Maurice Costello Movies

The earliest surviving screen version of William Shakespeare's romantic comedy, this Vitagraph production managed to cram most of the play into its one-reel running time. The Duke of Athens decrees that Hermia (Rose Tapley) shall forsake Lysander (Maurice Costello) in favor of her father's choice, Demetrius (William Ackerman). The lovers elope into the woods, quickly followed by Demetrius and his love, Helena (Julia Swayne Gordon). The town tradesmen, meanwhile, rehearse a play in honor of the duke's betrothal to Hippolyta. Back in the forest, Titania, Queen of the Fairies (Florence Turner), quarrels with Penelope, who avenges herself by sending Puck (Gladys Hulette) away with a magic herb, which, dabbed on the eyes of a sleeping person, shall make the "victim" fall in love with the first person to appear after awakening. Soon, Lysander and Demetrius are smitten with the wrong girls and Titania has fallen in love with Bottom (William V. Ranous, the egotistical leader of the tradesmen, whom Puck has turned into an ass. When Penelope discovers all this mischief, she lifts the spell and the wedding of the duke and Hippolyta can proceed. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

This sixth installment in MGM's "Andy Hardy" series is among the best, thanks in great part to the breezy direction of "Woody" Van Dyke. In this outing, teenaged Andy (Mickey Rooney) develops a crush on his high-school drama teacher Rose Meredith (Helen Gilbert). Andy's dad Judge Hardy (Lewis Stone) knows that his son is riding for a fall, but he decides to let the boy find out for himself that there's a big difference between youthful infatuation and true love. Sure enough, when Andy proposes marriage to Rose, she reveals that she already has a fiancee. It's a crushing blow for our hero-but only temporarily, since his perennial sweetheart Polly Benedict (Ann Rutherford) is waiting in the wings. Outside of the puppy-love main plot, the film is at its best when Andy writes a play as a vehicle for himself and Rose, with the expected silly results. Less than five months after the release of Andy Hardy Gets Spring Fever, Columbia Pictures "answered" the film with the zany 2-reel comedy Andy Clyde Gets Spring Chicken. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Although the plot to this Northwoods tale reads like a comedy, it was apparently meant to be a drama. William Crombie (William B. Davidson) thinks the world can be had for money. He uses his fortune to buy Agnes (Hedda Hopper) as his wife, but then he neglects her. When another man comes along, Crombie is not able to hold her. Then he goes on a hunting trip, where the other men ridicule him because without his guides, he can't bag any deer. Frustrated, Crombie goes out into the wilderness by himself and promptly gets lost. He is taken in by a woodsman who is living with a pretty young girl named Jennette (Betty Hilburn). Crombie falls for her and tries to convince her to run off with him. When the woodsman suggests that they fight over the girl, however, he chickens out. Back home, he finds his wife is still involved with someone else. Crombie finally decides he must learn to be a man and hires a trainer. Once he knows how to fight, he beats up his wife's love and tells her he wants a divorce. Then he heads into the forest, but he finds the woodsman near death and Jennette nursing him. At the girl's urging he fetches a doctor, and, when he returns, he fights off a half-breed who is attacking her. The woodsman recovers and offers to let Crombie have Jennette, but he turns him down. Back at the hunting lodge, he finds his wife waiting for him and the couple are reconciled. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

This independently made drama ran a tiresome 11 reels (in the days when most films ran half that length), but was edited down to a more reasonable eight. The will of Whitechapel banker John Morton designates that his twin sons should be kept unaware of their true identities until they are 30 years old. When the sons reach adulthood, John Jr. becomes a missionary, while James becomes a playboy (both roles are played by Alpheus Lincoln). While performing charity work, heiress Frances Lloyd (Gene Burnell) is tricked into a robbers' den, and John comes to her rescue. The couple fall in love, but Lord Warburton, a criminal mastermind (Walter Ringham), wants her for himself. He convinces Frances that John is not the upstanding young man he seems to be -- and when she learns of his brother's scandalous behavior, she thinks her lover is responsible. Eventually everything is straightened out, and not only does John marry Frances, James wins his girl, a reformed thief by the name of Luckey (Irene Tams). ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

In this, the first entry in four-part series, children's movie, Polly Pepper takes care of her siblings while her mother toils at a factory. Polly's newest friend is Jasper, a rich kid who likes to play with the Pepper kids. Trouble ensues when the littlest Pepper comes down with the measles and infects Jasper and his grandfather, Mr. King. They all wind up stuck together in a quarantined house. After the devoted Polly collapses from working too hard, Mr. King moves the Pepper clan into his mansion. The plucky family finally garners a fortune when it is discovered that Polly has inherited the controlling shares in a mine that the grandfather wants to purchase. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

After Hollywood was rocked by several scandals, the specter of censorship reared its ugly head. To keep local community leaders from doing the censoring, the film industry opted to do the editing itself. Perhaps that's why pictures such as this Allan Dwan-directed society drama based on a novel by Edith Wharton seem a bit bloodless. Although Susan Branch (Bebe Daniels) has lost her money, she still manages to live off her society friends. While staying with Fred and Ursula Gillow (Maurice Costello and Nita Naldi), she falls in love with penniless writer Nick Lansing (David Powell). In spite of his financial situation, Susan and Lansing marry, and live for the next year on money given to them by friends, staying in lavish villas in Paris, Venice, and Monte Carlo. But when the money runs out, so does their happiness. After an argument, they separate, even consulting a lawyer about divorce; but when the lawyer sees that they still love each other, he convinces them to stay together. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Hollywood Boulevard is a trenchant look at the underside of Tinseltown. Though the nominal hero is a disillusioned screenwriter played by Robert Cummings (whose dialogue anticipates the lines spoken by William Holden in 1950's Sunset Boulevard), the focus of the story is John Halliday as a washed-up film star. Desperately, Halliday accepts the offer from a sleazy "tell all" magazine to write his memoirs. The actor's estranged family is devastated by the resultant scandal, and out love for his daughter (Marsha Hunt), Halliday tries to break his contract. But the publisher (C. Henry Gordon) threatens to ruin Halliday's comeback attempt if he refuses to write the rest of his memoirs. In a scuffle, the publisher kills Halliday, and the blame falls on the actor's daughter. But wise guy screenwriter Cummings gets to the truth of the mystery. A slick B-plus crime melodrama, Hollywood Boulevard has the added bonus of several well-known silent film personalities (Charles Ray, Francis X. Bushman, Maurice Costello, Mae Marsh etc.) in cameo roles, as well as a guest appearance by Gary Cooper. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

John Wayne goes up against the lottery racket, 1880 Louisiana-style, in this passable time-killer from Republic Pictures. Arriving from New England to look into the Louisiana lottery on behalf of uplifter Blanche Brunot (Helen Westley), attorney John Reynolds (Wayne) falls in love with sultry Julie Mirbeau (Osa Munson), who attempts to persuade him that her father's gaming business is on the up and up. When a New Orleans restaurateur, Gaston (Shimen Ruskin), is found murdered, Reynolds begins to suspect that General Mirbeau's (Henry Stephenson) gang is behind the killing. To meet the attorney halfway, Mirbeau fires his chief henchman, Blackie (Ray Middleton), but is himself killed by one of Blackie's men, Cuffy Brown (Jack Pennick). Reynolds, who has been appointed special city attorney, pays his respect to Julie, but the angry girl accuses him of indirectly causing the death of her father and then flaunts her engagement to Blackie. Said engagement, however, suffers a fatal blow when Julie finds her fiancé in the arms of gambling hall hostess Pearl (Jacqueline Dalya). Taking the stand in court against the racket, Julie's testimony is interrupted when a rainstorm sweeps the area, breaking a levee. While pursuing a fleeing Blackie, Reynolds orders a steamship to block the hole in the levee, a plan that ultimately saves New Orleans. Having survived the potential disaster, Julie leaves the lottery racket behind and agrees to become Mrs. Reynolds. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Who else would have directed a film with a title of such thundering moralistic drama but film pioneer J. Stuart Blackton? Americans in the 1920s were horrified at the growing divorce statistics, so the failure of marriage became a popular and sensational subject for motion pictures. This marriage drama was based on a novel by Basil King. When Harry Vassali (Leslie Austen) gets engaged to Petrina Faneuil (Pauline Frederick), Dick Lechmere (Lou Tellegen) warns him that his own marriage to an opera singer failed because of her ambition. The couple marries anyway, but their differences of opinion split apart their union. Although Petrina never stops loving her former husband, pride keeps them apart, and she marries Lechmere. Lechmere's ex-wife returns, her voice gone, and Lechmere gets back together with her. When she dies, he commits suicide. In her suffering, Petrina turns to the only man she could ever trust -- Vassali -- and they are reunited. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Norma Shearer plays Dora Perkins, a country girl who runs away to New York City. She gets work as a nurse and marries Dr. Howard Fleming (Robert Elliott), a famed brain surgeon. Supposedly she dies in a fire, and some time later Fleming takes a vacation in the country, where by some odd cinematic coincidence he winds up meeting Dolly, Dora's sister (Gladys Leslie). Without realizing her relationship to Dora, he marries her. Soon Dolly is expecting, and not long after, Dora pops up -- she survived the fire, but has been left hopelessly insane. An operation restores her sanity, but Fleming's cousin reveals that she is married to a bigamist, causing Dora to panic and injure herself again. A second operation conveniently kills her, and Dolly -- who has been kept ignorant of all these plot complications -- can have Fleming's child in peace. Shearer somehow managed to make her role believable -- a near miracle, considering the material. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Frank Capra's classic comedy-drama established James Stewart as a lead actor in one of his finest (and most archetypal) roles. The film opens as a succession of reporters shout into telephones announcing the death of Senator Samuel Foley. Senator Joseph Paine (Claude Rains), the state's senior senator, puts in a call to Governor Hubert "Happy" Hopper (Guy Kibbee) reporting the news. Hopper then calls powerful media magnate Jim Taylor (Edward Arnold), who controls the state -- along with the lawmakers. Taylor orders Hopper to appoint an interim senator to fill out Foley's term; Taylor has proposed a pork barrel bill to finance an unneeded dam at Willet Creek, so he warns Hopper he wants a senator who "can't ask any questions or talk out of turn." After having a number of his appointees rejected, at the suggestion of his children Hopper nominates local hero Jefferson Smith (James Stewart), leader of the state's Boy Rangers group. Smith is an innocent, wide-eyed idealist who quotes Jefferson and Lincoln and idolizes Paine, who had known his crusading editor father. In Washington, after a humiliating introduction to the press corps, Smith threatens to resign, but Paine encourages him to stay and work on a bill for a national boy's camp. With the help of his cynical secretary Clarissa Sanders (Jean Arthur), Smith prepares to introduce his boy's camp bill to the Senate. But when he proposes to build the camp on the Willets Creek site, Taylor and Paine force him to drop the measure. Smith discovers Taylor and Paine want the Willets Creek site for graft and he attempts to expose them, but Paine deflects Smith's charges by accusing Smith of stealing money from the boy rangers. Defeated, Smith is ready to depart Washington, but Saunders, whose patriotic zeal has been renewed by Smith, exhorts him to stay and fight. Smith returns to the Senate chamber and, while Taylor musters the media forces in his state to destroy him, Smith engages in a climactic filibuster to speak his piece: "I've got a few things I want to say to this body. I tried to say them once before and I got stopped colder than a mackerel. Well, I'd like to get them said this time, sir. And as a matter of fact, I'm not gonna leave this body until I do get them said." ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

While James Stewart was filibustering from his senator's pulpit in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), Gene Autry battled congressional bureaucracy in Rovin' Tumbleweeds, which barely could call itself a Western. Gene runs for a congressional seat in order to pass a flood control bill that would save a group of dispossessed ranchers and farmers, the victims of a disastrous storm. But once elected, the hero's best efforts are thwarted by greedy meat packing plant owner Holloway (Douglas Dumbrille), who lobbies against him. With another storm brewing and Autry's only political ally, Senator Nolan (William Farnum), killed in a car accident, all hope seems gone. But when Gene rallies his troops in a climactic battle, even Holloway catches the community spirit and the valley is saved. Taking time out from fighting both political corruption and the elements, Gene, Smiley Burnette, and the Pals of the Golden West perform "Paradise in the Moonlight," "Ole Peaceful River," Rovin' Tumbleweeds," and other favorite selections. Rovin' Tumbleweeds has been restored to its original length by Gene Autry Entertainment. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide