Glen Cavender Movies

An expansion of, and improvement upon, Lillian Hellman's stage play of the same name, Watch on the Rhine stars Paul Lukas, recreating his Broadway role of tireless anti-fascist crusader Kurt Muller. As the clouds of war gather in Europe in the late 1930s, Muller arrives in Washington DC, accompanied by his American wife Sara (top-billed Bette Davis) and their children Joshua (Donald Buka), Bodo (Eric Roberts) and Babette (Janis Wilson). The Mullers stay at the home of Sarah's wealthy mother Fanny Fannelly (Lucille Watson), who lives in her own world of society get-togethers and can't be bothered with politics. Also staying with Fanny is Rumanian aristocrat Teck de Branovis (George Coulouris) and his American wife Marthe (Geraldine Fitzgerald). To protect his family, Muller keeps his "underground" activities a secret from Fanny and her guests, but de Branovis is suspicious of the mild-mannered visitor. It turns out that de Branovis is actually a Nazi sympathizer, willing to betray Muller for a price. Using blackmail as one of his weapons, de Branovis threatens to destroy all that Muller has been fighting for. To prevent this, Muller kills de Branovis in cold blood. Now technically a murderer, Muller bids his family a reluctant goodbye, heading back to Europe to continue his vital work. If ever there was a justifiable homicide in a motion picture, it was the killing of the odious de Branovis in Watch on the Rhine. Still, the Hollywood production code dictated that a murderer must always pay for his crimes, thus a coda is added, alluding to Muller's death-providing a golden opportunity for a nifty smiling-through-the-tears curtain speech by Bette Davis. Scripted by Lillian Hellman's lover Dashiel Hammett, Watch on the Rhine earned several Academy Award nominations, as well as a "best actor" Oscar for Paul Lukas. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The fact that star Errol Flynn had been recently embroiled in a real-life rape trial only served to increase the box-office "pull" of Warner Bros. Northern Pursuit. Flynn is cast as Canadian mountie Steve Wagner, assigned to track down and capture downed Nazi pilot Hugo von Keller (Helmut Dantine) in the snowier Hudson Bay regions. Once Wagner and fellow mountie Jim Austin (John Ridgely) catch up with Von Keller, they pretend to be on his side, hoping that he'll reveal his espionage plans. Taken in, Von Keller leads the mounties towards a secret Nazi hideaway, where the Germans have hidden a huge bombing plane, to be used against North America. The fact that Wagner is posing as a Nazi sympathizer hardly endears him to Von Keller's hostage Laura McBain (Julie Bishop), but when the truth is revealed she professes her love for him. In the light of Flynn's recent legal problems, one line in Northern Pursuit invariably brought down the house in 1943: After assuring Laura that she's the only woman he's ever loved, Wagner/Flynn turns to the camera and quips "What am I saying?" ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this screen version of the James Thurber-Elliot Nugent Broadway play of the same name, Henry Fonda stars as bespectacled, bookish college professor Tommy Turner, who puts his career on the line by insisting upon standing up for his right to free speech. Determining to read a letter written by executed anarchistic Bartolomeo Vanzetti to his classroom,Tommy not only risks dismissal and castigation by the conservative college trustees, but seriously jeopardizes his marriage to his wife Ellen (Olivia DeHavilland), who wishes that Tommy would stop making waves and start lobbying for a raise. Coinciding with all this is the arrival of former college football star Joe Ferguson (Jack Carson), who many years earlier had been Tommy's rival for Ellen's affections. Eminently successful and aggressively athletic, Joe seems to be everything that Tommy isn't, and the little professor is worried that he's going to lose Ellen to Joe after all. An all-night drinking session with equally idealistic student Michael Barnes (Herbert Anderson) convinces Tommy to stick to his principles no matter what the cost-and miracle of miracles, this resolve makes him a hero in everyone's eyes, including sweet Ellen. The Male Animal was remade in 1952 as She's Working Her Way Through College, with the liberal ideology of the original film sacrificed in favor of McCarthy-era banalities. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Underground is an average Warner Bros. suspenser, given a boost by its unrelenting portrayal of Nazis as verminous scum--several months before America's entry into World War II. Jeffrey Lynn plays an impressionable young European who is intoxicated by the "glories" of National Socialism. Lynn's brother, Philip Dorn, is on the opposite side of the fence as an announcer for an underground Resistance radio station. At first scornful of his brother's activities, Lynn soon learns that Hitler isn't the saint he believed him to be--especially after several of his friends are liquidated by the Gestapo. Lynn belatedly joins his brother's cause and, at the cost of his own life, helps the Resistance thwart a band of fifth columnists. Underground is a solid piece of film craftsmanship, lacking only the big star names that would have made it a box-office hit. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This cautionary pre-World War II drama stars Joan Bennett as an American girl who falls in love and marries a German (Francis Lederer) in 1938. At first he seems charming, but Joan discovers that her husband is slowly being seduced by the Nazi Party. Determined to leave, Bennett is forced to battle Lederer for custody of their child, whom the husband plans to raise as a budding Fascist. The Nazi is foiled by his father(Otto Kruger), who crushes Lederer's "iron will" by informing his son that his own mother was Jewish. At 77 minutes, The Man I Married cuts out all slack, and the result is a taut, exciting melodrama. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Torchy Plays with Dynamite was the final entry in Warner Bros.' "Torchy Blane" series, based on characters created by Frederick Nebel. Taking over from series star Glenda Farrell, Jane Wyman imitates Farrell to the nth degree, right down to the mile-a-minute dialogue delivery and the angle of her hat. Hoping to get the goods on gangster Denver Eddie (Eddie Marr), intrepid girl reporter Torchy Blane (Wyman) gets herself arrested and thrown into the same prison with Eddie's gun moll Jackie McGuire (Sheila Bromley). All this effort is aimed at winning Torchy's detective boyfriend Steve McBride (Allen Jenkins) a promotion, but it nearly winds up with our heroine pushing up daisies. According to the opening credits, the film's official title is Torchy Blane?Playing With Dynamite. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this, the premiere entry in the "Brass" Bancroft series (starring the man who would-be President, Ronald Reagan), Brass is seen as an ex-Army pilot who works as a commercial airline pilot. One day he quits his well-paying, safe job to become an agent for the Secret Service. His first assignment is to look into a gang of smugglers who are suspected of sneaking illegal aliens into the US via airplanes. This gang is really bad, and whenever they fear that they will be caught, they simply open their hatches and drop the hapless aliens like so many bombs. Bancroft is enraged at their inhumanity, and in the end, he and the ring leader battle it out in a plane spinning out of control. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A remake of Dr. Socrates (1935), this middling melodrama features Kay Francis as Carol Nelson, a medical doctor blaming gangster Joe Gurney (Humphrey Bogart) for the death of her husband (John Eldredge) during a police raid. Determined to get even, Dr. Nelson sets up practice in a small town where a couple of Gurney's henchmen are serving time. And sure enough, Gurney is soon in dire need of Carol's help after being wounded in a jailhouse break. Convincing the gang boss and his men that they all suffer from eye infections, the good doctor proceeds to blind the mobsters with adrenaline eye drops and then calls the cops. Warner Bros. used the general idea a third time in Bullet Scars (1942), yet another B-movie. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Warner Bros.' Girls on Probation was, and is, a potboiler, redeemed slightly by its cast. The fascinating, underused Jane Bryan stars as innocent young Connie Heath, who is falsely accused of theft by witchy Gloria Adams (Susan Hayward). Though Gloria withdraws her charge, the insurance company continues to persecute poor Connie, resulting in a charge of grand larceny. Championing her cause is crusading attorney Neil Dillon (Ronald Reagan), who gets Gloria off with probation. Alas, she resumes her friendship with "fast girl" Hilda Engstrom (Sheila Bromley), who was responsible for getting Connie into trouble in the first place. And there's still 30 minutes to go! Girls on Probation received plenty of airplay in the 1980s during the Reagan presidency then enjoyed a second life as a late-night mainstay of the Turner Classic Movies cable service. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Stage Struck is one of the least known of Busby Berkeley's Warner Bros. musicals, chiefly because there are no major production numbers. The plot is that old saw about young, unknown hopefuls who put on a Big Show and become overnight stars. Alas, the magic didn't work for leading lady Jeanne Madden, who disappeared from films shortly after this brief bid for fame. The film's highlight is a satirical number by the Yacht Club Boys, a "nut" singing group best described as the Gentile Ritz Brothers. The songs for Stage Struck were written by E. Y. Harburg and Harold Arlen, whose talents would be displayed to better advantage in 1939's Wizard of Oz. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this romance, a social worker employed by Traveler's Aid finally is able to show her love to a construction foreman responsible for building the Golden Gate Bridge. She has loved him for nine years and is delighted that they can finally be together. Unfortunately, both of them are so busy that it is difficult to be together. Fortunately, they do eventually connect. The film contains actual footage of the construction of the great San Francisco Bridge. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A typical Poverty Row potboiler, this minor silent action melodrama featured Jacqueline Logan as a young woman searching for her wayward brother (Arthur Rankin), who is falsely accused of murder and on the lam. Along the way, Miss Logan encounters untold dangers from a maniacal Chinese warlord (the always watchable Sojin) and falls in love with a handsome ship's captain (Jack Mower). A 1922 WAMPAS Baby Star, the beautiful Jacqueline Logan had played a very alluring Mary Magdalene in Cecil B. DeMille's The King of Kings (1927), after which her career inexplicably went into a free fall. A late entry in the "yellow peril" cycle, Ships of the Night was penned by prolific genre specialist Arthur Hoerl. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

For the whole two reels of this comedy, Stan Laurel plays a drunk, and, while some have compared this film to Charles Chaplin's One A.M., in reality it's nowhere near as funny. Stan's drunkenness completely disrupts the goings-on at a nightclub, and finally the club's owner (Glen Cavender) throws him out. A cop finds the helpless, inebriated Stan and escorts him home -- except that he's taken the address from a card in Stan's pocket, and it's the business card of the nightclub owner. When the nightclub owner comes home and finds Stan in his bed, all hell breaks loose, but Stan manages to escape both his antagonist and the cops. Although this is not one of Laurel's best comedies as a solo artist, it does have its moments -- one of the funniest happens almost completely out of camera frame. The nightclub owner, fed up with Stan, makes him stand up. The two men can only be seen from the chest down, with the nightclub owner's arm swinging. When Stan sits down again, he has a black eye. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide