Mabel Smaney Movies

Toward the end of Jerry Lewis's Paramount studio period, Lewis slapped together this bitter comedy about Hollywood phoniness and fame that has to be the most rancid portrait of the Hollywood star system in the Rat Pack era this side of Clifford Odets. When a famous entertainer suddenly is killed in an airplane crash, his team of flunkies -- producer Caryl Fergusson (Everett Sloane), writer Chic Wymore (Phil Harris), press agent Harry Silver (Keenan Wynn), director Morgan Heywood (Peter Lorre in his final film role), valet Bruce Alden (John Carradine), and secretary Ellen Betz (Ina Balin) -- decide to continue their life style by finding a complete unknown and manufacturing him into a Hollywood star. That unknown turns out to be the nervous and inept bellboy Stanley Belt (Jerry Lewis). They train Stanley to become an over-night singing sensation, and despite a disastrous recording session and a failed nightclub performance, the public relations blitz makes Stanley's recording of "I Lost My Heart in a Drive-In Movie" a smash single. So much so that Stanley is given a shot at appearing on "The Ed Sullivan Show." Expecting the worst, Stanley's management team abandons him right before his performance. But Stanley musters up enough confidence to go on the live program alone and manages to surprise his pessimistic ex-staff. A collection of Hollywood celebrities circa 1964 --George Raft, Ed Wynn, Ed Sullivan, Mel Torme, Rhonda Fleming and Hedda Hopper -- make cameo appearances. High spots include an apocalyptic music lesson with voice teacher Dr. Mule-rrr (Hans Conried), Ed Sullivan performing a bizarre impersonation of himself, and an ending that would make even Jean-Luc Godard blush. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Though Humphrey Bogart is the official star of Knock on Any Door, the film is essentially a showcase for Columbia's newest young male discovery John Derek. The first production of Bogart's Santana company, the film casts Bogart as attorney Andrew Morton. A product of the slums, Morton is persuaded to take the case of underprivileged teenager Nick Romano (Derek), who has been arrested on a murder charge. Through flashbacks, Morton demonstrates that Romano is more a victim of society than a natural-born killer. Though this defense strategy does not have the desired result on the jury thanks to the badgering of DA Kernan (George Macready), Morton does manage to arouse sympathy for the plight of those trapped by birth and circumstance in a dead-end existence. As Nick Romano, John Derek would never be better, nor would ever again play a character who struck so responsive a chord with the audience. Nick's oft-repeated credo--"Live fast, die young, and leave a good-looking corpse"--became the clarion call for a generation of disenfranchised youth. Director Nicholas Ray would later expand on themes touched upon in Knock on a Any Door in his juvenile delinquent "chef d'oeuvre" Rebel without a Cause. Viewers are advised to watch for future TV personalities Cara Williams and Si Melton in uncredited minor roles. Knock on Any Door spawned a belated sequel in 1960, Let No Man Write My Epitaph. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Both Van Johnson and Gregory Peck were considered for the role of baseball star Monty Stratton in the 1949 biopic The Stratton Story before settling upon the real Stratton's own first choice, James Stewart. The film covers several years in the 1930s, as Texas farm boy Stratton rises from the minors to the Chicago White Sox. Along the way, Monty marries an Omaha gal named Ethel (June Allyson), who gives him a son. In November 1938, Monty accidentally shoots himself in the leg while on a hunting excursion. When the leg has to be amputated, it looks as though Stratton's pitching career is over. He broods over his bad luck for months before snapping out of his self-pity and learning to walk with his new prosthesis. To prove to himself that he's overcome his handicap, Monty takes a job pitching with the Southern All-Stars. His return to baseball is rough sledding (the other team persistently bunts balls out of his reach), but Monty Stratton is finally able to make a successful comeback. Only occasionally playing fast and loose with the facts (the time-frame of Stratton's real-life return to baseball is telescoped by several years), The Stratton Story was one of the best and most profitable baseball pictures ever turned out by Hollywood. Fans of the game will get an extra kick from the presence in the cast of big-leaguers Bill Dickey and Jimmy Dykes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A man down on his luck runs afoul of a beautiful but dangerous woman in this superior low-budget film noir. Mike Lambert (Glenn Ford), while trained as a mining engineer, has fallen on hard times and is driving a truck when his rig breaks down in a small town. He soon meets the seductive Paula Craig (Janis Carter) at a cafe and is quickly drawn into her web of larceny. Paula encourages her lover, Stephen Price (Barry Sullivan), to rob the bank that he manages, then kills Stephen and takes the ill-gotten money. Paula confesses the killing to Mike and begs him to run away with her, claiming she murdered Price in a fit of passion while she was drunk. Mike considers her offer until he learns that his close friend Jeff Cunningham (Edgar Buchanan) has been accused of killing Stephen -- and that Paula intends to pin the robbery that Stephen committed on Mike. Femme Fatale Janis Carter originally studied to be a classical musician before her career as an actress took off, while Edgar Buchanan's big break would come 16 years down the road, when he was cast as "Uncle Joe" on the television series Petticoat Junction. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide