Joan Blondell Movies

Two-fisted New York police detective Edward G. Robinson is so volatile that he manages to get himself thrown off the force in disgrace. The local gangsters are delighted, in that Robinson had been breathing down their necks. When Robinson goes to crime boss Barton MacLaine insisting that he's through with law enforcement and wants to switch to the other side, MacLaine's chief henchmen Humphrey Bogart doesn't buy the story, but has to go along since he doesn't want to incur the wrath of MacLaine. Robinson offers to show his former enemies how to circumvent the law, making him an invaluable participant in gang activities. Actually, Robinson hasn't gone crooked at all; he's operating undercover, with the full knowledge of the city police inspector, in hopes of locating the "big boys" who've been financing the mob. His diligence costs him his life, but Robinson, with the help of bad-girl-gone-good Joan Blondell, busts the rackets wide open. Former crime reporter Martin Mooney was responsible for the story upon which Bullets or Ballots was based. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

All but forgotten today, the George Abbott-John Cecil Holm stage comedy Three Men on a Horse was once a staple of the community theatre and summer-stock circuit (a 1958 TV production starred no less than Johnny Carson). Though a faithful adaptation of the Broadway original, this 1936 film version avoids staginess thanks to the sprightly direction of Mervin LeRoy. Frank McHugh plays a meek, henpecked greeting-card writer who has an uncanny knack for picking winning race horses. Wandering into a bar after a spat with his wife (Carol Hughes), the prognosticative McHugh is "adopted" by Runyonesque horseplayers Sam Levene, Allen Jenkins and Teddy Hart. Held a virtual prisoner by the three gamblers, McHugh is unable to return to his job at the greeting card company, forcing his boss Guy Kibbee to realize for the first time the indispensability of his missing employee. A very slight piece, Three Men on a Horse is buoyed by the talents of the above-mentioned actors, as well as such reliables as Joan Blondell, Edgar Kennedy and Eddie "Rochester" Anderson. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell, the female Laurel and Hardy of Warner Bros., share top billing in We're in the Money. This time Blondell and Farrell are cast respectively as Ginger and Dixie, intrepid process-servers for goofy lawyer Homer Bronson (Hugh Herbert). Things go from the ridiculous to the even more ridiculous when the girls are ordered to serve a summons to Ginger's wealthy boyfriend C. Richard Courtney (Ross Alexander), who's entangled in a breach-of-promise suit. Our heroines are also called upon to deliver their missives to a nightclub singer (Phil Regan), a brawny wrestler (Man Mountain Dean) and a surly gangster (Lionel Stander), with predictable but hilarious results. With so many expert farceurs in the cast, poor Ross Alexander virtually ends up as dramatic relief! ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Based on Frederick Hazlett Brennan's play Battleship Gertie, Miss Pacific Fleet is short and snappy "gobs and gals" affair. At the urging of gold-digging showgirls Gloria Foy (Joan Blondell) and Mae O'Brien (Glenda Farrell), goofy promoter Augustus Frietag (Hugh Herbert) comes up with a "Miss Pacific Fleet" contest, with each 10-cent purchase at a seaside amusement park representing one vote. Hundreds of sailors participate in the voting process, including Kewpie Wiggins (Allen Jenkins), who hopes that his "goil" Gloria will emerge the winner -- whereupon she and Mae will confiscate the money collected and skeedaddle to New York. Naturally, there are a few snags in this scheme, especially when the girls both fall for handsome marine sergeant Tom Foster (Warren Hull). Marie Wilson pilfers most of the film with her standard dizzy-dame routine. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this crime drama, Flicker Hayes (James Cagney) is a safecracker who has just been released following a stretch in prison; after his last job, his partners Dan Curley (Bradley Page) and Red Deering (Ralf Harolde) set him up, and now Hayes is determined to get revenge. Fooling them into believing that there's no hard feelings, Hayes sets up another robbery with Curley and Deering, but after it goes off without a hitch, Hayes turns the tables on his so-called friends and squeals on them to the cops, keeping all the money for himself. Hayes makes tracks for San Francisco, unaware that Curley has escaped from the police and is hot on his trail. Once he settles in San Francisco, Hayes meets Rose Lawrence (Joan Blondell), a former streetwalker who has reformed and settled down with fisherman Nick Gardella (Victor Jory). Even though she's married, Hayes falls head over heels for Rose, and she finds that she's quite attracted to him as well. Rose is torn between Hayes and Gardella, but Hayes' decision about the relationship is made for him when Curley and his goons arrive in San Francisco, and Hayes has to flee for his own safety. He Was Her Man was the last of seven pictures James Cagney and Joan Blondell would make together. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Completed just before the Production Code went into effect, I've Got Your Number is delightfully racy, risque entertainment. Pat O'Brien is all wisecracks and left hooks as Terry, a troubleshooter for the New York telephone company. Terry puts his talents -- and his eavesdropping skill -- to good use when he decides to rescue his switchboard-operator girlfriend Marie (Joan Blondell) from taking the fall in a stolen-bond scheme. Not to be taken seriously for a moment, I've Got Your Number concludes with a belly-laugh as Terry's old telephone-linemen pals "bug" his honeymoon suite. The only false note struck by the film is the notion that know-it-all Joan Blondell could be slickered twice by the same gang of con artists. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

As the title song says, you go to those shows to see those beautiful dames--and there's dames aplenty in this 1934 Busby Berkeley extravaganza. The wisp of a plot is motivated by one Ezra Ounce (Hugh Herbert), a silly millionaire who spearheads a national anti-fun movement. Ounce's distant cousin Dick Powell is a producer of musical comedies. Ounce's partner is Guy Kibbee, whose daughter is Ruby Keeler. Kibbee is also the "sugar daddy" of Joan Blondell, Powell's friend and co-worker. Fill in the rest of the blanks yourself. If the plot doesn't interest you (and there's no reason why it should), sit back and enjoy the humongous production numbers based on the Warren/Dubin songs "I Only Have Eyes for You", "The Girl on the Ironing Board", and of course the title number. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The second talkie version of the Avery Hopwood's theatrical war-horse The Golddiggers of Broadway, Gold Diggers of 1933 was the second of three back-to-back 1933 Warner Bros. musicals benefiting from the genius of Busby Berkeley. The basic plot is retained from the Hopwood play: Showgirls Joan Blondell, Ruby Keeler and Aline McMahon attempt to find financial backing for the new show planned by producer Ned Sparks. Songwriter Dick Powell, an incognito man of wealth, offers to put up the money, a fact that brings down the wrath of his older brother Warren William, who despises show folk. Attempting to buy off the three girls, William is placed in a compromising position by the crafty Blondell and is compelled to bankroll the musical himself. The oddest aspect of Gold Diggers of 1933 is the fact that the mood of the songs is wildly at variance with the plot. The film begins with dozens of chorus girls (led by Ginger Rogers) happily chirping "We're In the Money", a rehearsal number interrupted when the finance men burst in to claim the sets and props from the impoverished troupe. At the end, when everyone is genuinely in the money, the troupe stages a downbeat "Brother Can You Spare A Dime"-style production number, "Remember My Forgotten Man"--and it is on this doleful indictment of the Depression that the film fades out! Other Berkeley-staged musical highlights include "Pettin' in the Park" (yes, that salacious little baby really is Billy Barty) and the neon-dominated "Shadow Waltz", all written by the prolific Harry Warren and Al Dubin. As spectacular as Gold Diggers of 1933 was, it would be topped by the last of Berkeley's 1933 trilogy, Footlight Parade. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

William Powell is a poor East Side lawyer who works his way up the ladder to assistant prosecutor. He isn't too particular how he uses and misuses the law, much to the dismay of his faithful secretary (Joan Blondell). Powell's downfall comes when he falls for a shady lady (Claire Dodd) who blackmails him for a past misdeed. He escapes prosecution with a hung jury, but the experience rekindles his conscience. With his loving secretary at his side, Powell returns to his old neighborhood to set up an honest legal practice. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Famous author Kenneth Bixby (Warren William) would like to jump-start his romance with ex-sweetheart Julie (Genevieve Tobin). There are, however, at least two people who'd prefer that Bixby stick to writing and stay away from Julie. One is Julie's husband Harvey Wilson (Hugh Herbert); the other is Bixby's loyal secretary Anne (Joan Blondell), who's been carrying a torch for her boss for years. It all winds up in a cross-country chase, with everybody suspiciously tailing everybody else. Based on a play by George Haight and Allan Scott, Goodbye Again was dutifully remade under a different title by the Warner Bros. "B" unit in the early 1940s. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Practically every member of the Warner Bros. stock company except Glenda Farrell shows up in the rowdy, raunchy pre-Code comedy Convention City. Joan Blondell plays Nancy Lorraine, an enterprising lass who is employed by a big-city hotel as a "hostess" for out-of-town conventioneers. She spends a great deal of the film in the company of small-town businessman George Ellerbe (Guy Kibbee), who goes to great lengths to avoid his nagging wife (Ruth Donnelly). Weaving in and out of the proceedings are inveterate practical jokers Goodwin (Frank McHugh) and Hotstetter (Hugh Herbert), who use the convention as an excuse for a three-day binge. The plot rears its ugly head when Nancy finds her affections torn between slick CEO T.R. Kent (Adolphe Menjou) and handsome young salesman Jerry Ford (Dick Powell). The New York Times described it as, "Not a dull foot. One of the few comedies that can truthfully be called positive entertainment." Unfortunately, there are no known surviving prints of Convention City, so it remains one of the era's many "lost films." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Based on the play New York Town by Ward Morehouse, Mervyn LeRoy directs the black-and-white 1932 comedy drama Big City Blues. A small-town innocent from Indiana, Bud Reeves (Eric Linden) inherits money and goes to New York to get in all sorts of trouble. He meets up with his cousin Gibby (Walter Catlett), who introduces him to chorus girl Vida Fleet (Joan Blondell). Bud and Gibby then throw a drunken hotel party with bootleg liquor that gets out of hand and a young woman (Josephine Dunn) is hit on the head and accidentally killed. Bud and Vida go gambling and drinking to escape the cops, but they are caught and arrested with everyone else from the party. Eventually, the police find the real killer and release everyone. Bud leaves for Indiana, but plans to go back, get his dog, and marry Vida. Humphrey Bogart appears in a brief uncredited role as Shep Adkins, a guy who gets into a fight with Lyle Talbot during the party. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi

Wealthy industrialist George M. Ferguson (Purnell Pratt) is murdered and his wife (Vivienne Osborne) left bound and gagged in their summer home in the tiny upstate New York hamlet of Cornwall. Rumors quickly start going through the town -- many people don't know what to make of Mrs. Ferguson's claim that a pair of burglars attacked them, shot her husband, and stole her jewelry, especially as there have already been rumors of an affair between Mrs. Ferguson and bank employee Judd Brooks (Leon Ames). But the real trouble starts when a pack of reporters from New York City descend on the town. Some of them, led by veteran journalist Martin Collins (Grant Mitchell), are there to report the facts as they find them -- but another more aggressive bunch, led by smooth-talking Bob Parke (Kenneth Thompson), are prepared to report any rumor, no matter how scurrilous, far-fetched, or unsupported by facts it might be, as a new development. They enlist the aid of the two employees from the local paper, Bruce Foster (Tom Brown) and Toni Martin (Adrienne Dore), into their efforts. And soon Bob is corrupting wide-eyed, ambitious Toni -- who has always wanted to leave Cornwall for New York City -- with drinks and romance, much to the chagrin of his one-time paramour Maizie Dickson (Joan Blondell). Maizie, who is also a reporter, has been around the block and knows where Bob will leave Toni when he gets bored with her. The scandal-sheet reporters eventually persuade the weak-willed local prosecutor (Clarence H. Wilson) to arrest Brooks as a material witness -- an event that causes the man's pregnant wife to faint -- and bring murder charges against Mrs. Ferguson. Now the press sharks have a field day, trumpeting every nasty rumor they can pump up into a headline. Meanwhile, Bruce Foster, following the advice of Martin Collins, starts digging on his own into the case. The trial proceeds to the point where the jury is about to start deliberating when the real facts emerge, turning the whole town and the visiting press corps upside down, but not before events destroy one family and nearly wreck the town. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi