbidden was directed by Rudolph Mate, a former cinematographer
who could probably find long, looming shadows in the Sahara Desert at high
noon.
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The Doberman Gang
A small-time crook (Byron Mabe) hits upon the clever plan of training Dobermans to substitute for criminals in a bank-robbery scheme. He hires a military dog-trainer (Hal Reed) and pulls off the heist, though problems arise due to the dogs--perhaps trained too well. The 1972 film spawned two sequels.
Rel/1972
Rel/1972
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