Dick Curtis Movies

City of Silent Men comes so close to being a "model" "B" picture that it's a downright shame it just misses the mark. The plot revolves around a group of ex-convicts who try to start life anew by relocating in a small town under assumed names. The mayor of the town welcomes the former cons with open arms, helping them re-open a dormant canning factory and encouraging them to hire other reformed criminals. Alas, the bigoted local newspaper editor stirs up public hostility towards the new cannery and its owners, but everything is resolved happily when the ex-cons are awarded a defense contract. City of Silent Men could easily have lapsed into pointless melodrama, but the sincerity of the performers and the strength of Joseph Hoffman's screenplay keep the events on an even and realistic keel. All City of Silent Men lacks is a decent budget, but that's to be expected in a PRC Picture from this period. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Originally written as a stage vehicle for corpulent character actor Macklyn Arbuckle, Ernest Day's The Roundup was first filmed in 1920 with Fatty Arbuckle (no relation) in the lead. By the time the film was remade in 1941, Arbuckle's character, a roly-poly frontier sheriff named Slim (!), was refashioned as a supporting role, with Jack Benny's radio announcer Don Wilson essaying the part. The plot, however, remained fairly intact: Upon hearing that her fiance Greg (Preston Foster) has been killed, Janet (Patricia Morison) agrees to marry rancher Steve (Richard Dix) on the rebound. On the day of the wedding, who should show up but Greg, determined to raise as much Hell as humanly possible. A rewritten finale permits the Steve-Janet-Greg triangle to resolve itself without offening the Hays Office. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The famous outlaw rides again in this fictionalized western that chronicles Billy's turn from criminal to fine upstanding citizen. The film received an Oscar nomination for its color cinematography. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Mystery Ship was one of the last of Columbia's pre-Pearl Harbor "preparedness" melodramas. Paul Kelly and Larry Parks are cast as G-men Allan Harper and Tommy Baker, assigned to maintain control on a most unusual prison ship. The "passengers" are crooks and saboteurs who've been designated as undesirables and shipped off for deportation to an unnamed foreign country. While on the high seas, the human "cargo" mutinies, which could spell curtains for Harper and actually does precipitate the death of Baker. Making matters worse is the presence of newspaper reporter Patricia Marshall (Lola Lane), who stowed away in the first reel and may not survive to the last. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The second of Columbia Pictures' four "Wild Bill Saunders" westerns, Pioneers of the Frontier features William Elliott as the title character who discovers that his uncle Mort (Lafe McKee) has been murdered by an unscrupulous ranch foreman, Matt Brawley (Dick Curtis). But before he can right Brawley's wrongs, Wild Bill is arrested for a murder he didn't commit. Sidekick Cannonball Sims (Dub Taylor) and disgruntled girl rancher Joan Darcy (Dorothy Comingore) plot to break Wild Bill out of jail but Brawley is wise to their plan. Wild Bill nevertheless manages to escape and concocts a plan to trap Brawley and his men. The scheme succeeds but before he can settle down, Wild Bill heeds the call of a friend in trouble and rides off to bring law and order to another violent part of the Old West. Preceded by Taming of the West (1939), Pioneers of the Frontier was followed by two additional "Wild Bill Saunders" westerns: The Man from Tumbleweeds and The Return of Wild Bill (both 1940). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Few studios churned out prison pictures with as much frequency as Columbia Pictures. In Men Without Souls, young Johnny Adams (Glenn Ford) deliberately gets himself thrown in prison to accumultate incriminating evidence against Capt. White (Cy Kendall), the sadistic guard responsible for death of Johnny's father. Unfortunately Johnny is swept up in a prison break engineered by cell-block boss Blackie Drew (Barton MacLane), which culminates in the murder of White. Our hero is saved from the electric chair through the intervention of obligatory prison chaplain Reverend Storm (John Litel). Meanwhile, Johnny's true-blue girlfriend Susan Leonard (Rochelle Hudson) awaits the outcome of events on "the outside". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Clark Gable is "Big John" and Spencer Tracy is "Square John"; both "Johns" seek their fortunes in the Texas oil fields. They simultaneously fall in love with Claudette Colbert, but it's "Big John" who wins out. When both Johns grow rich on oil, "Big John" lets money go to his head, and he begins neglecting wife Colbert for Hedy Lamarr, the "been around" companion of businessman Lionel Atwill. "Square John", who still carries a torch for Colbert but doesn't want to see her heart broken, tries to buy off Lamarr; when this fails, he decides to ruin "Big John" financially. But when "Big John" is charged with violating anti-trust rules by the crooked Atwill, "Square John" rushes to the side of his old pal. Both men end up where they started--broke but happy. "Big John" returns to faithful Colbert, while "Square John" stands by with an ear-to-ear grin. Boom Town was the last film to co-star Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy; though Tracy was fond of Gable, he resented playing "eunuch" in their on-screen romantic triangles. Claudette Colbert's scenes with Clark Gable are pleasant enough, but the sparks that had ignited their scenes in It Happened One Night are largely absent here. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The major difference between Bullets for Rustlers and the previous entries in Charles Starrett's western series is that Lorna Gray, rather than Iris Meredith, plays the heroine. Otherwise, it's the mixture as before, with hero Starrett working side by side with the Cattlemen's Protective Association to flush out a gang of rustlers. The story moves along in utterly predictable fashion to the anticipated climactic mano y mano fight between Starrett and perennial bad guy Dick Curtis. The film's highlight is a well-mounted stagecoach chase, which would pop up with regularity via stock footage in future Starrett vehicles. And as always, the musical interludes are served up by Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In addition to being a fine Western in its own right, this film served to introduce perhaps Hollywood's oddest romantic couple: the gruff but lovable Wallace Beery and the tart but lovable Marjorie Main. Beery plays "Reb" Harkness who, with his Mexican pal Pete (Leo Carrillo), is almost caught red-handed attempting to rob a train carrying General Custer (Paul Kelly) and the cavalry. Double-crossed by his partner and with the cavalry in hot pursuit, Reb escapes to Wyoming where he finds shelter on a ranch belonging to orphaned Lucy Kinkaid (Anne Rutherford) and her kid brother Jimmy (Bobs Watson). The local ranchers are battling an unscrupulous empire builder, Buckley (Joseph Calleia), and Reb is involuntarily dragged into the feud. When plain-speaking blacksmith Mehitabel (Marjorie Main) loses her brother to Buckley's bullets, Reb takes matters into his own hands, and with the help of Custer's men, he manages to end Buckley's reign of terror. Casting plain-looking, twangy Marjorie Main as Beery's leading lady was a stroke of genius. The two actors complimented each other to the nth degree, and Main was seen as a worthy replacement of the late Marie Dressler. As a result, the former stage actress (Dead End) was put under a seven-year contract by MGM, who co-starred her with Beery in Barnacle Bill (1941), The Bugle Sounds (1941), Jackass Mail (1942), Rationing (1944), and Bad Bascomb (1946). Wyoming, which also benefitted from fine performances by Henry Travers as a sly sheriff and Stanley Fields as Buckley's chief henchman, was filmed on location at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and the Grand Tetons National Park by a director, Richard Thorpe, who had worked in the Western field since the silent days. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Whether in the newsroom or on board a speeding train, aspiring reporter Buster Keaton creates havoc in this funny short. To get Keaton out of his hair, the city editor (Vernon Dent) assigns him to shadow a wealthy woman (Dorothy Appleby) who is taking the train to Reno to divorce her mobster husband (Richard Fiske). Keaton travels with his parrot Clarice, and because its cooing sounds like the wife, the jealous gangster attacks Keaton in his berth. A wild chase ensues which ends with Keaton trussing up the gangster in the train's emergency chord, thus winning himself a spot on the newspaper as a star reporter. Note that producer/director Jules White remade this script (written by longtime Keaton collaborator Clyde Bruckman) as the 1947 Columbia two-reeler Rolling Down to Reno starring Harry Von Zell. ~ Nicole Gagne, All Movie Guide

This is the celebrated Blondie episode that costars Rita Hayworth, who in 1940 was still just another Columbia contract actress. Hayworth plays an old flame of Dagwood Bumstead's (Arthur Lake), who moves into the Bumstead household when wife Blondie (Penny Singleton) advertises for a boarder. Blondie (Penny Singleton) tries to be civil when she meets Rita, but her true feelings are manifested in a superimposed montage of explosions and gunshots. Innocently caught in a compromising position with Hayworth at a local movie house, Dagwood is shown the door by the heartbroken Blondie. All misunderstandings are swept away by fadeout time in this fifth installment in Columbia's Blondie series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Charles Starrett plays the title role in Stranger from Texas, but he's no stranger to the cliches inherent in the film's plotline. Things get under way when US marshal Tom (Starrett) finds himself in the midst of a range war. The villains are a band of rustlers who play both sides of the confrontation against one another, the better to move in and claim all the livestock. In time-honored fashion, the plot is resolved with a fistfight between Charles Starrett and his perennial screen foe Dick Curtis. Lorna Gray substitutes for Starrett's usual leading lady Iris Meredith. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide