William Cottrell Movies

Famed German filmmaker E. A. Dupont, who in his peak years was responsible for such classics as Variety, merely goes through the motions in this updated sequel to Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island. Instead of Jim Hawkins, the film offers Jim's beautiful female descendant Jamesina (Dawn Addams), who manages to get her hands on Captain Flint's fabled treasure map. This makes Jamesina the target of a variety of scurrilous fortune-hunters, including phony archeologist Harris (Porter Hall) and the malevolent, sightless Newman (James Seay). It is handsome archeological student Clive Stone (Tab Hunter) who helps Jamesina locate the treasure and elude the villains. At least Return to Treasure Island wasn't intended to be taken seriously. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

A pet project of Walt Disney's since 1939, this animated version of James M. Barrie's Peter Pan reached full fruition in 1953. Eschewing much of Barrie's gentle whimsy (not to mention the more sinister aspects of the leading character), Disney and his staff fashioned a cheery, tuneful cartoon extravaganza, which cost $4 million and reaped several times that amount. The straightforward story concerns the Darling family, specifically the children: Wendy, Michael and John. Wendy enjoys telling her younger siblings stories about the mythical Peter Pan, the little boy who never grew up. One night, much to everyone's surprise, Peter flies into the Darling nursery, in search of his shadow, which Wendy had previously captured. Sprinkling the kids with magic pixie dust, Peter flies off to Never-Never Land, with Wendy, Michael and John following behind. Once in Peter's domain, the children are terrorized by Captain Hook, who intends to capture Peter and do away with him.

After rescuing Indian princess Tiger Lily from Captain Hook, Peter must save the children, not to mention his own "Lost Boys," from the diabolical pirate captain. In addition, he must contend with the jealousy of tiny sprite Tinker Bell, who doesn't like Wendy one little bit. Breaking with several traditions, Peter had been played by a girl in all previous incarnations, Tinker Bell had always been depicted by a shaft of light, etc ... this "Disneyized" version of Peter Pan may not be authentic James Barrie, but it has never failed to enthrall audiences of all ages. Adding to the fun are the spirited voiceover performances by Bobby Driscoll (Peter), Hans Conried (Captain Hook and Mr. Darling), Kathryn Beaumont (Wendy) and Bill Thompson (Smee), and the sprightly songs by Sammy Cahn, Sammy Fain, Ollie Wallace, Erdman Penner, Ted Sears, Winston Hibler, Frank Churchill and Jack Lawrence. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Joseph L. Mankiewicz directed this exquisite version of William Shakespeare's play. Louis Calhern is Julius Caesar, whose conquests have enabled him to rise to the status of Roman dictator. But his ascent to almost God-like status has given pause to influential members of the Roman Senate. Chief among them is Cassius (John Gielgud), who is troubled by Caesar's popularity and dictatorial status. Convinced that Caesar's assassination would be the best thing for Rome, he conspires with Casca (Edmond O'Brien) and the influential Brutus (James Mason) to plot Caesar's murder. Despite dark omens, Caesar walks confidently into the Roman Senate, where he is stabbed to death by the conspirators. His companion Marc Antony (Marlon Brando) is shocked and runs to the corpse of his beloved friend. He agrees to support Brutus while an unruly mob gathers in front of the Senate doors, having heard rumors of Caesar's assassination. Brutus convinces the mob that Caesar's death was for the good of Rome, preventing him from forming a monarchy. Then Antony appears, determined to destroy the conspirators; he delivers a speech that subtly damns the assassins. With the mob against them, the conspirators are forced to flee Rome and Antony organizes an army against them. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi

Gus (George Winslow) is the young son of divorced industrialist Dave Jennings (Richard Widmark). Unable to cope with Gus' mischievous streak, Jennings places the boy in a day-care center. Gus' teacher Lydia Marble (Joanne Dru) manages to curb the boy's prankishness, and along the way falls in love with Jennings. Enter the villainess of the piece: Jennings' ex-wife Joyce (Audrey Totter), who claims that the divorce is invalid and demands a huge sum from Jennings, lest she claim custody of Gus. In the end, it comes down to priorities: does Jennings value his son over his money, or vice versa? My Pal Gus is no Kramer vs. Kramer, but it does pass the time in an agreeable manner. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Reunited for the first time since 1932's The Old Dark House, Charles Laughton and Boris Karloff star in the second-echelon Universal melodrama The Strange Door. Based on a Robert Louis Stevenson story, the film casts Laughton as unhinged French aristocrat Alan De Maletroit. Angered when his sweetheart jilts him in favor of his brother Edmond (Paul Cavanuagh), De Maletroit tosses Edmond in his castle dungeon, then years later forces Edmond's daughter Blanche (Sally Forrest) into a marriage of convenience with the seemingly worthless Dennis de Beaulieu (Richard Stapley). Imprisoned within the walls of the castle by the overbearing De Maletroit, Blanche and Dennis fall genuinely in love, then conspire with De Maletroit's long-suffering servant Voltan (Boris Karloff) to escape. But the villain's torture chamber is just large enough for the three would-be escapees ... While Strange Door permits Charles Laughton plenty of room to dole out ham in thick, juicy slices, poor Boris Karloff has nearly nothing to do, much to the disappointment of his fans. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Young model Jean Dexter is knocked unconscious and drowned in her own bathtub in her Manhattan apartment, and a lot of jewelry that she supposedly owned is missing. The Naked City is actually about six days in the life of New York City that coincide with the murder and the subsequent investigation by Lt. Dan Muldoon (Barry Fitzgerald) and Detective James Halloran (Don Taylor). The account of their work, and the workings of the New York City police department, is interspersed with brief vignettes about the life of the city around them, and, especially, the reaction of residents to the murder and the newspaper reports of the progress of the case. Muldoon and Halloran first must determine why she was killed, which may (or may not) have to do with how a woman with a minimal income came by the jewelry -- was it a love affair gone bad (and if so, with whom?), or something more complex and sinister? Retracing the final 18 months of the victim's life, their investigation reaches out to a mysterious "Philip Henderson" with whom she was supposedly linked romantically, and to Frank Niles (Howard Duff), who's a little too fast-and-loose with the truth when he doesn't have to be to make Muldoon comfortable; to make things more complicated, Muldoon determines that there were at least two men involved with the actual commission of the murder. The victim turns out to have led a wild life, filled with men and parties, and was tied up with several sordid figures. Their investigation carries them into the highest and lowest ends of New York's social strata to find the killer, and it turns out there are a lot of interlocking reasons why at least three men might've wanted her dead. In the process, we get glimpses of the private lives of the detectives, which was something new in movies at this time; in the midst of all of this activity, the writers set up a fascinating contrast, in adjacent scenes, between Halloran, his wife, and their young son looking toward the future, with the parents of the dead woman, looking back with bitter regret and recriminations -- no movie ever presented in more subtle fashion the contrast between the zeitgeist of the 1930s and that of the postwar era. The final chase on the Williamsburg Bridge is one of the classic pieces of suspense cinema, as the armed and desperate killer races up the walkway past children playing and adults strolling, while detectives close in on foot from behind and patrol cars come up from ahead, with crowded subways rolling past, and then into the superstructure of the bridge for a stand-off and shootout. Sharp-eyed viewers will spot future character leads Paul Ford, James Gregory, John Marley, Kathleen Freeman, and Arthur O'Connell as well as familiar faces Tom Pedi, John Randolph, Molly Picon, and Walter Burke in the supporting cast. Cinematographer William Daniels and editor Paul Weatherwax won Oscars for their work, but awards might just as easily have been presented to director Jules Dassin, writers Albert Maltz and Malvin Wald, composers Miklos Rozsa and Frank Skinner, and, most notably, to producer/narrator Mark Hellinger, who intoned the closing monologue, which opens with one of the most famous tag lines in movie history: "There are eight million stories in the Naked City." ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

This story of two young hopefuls who come to Hollywood is merely a thin device to feature almost every star working for Paramount Studios in 1947. Mary Hatcher plays Catherine Brown, a woman of humble origins who arrives in Hollywood, where she meets another wanna-be movie star, Amber La Vonne (Olga San Juan). They work their way through the Paramount studios, trying to impress every important person. Mostly, the film is a cavalcade of songs by various stars that take place at several studio and Hollywood locations, including the famous Brown Derby restaurant. Many of the film's songs were written by Frank Loesser. Dorothy Lamour and Alan Ladd sing "Tallahassee"; Bing Crosby and Bob Hope play golf and sing a duet, "Harmony"; the Original Dixieland Jazz Band plays "Tiger Rag"; and a host of other top performers of the era appear in brief cameos. ~ Michael Betzold, Rovi

Walt Disney's animation/live action hybrid feature Victory Through Air Power is unabashed, and undeniably entertaining, wartime propaganda. At the time the film was made, Disney was fascinated with the theories of Major Alexander de Seversky, a proponent of strategic long-range bombing. Since America's military leaders did not altogether subscribe to Seversky's "revolutionary" notions, Disney hoped to win their support with this 65-minute film. Beginning with a semicomic animated history of aviation, the film then segues into a retelling of Seversky's accomplishments, with the Major himself appearing to explain key points of his theories. Switching back to animation, the finale shows Seversky's "dream air force" in action, scientifically bombing enemy war factories and supply lines and thereby incapactitating their power to make war. Released by United Artists rather than Disney's usual conduit RKO, Victory Through Air Power served its purpose both in terms of the War Effort and in terms of enlightening the civilians in the audience. It has not been seen theatrically since, though portions of the animated sequences have popped up on Disney's various TV anthology series. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The very first Disney feature to include live-action footage, this behind-the-scenes documentary about the studio's animation process includes the cartoon short of the title, which in later years was often exhibited separately from this film. Robert Benchley stars as himself, a visitor to the Disney lot, where he intends to pitch an animated version of the children's fairy tale The Reluctant Dragon by Kenneth Grahame to Walt Disney himself. Benchley wanders away from his studio-appointed guide and tours the facilities himself, where he sees various new cartoons in the process of being storyboarded, including a Baby Weems short. Benchley also meets Clarence Nash, the voice of Donald Duck, and a young animator (played by Alan Ladd) before being corralled to Disney's screening room, where he is shown the company's new short, none other than The Reluctant Dragon. ~ Karl Williams, Rovi

It was called "Disney's Folly." Who on earth would want to sit still for 90 minutes to watch an animated cartoon? And why pick a well-worn Grimm's Fairy Tale that every schoolkid knows? But Walt Disney seemed to thrive on projects which a lesser man might have written off as "stupid" or "impossible". Investing three years, $1,500,000, and the combined talents of 570 artists into Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Disney produced a film that was not only acknowledged a classic from the outset, but also earned 8,500,000 depression-era dollars in gross rentals. Bypassing early temptations to transform the heroine Snow White into a plump Betty Boop type or a woebegone ZaSu Pitts lookalike, the Disney staffers wisely made radical differentiations between the "straight" and "funny" characters in the story. Thus, Snow White and Prince Charming moved and were drawn realistically, while the Seven Dwarfs were rendered in the rounded, caricatured manner of Disney's short-subject characters. In this way, the serious elements of the story could be propelled forward in a believable enough manner to grab the adult viewers, while the dwarfs provided enough comic and musical hijinks to keep the kids happy. It is a tribute to the genius of the Disney formula that the dramatic and comic elements were strong enough to please both demographic groups. Like any showman, Disney knew the value of genuine horror in maintaining audience interest: accordingly, the Wicked Queen, whose jealousy of Snow White's beauty motivates the story, is a thoroughly fearsome creature even before she transforms herself into an ancient crone. Best of all, Snow White clicks in the three areas in which Disney had always proven superiority over his rivals: Solid story values (any sequence that threatened to slow down the plotline was ruthlessly jettisoned, no matter how much time and money had been spent), vivid etched characterizations (it would have been easier to have all the Dwarfs walk, talk and act alike: thank heaven that Disney never opted for "easy"), and instantly memorable songs (Frank Churchill, Leigh Harline, Paul J. Smith and the entire studio music department was Oscar-nominated for such standards-to-be as "Whistle While You Work" and "Some Day My Prince Will Come"). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi