ONE TOO MANY

Ruth Warrick contemplates her next drink

ONE TOO MANY (1950). Director: Erle C. Kenton.

Helen Mason (Ruth Warrick of Guest in the House) was once a well-known concert pianist who gave it up when she married reporter Bob (Richard Travis of The Man Who Came to Dinner) and had a daughter named Ginger (Ginger Prince). She has substituted booze for her career while Bob is what Dr. Phil would call an "enabler." Helen is convinced she is not an alcoholic and can get off the sauce without going to AA. But in this she is kidding herself. Helen and Bob find their lives spiraling out of control as Helen not only continues to drink but to drive drunk, endangering herself, her daughter, and everyone else on the road ... 

The Harmonaires pad out the running time

One Too Many probably has its heart in the right place although its polemical approach to the material is not as dramatic as intended. Much of the movie has Bob and others arguing that alcoholism is a disease that needs treatment and special hospital wings, dismissing the notion that all addicts are just weak-willed drunks of low character. Unfortunately these sequences turn the movie into a lecture that makes some good points but is not terribly entertaining. Strangely, the movie is padded with a long concert sequence at the end when the black group the Harmonaires do three numbers, and Warrick plays "The Minute Waltz" and a more contemporary number on the piano in a nightclub. 

An enabler? Richard Travis

Warrick gives a good performance in this although she's not the kind of riveting actress who can give an added bite to the picture a la Stanwyck or Crawford. Travis is, as usual, likable and pleasant and laid-back even when his world seems to be falling apart. William Tracy, who plays a photographer, is given a long, tedious sequence -- more padding -- as he waits outside the window in the maternity ward where his wife is having a baby. Ginger Prince is a talented child actress who can also sing and dance. Rhys Williams, Mary Young, Thurston Hall, and Victor Kilian are all good as Sully the bartender and his wife, newspaper publisher Simes, who hates drunks, and Emery, a mayoral candidate who gets caught in an inebriated state in a bar. Larry J. Blake is fine as Helen's old friend, bandleader Walt Williams. Erm Westmore appears briefly to give Warrick a makeover. Little did audiences of 1950 know that the scourge of drugs would almost replace alcoholism as a social ill. Erle C. Kenton also directed Why Men Leave Home, which also has Westmore and Prince in it and is even worse. From Hallmark. 

Verdict: A long commercial for AA -- a cocktail might help. **. 

TERRY AND THE PIRATES SERIAL

Jeff York (aka Granville Owen) and William Tracy

The art of Milton Caniff

TERRY AND THE PIRATES (15 chapter Columbia serial/1940). Director. James W. Horne.

In this cliffhanger version of the famous newspaper comic strip, young Terry Lee (William Tracy) goes off to find his father, Dr. Herbert Lee (John Paul Jones), with the aid of his buddy and his father's assistant, Pat Ryan (Jeff York, aka Granville Owen, of Li'l Abner). As they search for Dr. Lee, the two men find themselves embroiled in a conflict between an evil half-caste named Fang (Dick Curtis) and his followers, and the mysterious Dragon Lady (Sheila Darcy of Drums of Africa), who presides over her subjects in a cavern headquarters. Fang seeks to control all of the natives in the area, as well as the white settlers, and is after a treasure that he thinks Dr. Lee can lead him to. Lee is only interested in the scientific achievement of locating a lost race. Other characters include Forrest Taylor as Allen Drake, and Joyce Bryant as his daughter, Normandie -- both actors also appeared in The Iron Claw serial --  while Fang's despicable henchman, Stanton, is played by Jack Ingram. Connie, a diminutive Asian fellow, is charmingly played by Allen Jung -- and looks much less like a caricature than he did in the strip -- and the unfortunately-named Big Stoop is essayed by Victor DeCamp. During the fifteen chapters, Terry, Pat and the other good guys must contend with Fang's army of leopard men -- who wear hoods and striped robes -- as well as an agitated and nasty gorilla named Bobo (Jack Leonard). Pat is nearly beheaded by a High Priest (John Ince), Terry nearly eaten by gators, and both are endangered by walls that slowly move in to push them into a pit full of spikes. One of the best cliffhangers has the boys trapped in another pit that is rapidly filling with water.

Terry and the Pirates is a consistently lively, amusing, and exciting serial, but it is far below the level of the comic strip and much less serious. In the comic strip, the Dragon Lady is a beautiful Eurasian who heads a group of modern-day pirates, but in the serial she has been reduced to a fairly pretty white lady who rules a standard lost sect. At 23, William Tracy is far too old to play the boy Terry -- Jeff York was only five years older -- and has to compensate with some "gee willikers" expressions and a high-pitched screech when they are in trouble. Years later he played another recurring role in the Terry and the Pirates TV series. Dick Curtis is actually good as Fang, but unfortunately he is saddled with a voice characterization that makes him sound like an Oriental parody in a bad sitcom, Asian by way of the Borscht Belt. Jeff York is suitably handsome and heroic and more than competent as Pat. Lee Zahler has contributed a very effective score.

In the strip, writer-artist Milton Caniff -- who eventually left the comic to do Steve Canyon, for which he controlled the rights -- aged Terry until he became an adult and Pat Ryan's role was diminished and possibly eliminated. I don't know if Pat was actually Dr. Lee's assistant in the comic, and believe it is more likely that Terry was an orphan, with Ryan acting as his mentor.

Verdict: Frankly ridiculous at times, but also fun and fast-paced. ***. 

STRIKE UP THE BAND

Mickey!

STRIKE UP THE BAND (1940). Director: Busby Berkeley.

High school student Jimmy Connors (Mickey Rooney) has one passion: playing the drums in a band. Mary Holden (Judy Garland) has just one passion: Jimmy Connors. Mary can also sing quite well. Jimmy wants to take his band to Chicago to play on Paul Whiteman's radio show in a band competition, but where oh where can  he get the money for traveling expenses. Just when the money is raised, a dear friend, Willie (Larry Nunn), becomes seriously ill and needs an operation ... The sentiment is thick  but somehow never overbearing in this charming musical which boasts the talents of Rooney and Garland, both of whom are typically superb. Larry Nunn offers a highly appealing and sympathetic portrait of Willie, who has a hopeless crush on Mary and proposes -- at thirteen! William Tracy [Terry and the Pirates] and June Preisser [Judge Hardy and Son] play two more of the kids, most of whom look like they've been out of high school for quite a few years. The title tune was composed by Gershwin, but the other songs are by Freed and Edens, including the memorable "Our Love Affair," expertly warbled by Garland, and "I Ain't Got Nobody." (Garland's torch song, "The Curse of an Aching Heart," was cut.) Ann Shoemaker [Seventeen] plays Jimmy's mother, who has always wanted him to be a doctor. While Shoemaker is always good, in this she just seems to come on too strong and smothering.  Nunn was a very talented child actor but his film career only lasted eight years.

Verdict: Rooney and Garland in top form! ***.

THE JONES FAMILY IN HOLLYWOOD

George Ernest tries to console June Carlson

THE JONES FAMILY IN HOLLYWOOD (1939). Director: Malcolm St. Clair.

The long-running Jones Family series [a total of 17 movies!] actually started with Every Saturday Night in 1936 when the family was named "Evers." (Presumably somebody with the same name objected because they became the more generic Jones Family with the next installment and thereafter.) This movie is about at the halfway mark for the series, and has the family traveling to Hollywood when Father Jones (a dithery and unappealing Jed Prouty) attends an American Legion convention, and everyone else, including the peppery Granny Jones (Florence Roberts), insists on going along. Lucy (June Carlson) thinks she's going to become a movie star thanks to the manipulations of sleazy actor Danny Regan (William Tracy of Terry and the Pirates), while girl-crazy Jack (Kenneth Howell) thinks he's fallen for an actress who only wants to use the handsome lug for research. The more studious brother, Roger, is played by the aptly-named George Ernest. At one point Roger, who is making a home movie, stands in for Lucy and shows her how to make love to her boyfriend, Tommy (Marvin Stephens), making it seem as if he has a crush on him. The actors are all adept, but the script is thin and silly and the laughs merely sporadic when they come at all.The only "name" in the cast is Spring Byington (Walk Softly Stranger), who is her usual self as Mrs. Louise Jones. Howell was also in Henry Aldrich for President and Junior G-Men. St. Clair also directed Jitterbugs with Laurel and Hardy.

Verdict: If nothing else a quaint curiosity of a long-forgotten series. **.

TERRY AND THE PIRATES TV

TERRY AND THE PIRATES TV show. 1952.

This fair-to-middling television show based on Milton Caniff's famous comic strip only lasted for 16 episodes. John Baer is perfect in both good looks and demeanor for Terry Lee, while William Tracy, in an atrocious rug, is also good as his partner, "Hotshot" Charlie. The two fly planes to and from Hong Kong for a shady character named Chopstick Joe (Jack Reitzen). The Dragon Lady, played to perfection by the sexy Gloria Saunders, appeared in almost all of the episodes, and was usually up to some hijinks. Burma (first Mari Blanchard, and then Sandra Spence) appeared with less frequency. The show wasn't terribly riveting -- although cute, appealing Baer and super-slinky Saunders must have had their fans -- but there were a few decent episodes. Pamela Duncan (Attack of the Crab Monsters) appears in "Black Market for Death," in which Terry assumes that the Dragon Lady is behind the theft of an important serum; this one has a good twist at the end. In "Extra Cargo" the boys foil the D L's plot to assassinate a maharajah with a bomb on a plane [Burma is in this episode as well]. The corpse of a wealthy man is held for ransom in "Chinese Coffin" and a boy prince (little Stephen Wong) is kidnapped in "Little Mandarin." "Tea Hee" has an old lady buying a special blend of tea from the Dragon Lady which has valuable jewels hidden inside. Series guest-stars include Tristram Coffin, Lyle Talbot, Phyllis Coates and Victor Sen Yung. Baer also appeared in Night of the Blood Beast. 12 years earlier William Tracy actually played a younger Terry Lee in the Terry and the Pirates serial.

Verdict: Attractive leads certainly don't hurt. **1/2.