DOLL FACE

Perry Como and Vivian Blaine

DOLL FACE (1945). Director: Lewis Seiler.

"Doll Face" Carroll (Vivian Blaine) is a top burlesque performer who tries to go legit, but when one producer, Flo Hartman (Reed Hadley), finds out who she really is he refuses to hire her. Doll Face's manager and boyfriend, Mike (Dennis O'Keefe), comes up with the dubious notion of showing that she has "class" by hiring a ghostwriter, Fred (Stephen Dunne), to pen her memoirs -- as a burlesque queen! As Fred falls for Doll Face, and singer Nicky Ricci (Perry Como) tries to get dancer "Frankie" (Martha Stewart) to warm up to him, Mike decides to turn Doll Face's memoir into a Broadway show. Can Doll Face finally go legit? And will she wind up with Mike or Frank?

Stephen Dunne and Carmen Miranda

This was adapted from a play by Gypsy Rose Lee but Doll Face should certainly not be confused with Gypsy! The script for this is no world-beater, although most of the performers are game. Vivian Blaine had her most famous role in Guys and Dolls, but in this I found her lacking in distinction. O'Keefe is as buoyant as ever, and poor Carmen Miranda is given no romance and only one catchy number, "Chico from Puerto Rico." The songs by McHugh and Adamson [Four Jills in a Jeep] are pleasant, however, with "Here Comes Heaven Again" arguably being the best. Reed Hadley is fine as the producer, who ultimately opts to work with Doll Face, and Perry Como is mildly appealing as Nicky. Handsome Stephen Dunne is billed in this as "Michael" Dunne, the name he used in his earliest appearances. He later starred as "Steve" Dunne on The Brothers Brannagan for TV.

Verdict: Acceptable but rather minor musical. **1/2. 

I TAKE THIS WOMAN

Hedy Lamarr

I TAKE THIS WOMAN (1940). Director: W. S. Van Dyke.

"Time wounds all heels." -- Marcesca.

Georgi Gregore (Hedy Lamarr) tries to throw herself off of an ocean liner due to an unhappy love affair, but she is saved by the compassionate Dr. Karl Decker (Spencer Tracy). Georgi is still dealing with her feelings for the married Phil Mayberry (Kent Taylor), when she gets involved with Karl -- who works at a clinic for low-income patients -- and marries him. But trouble begins when Karl joins a practice that caters to the wealthy, and Georgi runs into her ex-lover, Phil, once more. Can this marriage be saved?

Spencer Tracy and Hedy Lamarr

When I Take This Woman was first released, it came in for a mostly critical drubbing, and over the years has been considered a very bad picture starring a completely mis-matched Tracy and Lamarr. In actual truth, while the film is certainly not excellent, and at one point begins to rip off The Citadel, it is entertaining and very well-acted, with Tracy and Lamarr  playing very well together and making a very convincing romantic couple. In addition we've got some good work from Verree Teasdale as Georgi's effervescent friend, Marcesca, Kent Taylor as Phil, and Mona Barrie [Something to Sing About] as his bitter, heart-broken wife. Laraine Day, Louis Calhern, Frances Drake, and Paul Cavanagh also have notable supporting parts, along with Marjorie Main, Willie Best, Reed Hadley [Racket Squad], Don Castle [Roses are Red], and others.

I Take This Woman, alas, makes the mistake of trying to ape Frank Capra, throwing in a final scene that is sentimental in the wrong way and unconvincing. But the picture is still easy to take, Lamarr looks stunning, and the performances by both stars are quite memorable.

Verdict: Tracy and Lamarr make a better team than you might imagine. **3/4. 

RACKET SQUAD

Reed Hadley

RACKET SQUAD (1951 - 1953).

"There are people who can slap you on the back with one hand and pick your pocket with the other. And it could happen to you." -- John Braddock.  

Racket Squad was a very popular half hour TV show from the fifties that exposed bunco operations and lasted three seasons and 98 episodes. Reed Hadley [Sunset Murder Case] played Captain John Braddock, who introduced and narrated the episodes, and often took part in the story lines as well, such as one episode when he's nearly blown up in a mine explosion. Racket Squad was a snappy series that educated the public about schemes that are still going on today (imagine what a modern version of the show could make of Internet rackets). The best episodes focused not just on clever and occasionally diabolical schemes but the characters that got embroiled in them, including the criminals and the often gullible and sometimes greedy victims.

Hillary Brooke in Lady Luck

Among the most memorable episodes: "A Place for Grandma," with Mabel Paige as an elderly woman taken advantage of by the nasty woman who runs a boarding house; "The Case of Two Little Country Girls," which details an amazing scheme to rip off a hotel of thousands of dollars;  "The Christmas Caper," in which a kind man (Lloyd Corrigan) is exploited by people running a crooked charity for children; "The Family Tree," with Hugh Beaumont as a phony genealogist trying to scam Frances Bavier; "Miracle Mud," in which a phony health farm scheme is engineered by an unlikely suspect; "Sting of Fate," in which a couple scams a hotel with a fake ankle injury; "The Longshot," featuring a stupid old gambling woman with a fake Irish Sweepstakes ticket; "The Case of the Expensive Tumble," in which a high school boy is victimized by a gang who stage phony accidents and the resulting insurance fraud; "Lady Luck," with Hillary Brooke [Heatwave] as a woman who just can't stop cheating at cards; and "Pick a Number," with Byron Foulger playing a clearinghouse accountant who is innocently pulled into a dangerous scheme plotted by Edgar Barrier.

Garner and Gleason in His Brother's Keeper

Of the episodes I've seen, the most outstanding are "The Soft Touch," in which con artists, thinking the others are pigeons, try to out-con each other at a hotel, proving -- as Hadley puts it -- that anyone can be taken; and the moving "His Brother's Keeper" in which James Gleason [Spring Reunion] expertly plays an old bum who bonds with a boy (Don Garner) when both are forced into a phony begging racket in this grim tale of the exploitation of the homeless.  

Reed Hadley -- tough but compassionate, firm but fair -- makes the perfect lead for the show. After Racket Squad ended its run the unconventionally handsome actor sort of switched sides and became The Public Defender. 

Verdict: Nifty old crime show is worth a watch. ***.

SEA RAIDERS

SEA RAIDERS (12 chapter Universal serial/1941). Directors: Ford Beebe; John Rawlins.

The Dead End Kids and the Little Tough Guys join forces in this serial to take on a group called the Sea Raiders, who destroy Allied ships. Billy Adams (Billy Halop) and his buddies, including Toby (Huntz Hall) and Bilge (Gabriel Dell), are shanghaied by crooks, encounter the Raiders, and are eventually taken to their island headquarters. Billy has an older brother, square-jawed Tom (John McGuire), who's invented a new kind of torpedo, the plans for which are coveted by Tonjes (Reed Hadley), the leader of the Raiders. There are two women running around, the pretty Leah (Marcia Ralston, who resembles Merle Oberon), and the homely Aggie (Mary Field). One decent cliffhanger has one of the boys caught on a rope that is attached to a whale that's about to dive deep into the ocean, although another sequence features an octopus that doesn't appear to be in the same movie. [The same stock footage of a fight between a shark and an octopus later turned up in The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms.] The serial is hampered by the unfunny and irritating antics of the "kids," and the classical music on the soundtrack, such as The Barber of Seville, is always inappropriate. John McGuire had the lead in Stranger on the Third Floor.

Verdict: One of your lesser cliffhanger serials. **.

SUNSET MURDER CASE

SUNSET MURDER CASE (aka Sunset Strip Case/1938). Director: Louis J. Gasnier.

Dancer Kathy O'Connor (Sally Rand) is determined to get the man who ordered her cop father's death, and comes up with a rather implausible plan. She will go to Europe, develop a reputation as the Toast of the Continent under the name "Valerie," and come back to the US to work in a night club owned by bad guy Stephani (Paul Sutton), whereupon she will get the goods on him. Two men are vying for her favors: Detective Helton (Reed Hadley), who had worked with her father; and reporter Lou Fleming (Dennis Moore), who has feelings for Kathy but may have to make do with the slightly pixelated singer, Penny Nichols (Kathryn "Sugar" Kane). Sally Rand made quite a few movies before this, including many silents, but Sunset was her last picture. She became more famous as a burlesque performer with a famous fan dance than as an actress. There's a funny scene when Helton registers his disapproval of dancer Kathy without realizing she's the daughter of his partner. Rand is cute and likable, but Dennis Moore [The Fearmakers] makes the biggest impression as Lou, giving a fine performance of charm and humor. Orchestra leader Henry King plays himself. Handsome Hadley made more of an impression as the lead in the classic serial Zorro's Fighting Legion.

Verdict: Easygoing vehicle for Rand with a potpourri of a script. **.