Tom Phipps Movies
MGM's A Yank at Eton follows the same basic formula as the 1938 Robert Taylor starrer A Yank at Oxford, with a wartime angle thrown in. This time it's Mickey Rooney as the cocky young American who is shipped off to England to complete his education. Upon his arrival in the hallowed halls of Eton, Timothy Daniels (Rooney), bereft of common courtesy or a sense of tradition, wastes no time alienating the rest of the students. Eventually of course, Timothy knocks the chip off his own shoulder and becomes a model student and top athlete. Freddie Bartholomew, Rooney's costar in so many MGM classics of the 1940s, plays Timothy's upper-classman half-brother Peter Carlton, who applies a little "tough love" to bring our headstrong hero into line; also seen as the school bully is new MGM contractee Peter Lawford, who in 1938 had made his American film debut in the Rooney-Bartholomew starrer Lord Jeff. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mickey Rooney, Edmund Gwenn, (more)
This comedy is based on George M. Cohan's popular play and centers on an American businessman and his family who journey to England to meet a prominent English lord. It is an important meeting complicated by the fact that neither men care for each other's nationality. Unfortunately, their children have no such bias and they end up falling in love, forcing the two men to reconcile their differences. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Alfred Drayton, Robertson Hare, (more)
In this farce, a photographer gives up his successful career so that he can become a painter. Unfortunately, he is a terrible artist. Fortunately, his ex-secretary supports him all the way and eventually becomes his wife. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
A loving mother sacrifices all for her son in this drama. She is an artist's model who finds herself financially drained by a dead-beat artist when she falls in love with a younger man, marries him and bears a son. When her beloved husband dies in the war, the old artist tries to win her back. When that doesn't work, he lures her into his studio and pulls a gun on her. During the ensuing struggle, she accidentally shoots him and ends up spending 15 years in jail. Upon her release she heads for America to keep her son from discovering the truth. In the States, she gets involved with a gambler, but then returns to England and discovers her son is being flimflammed by gamblers. She then saves him from losing it all, but the ungrateful son only has eyes for his lover and his mother slowly fades from view. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bebe Daniels, Arthur Margetson, (more)
In this offbeat spy drama, an opera diva is suspected of leaking classified information for enemy spies. To see if this is true, a talented policeman is engaged to go undercover as a chorus member. While there, he finds himself the object of another singer's affections. Trouble ensues because the diva also falls for him and the two singers become bitter rivals. Eventually the other singer proves that all suspicions were correct--the prima donna really is a spy. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
In this WW I drama, an English soldier falls in love with an innkeeper's daughter. She is engaged to a German-born fellow who turns out to be a spy. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
In this comedy, an American chorine travels to France with a low-budget revue and nearly ends up stranded there. Fortunately, a handsome Frenchman proposes to her. Believing that he is wealthy, she accepts. Unfortunately, he deceived her and now the bride must live in a ramshackle hovel with his three children on his little farm. She is terribly disappointed, but rather than quit, she tries to make the best of things. This is difficult as a schoolteacher is terribly jealous and torments the dancer at every turn. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Glenda Farrell, Claude Hulbert, (more)








