LADY WITH RED HAIR

LADY WITH RED HAIR (1940). Director: Curtis Bernhardt. 

The "true" if fictionalized story of Caroline (Mrs. Leslie) Carter (Miriam Hopkins), who goes on the stage after she is divorced by her husband. The film suggests that Carter became an actress only to get money to fight for custody of her son, but in real life the boy actually stayed with his mother and was cut out of his father's will because of it. In the film Carter unrealistically tries to storm Broadway by coming in at the top instead of climbing from the bottom, but it is true that her association with David Belasco (a magnificent Claude Rains) gave an inestimable boost to her career. The film doesn't make clear that she was considered the American Sarah Bernhardt in her day. Richard Ainley plays her second husband, and as the film suggests, their marriage did signal the end of her association with Belasco (although in the film he comes in at the end to help guide her in one last production). Miriam Hopkins gives a solid performance, but up against Claude Rains there is little she can do to steal the picture. The supporting cast includes such sterling players as Laura Hope Crews, John Litel, Victor Jory, and Cecil Kellaway. A very young Cornel Wilde has a small role, and you probably won't notice Alexis Smith or Craig Stevens.

 Verdict: A lady you might like to make the acquaintance of -- on film, at least. ***.

THE SHADOW (1940)

Victor Jory as the Shadow

THE SHADOW (15 chapter Columbia serial/1940). Director: James W. Horne.

Criminologist Lamont Cranston (Victor Jory), who also masquerades as the underworld scourge the Shadow -- as well as Lin Chang, who owns a shop and is acquainted with many criminals -- is in a war with a mysterious figure known as the Black Tiger. Commissioner Weston (Frank LaRue), does not suspect Cranston of being the Shadow, but he's convinced that the Shadow and the Tiger are one and the same and is constantly trying to capture the former. The Black Tiger, who can make himself invisible, is one of a group of industrialists who are being targeted by the fiendish villain, who doesn't care how many lives are destroyed to achieve his goals.

Victor Jory as Lamont Cranston

Unlike in the terrible Rod La Rocque Shadow features, the pulp character returns to his roots in this excellent and exciting serial. Although the Shadow does not hypnotize people or display mystical powers as he does in the novels, he does dress up in a cloak and has two helpmates: his driver Harry Vincent (Roger Moore, not the British actor) and his secretary and assistant Margo Lane (Veda Ann Borg of Jungle Raiders). Victor Jory [The Lone Wolf Meets a Lady] adds some solidity to the serial with his strong portrayal of Cranston; Moore and Borg are professional and adept. Some of the more notable supporting performances include Jack Ingram [Terry and the Pirates] as the Tiger's chief lieutenant, Flint; Charles K. French as the nervous Joseph Rand; Constantine Romanoff as Henchman Harvey; and the ever-reliable Philip Ahn as Wu Yung, another of Cranston's helpful associates.

Victor Jory as Lin Chang

The Black Tiger (voiced somewhat over-dramatically by Richard Cramer) uses such weapons as a cigarette lighter with a miniature gun inside it, and a much bigger gun that fires rays that bring down airplanes. As for cliffhangers, there is a box-like trap that nearly shakes itself to pieces, almost dooming the Shadow; a descending freight elevator that nearly squashes Margo (and could not have been comfortable for actress Borg); and a laser-like beam that almost burns the hell out of Margo and Vincent. Interestingly, the Shadow does not manage to escape a number of death traps, but is fortunate to survive them anyway. Lee Zahler's musical score adds to the thrills.

Verdict: Another of Columbia's superior serials. ***1/2.

THE LONE WOLF MEETS A LADY

Warren William as Michael Lanyard, the Lone Wolf

THE LONE WOLF MEETS A LADY (1940). Director: Sidney Salkow.

"Jamison! Open the window -- and air the room!"

Joan Bradley (Jean Muir) is all set to marry wealthy Bob Penyon (Warren Hull), when her future mother-in-law (Georgia Caine) lends her an expensive diamond necklace. At her apartment Joan is confronted by an old acquaintance who demands the necklace before being promptly shot by an unseen figure; the necklace disappears. Before long Michael Lanyard, aka the Lone Wolf (Warren William), is involved in the case even as Inspector Crane (Thurston Hall), who loves rare plants, is on the trail of both Lanyard and Joan. The Lone Wolf Meets a Lady is distinguished primarily by the acting, with William, as usual, doing splendidly as the title character. Jean Muir [And One Was Beautiful] is on the money as Joan; Hall makes a terrific inspector; Fred Kelsey is funny as the bumbling cop, Dickens; Victor Jory [Manfish] scores as a sleazy "associate" of Lanyard's; and Eric Blore [Swiss Miss] nearly steals the picture as Jamison, Lanyard's butler and aide. The screenplay isn't terrible, with good dialogue, but The Lone Wolf Meets a Lady is no great shakes as a mystery. Not to be confused with The Lone Wolf and His Lady.

Verdict: Modestly entertaining with some very good performances. **1/2.

PAPILLON

Dustin Hoffman and Steve McQueen

PAPILLON (1973). Director: Franklin J. Schaffner.

Henri Charriere (Steve McQueen), a safecracker known as Papillon (Butterfly) due to a tattoo on his chest, is convicted of murdering a pimp (a crime he insists he did not commit) and sent to a French penal colony. He becomes friends with counterfeiter Louis Dega (Dustin Hoffman) and the two start planning an escape. After several false starts and others joining the team, they manage to get out -- but their trials and tribulations are by no means over. Papillon, if I recall correctly, was a very big hit and a feel-good movie about the indominability of the human spirit. It is also very much a Hollywood movie that often tries to stay on a "light" level despite the grimness of the proceedings. At first McQueen just seems to be walking through his role -- and Hoffman hardly ever seems anything other than Dustin Hoffman in a prison skit -- but with the aid of effective make up he is more impressive in the later scenes. Papillon has to be taken with a grain of salt, as Charriere's memoirs, upon which the film is based, were later determined to be largely fictional; he was never on Devil's Island for instance. McQueen was forty-three when he did this picture, four years older than Charriere was when he made his final escape, although the actor is made up to look like a senior citizen and emotes that way as well; this is not only highly-fictionalized but on occasion plays like a parody. Victor Jory [Cat-Women of the Moon] plays an old Indian chief who wants his own tattoo; Anthony Zerbe is the leader of a colony of lepers; Bill Mumy ["It's A Good Life"] is a young convict who essentially commits suicide; Don Gordon [The Final Conflict], Woodrow Parfrey and Robert Deman are all other convicts who get involved in the big escape one way or another; they are all good. But Papillon, which holds the attention and has a few harrowing moments without ever being really riveting, gets its power not from the performances but from Fred J. Koenekamp's cinematography and Jerry Goldsmith's typically effective musical score.

 Verdict: Not any kind of masterpiece but Papillon's exhaustive efforts to gain his freedom eventually pull you along. ***.

THE CAPTURE

THE CAPTURE (1950). Director: John Sturges.

When a payroll is robbed, Lin Vanner (Lew Ayres) goes after the alleged thief, Sam Tevlin (Edwin Rand), and kills him. But it develops that Sam might not have been the robber after all. A guilt-racked Vanner goes off and encounters the man's widow, Ellen (Teresa Wright), and becomes both surrogate husband and a father to her young son, Mike (Jimmy Hunt). Not only does Lin have to wonder how Ellen will react when she learns the truth, but he still has to capture the real payroll thieves. Injured and bleeding, Lin tells his story to a local priest, Father Gomez (Victor Jory of A Woman's Secret). The Capture is half-baked and sets up an intriguing situation that it doesn't develop with any dramatic intensity. Ayres [Damian: Omen 2] isn't bad in the lead, but the part requires a more passionate actor. Wright [Something to Live For] and little Jimmy Hunt come off best, and we also have weird Milton Parsons for good measure. William Bakewell and Duncan Renaldo are also in the cast.

Verdict: Holds the attention. **1/2.

CHARLIE CHAN IN RIO

Victor Sen Yung, Harold Huber, and Sidney Toler

CHARLIE CHAN IN RIO (1941). Director: Harry Lachman.

Charlie Chan (Sidney Toler) and his irrepressible son, Jimmy (Victor Sen Yung), have come to Rio where Charlie plans to arrest a woman from Honolulu who is wanted for murder; meanwhile Jimmy hopes to learn the mambo either from singer Lola Dean (Jacqueline Dalya) or her cute maid, Lili (Iris Wong). Alas, Lola is the woman wanted for murder, but she herself is killed before Charlie can put the cuffs on her. Suspects include Lola's baffled fiance, Clark (uncredited); Morana, the Indian mystic (Victor Jory of Cat-Women of the Moon); Ken Reynolds (a strangely unrecognizable Richard Derr of The Invisible Avenger); his wife, Joan (Mary Beth Hughes of Rockin' in the Rockies); friend Bill Kellogg (Hamilton MacFadden); the bitter Grace (Cobina Wright Jr.); Lola's efficient secretary, Helen (Kay Linaker); and even the butler, Rice (Leslie Denison). This is an entertaining mystery, but it lacks the tension and suspense of superior entries in the series. The acting is generally good, however, with Toler and Sen Yung in fine form. Harold Huber once again plays a police inspector, but is more relaxed and appealing than usual. Kay Linaker and Iris Wong were also in previous Chan pictures. Truman Bradley, who was in the last entry Dead Men Tell, is listed in the cast but I couldn't spot him in this and can't even remember the character!

Verdict: Acceptable Chan vehicle. **1/2.

JIGSAW

JIGSAW (1968). Director: James Goldstone.

Only three years after the film Mirage came out, a remake was made for television. Like Mirage, Jigsaw was based on Howard Fast's novel "Fallen Angel" as well as Peter Stone's screenplay for Mirage. However, screenwriter Ranald MacDougall [Queen Bee] fashioned a story that contained some elements from the earlier book and movie but was basically an entirely different story. NBC found the telefilm too violent -- or mediocre -- and decided not to run it, so Universal studios released it in theaters. Although the stars were Bradford Dillman and Harry Guardino, they were basically ignored [and they both gave excellent performances, too] in the advertising in favor of freakish Michael J, Pollard, who had only a bit part really [and two short scenes] but had been nominated for an Academy Award for his turn in Bonnie and Clyde. Such is show business! The poster also made it seem as if the movie were some sort of expose of the sixties Timothy Leary-type drug scene a la The Trip, which it definitely was not.

In Jigsaw Jonathan Fields (Dillman) temporarily loses his memory after ingesting sugar cubes laced with acid [LSD]. He remembers seeing the dead body of a woman in the bathtub of somebody's apartment, and this body later turns up in his own place. He goes to private investigator Arthur Belding (Guardino), who has his girlfriend Sarah (Diana Hyland) aid them in their investigation. Fields also has a girlfriend of sorts played by Hope Lange. The private detective is really the lead character in this and there's no death plunge until the very end. Unlike Mirage, Jigsaw gives away its secrets much too early and has a much more conventional murder/cover-up plot despite the psychedelic facade. The acting is fine, however, both by the aforementioned actors as well as by Pat Hingle as an associate of Fields' and Victor Jory [The Shadow serial] as his boss. 

Verdict: Not bad, holds the attention, but nothing special either despite solid performances. **1/2.

CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON

CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON (1953). Director: Arthur Hilton. 

When a group travels to the moon in a spaceship, the only female member of the team, Helen (Marie Windsor), begins receiving psychic input from someone named Alpha (Carol Brewster). It seems that there's a race of women on the moon who want to kill the earth men and take over their spaceship -- or something like that. They even influenced Helen to fall for the ship's commander, Laird (Sonny Tufts) instead of the man she really loves, Kip (Victor Jory), because Laird had a lot more technical information. There's also a giant fake spider that wiggles about and emits high-pitched noises. Some of the cat-women are man-friendly and disagree with Alpha. This was much more entertaining when it was remade six years later as Missile to the Moon. After the terrible Queen of Outer Space, this is probably the worst of the bunch of "space babe" movies that were made in the fifties. The actors all do their best, however. 

Verdict: Watch Fire Maidens of Outer Space instead. **.

MANFISH

MANFISH (1956). Director: W. Lee Wilder.

Brannigan (John Bromfield), the captain of the turtle boat Manfish, has a decidedly uneasy alliance with "the professor" (Victor Jory), who can lead him to a chest of treasure collected by the pirate Lafitte. Swede (Lon Chaney Jr. in what really amounts to a supporting role) is the mate who seems to love the Manfish even more than the Captain does. Tessa Prendagast is the sexy native girl Alita, and Barbara Nichols was "introduced" in the film as Mimi, the singing sometime girlfriend of the captain's. Manfish isn't terrible or terribly boring, it just throws together different elements -- treasure hunts, jealousy, babes and pirates -- that never really jell. Supposedly based on two Edgar Allan Poe stories, the movie has absolutely nothing to do with Poe. Jory gives probably his strangest ever performance. Bromfield and the gals are vital enough, and Chaney is typically mediocre. Bromfield was also in Revenge of the Creature, Three Bad Sisters, and The Furies.

Verdict: Only for the curious. **.

THE GREEN ARCHER

THE GREEN ARCHER (1940). 15 chapter Columbia serial. Director: James W. Horne.

Victor Jory adds a little class as the star of this cliffhanger, but The Green Archer can in no way be compared to the far superior Shadow, which also starred Jory. Jory doesn't play the title role this time, which is another problem. The story revolves around an old castle full of secret passages and trapdoors where a smooth villain named Abel Bellamy (James Craven) has framed his brother and taken over the place as headquarters for his nefarious activities. He even goes so far as to wreck the train taking his brother to prison in order to kill him. Bellamy imprisons his sister-in-law and spends the next fourteen chapters trying to outwit, confound or murder his brother's friend Spike Holland (Jory), an insurance investigator. In the meantime there are not one but two masked archers who are up to mischief. One, whose identity we know, is working for the bad guys. The other, whose identity is secret [although anyone over the age of five can figure out who it is] mysteriously shows up on the side of the angels now and then. There are some good scenes in The Green Archer, but it never quite recovers from the fact that the title character – unlike Batman, Superman, The Shadow etc. -- is a complete and rather colorless cypher. Highlights include a very well-done sequence featuring a most uncomfortable-looking Jory trying to stay well beneath some descending spikes; his fall out of a high window, which is broken by an awning; and an underground trap that rapidly fills with water. The exciting conclusion has most of the good guys trapped on a slowly crumbling shelf atop a fiery pit! There's a feisty lady gang member who doubles as a housekeeper, and a likable gunsel named Dinky. [In fact The Green Archer benefits from a large cast of talented character actors; Iris Meredith is the heroine.] Based on a novel by Edgar Wallace.

Verdict: Not one of the all-time great serials but not entirely without merit, either. **1/2.

THE MAN WHO TURNED TO STONE

THE MAN WHO TURNED TO STONE (1957). Director: Leslie Kardos.

Flat, uninspired direction is the main problem of this otherwise intriguing horror film set in a girls’ reformatory. A couple of female administrators can’t help but notice how many of the young women are dying of heart failure, and that the deaths occur the day after screams are heard in the night. William Hudson of Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman and Amazing Colossal Man fame plays a psychiatrist who’s called in and winds up spearheading an investigation into the problem. SPOILER ALERT: The people who run the school are all over two hundred years old, and use an electrical process to take life energy from one person (it works best with nubile women – don’t ask) and give it to another. The shame of it is that Victory Jory and some of the other actors give excellent performances, with Paul Cavanaugh a stand-out, especially during a scene when he’s told by the others that he is not going to receive another "treatment" but will be allowed to die. One of the sinister group is a hulking mute who grabs the girls in the night but is beginning to be more trouble than he’s worth. Some interesting notions in this film, but the pace is too slow and everything is presented in a dull matter-of-fact way that doesn’t exactly pull you into the story, which needed a lot of fine-tuning in the first place. Ann Doran (It, The Terror from Beyond Space) plays a bitchy headmistress (and one of the 200 + club) but she really isn’t very good. The title refers to the fact that the skin of the "old folk" starts to turn rock hard just before they need another treatment.

Verdict: Interesting ideas, mediocre execution. **.