José Crespo Movies

Filmed in Hollywood for the Spanish-language market, Tengo Fe En Ti (I Believe In You) was distributed in North and South America by RKO Radio. Rosita Moreno plays a dual role, appearing as prima ballerina Anna Tabor in the early scenes and as Anna's grown-up daughter Maria Ratyani in the rest of the film. The film's best performance is rendered by Franco (Frank) Puglia as Enrico Buriani, a heartbroken ballet teacher who raises Maria as his own daughter despite the fact that Anna had betrayed him many years earlier. Still in love with Anna's memory, Buriani grooms Maria to take her late mother's place in the ballet world. When she inevitably leaves her foster father in favor of a movie contract and a marriage to director Rodolfo Rey (Jose Crespo), Buriani swears vengeance, only to be dissuaded at the last moment by the realization that Maria has her own life to lead. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This low-budget precursor to Howard Hawks' Only Angels Have Wings stars Jack Holt as Bob Kent, the head of a charter-airplane service in South America. When not risking his life flying mail and supplies through the treacherous Andes, Kent must contend with the earthbound hostilities between his Bolivian and Paraguayan employees. He also gets into hot water by attempting to romance Theresa (Mona Barrie), never suspecting that she's the wife of Bolivian major Tovar (Antonio Moreno). The conclusion finds Kent taking to the air in mortal combat against a renegade pilot. For a man who was reportedly deathly afraid of flying, Jack Holt certainly made more than his share of aviation pictures. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Action expert "Breezy" Eason called the shots on this quickie comedy-melodrama. Frank Albertson stars as the publicity man for a Poverty Row studio. Thrown off the lot because of his drunken insolence, the PR man plans a comeback by convincing a foreign director (John Davidson) to film the life story of a notorious gangster. A stickler for realism, the director insists that a genuine gangster be engaged to play the leading role. The publicity man engages the services of a tough-looking bit player (Jose Crespo), only to discover that he's actually hired the crook whose life is about to be immortalized on celluloid! All ends happily when the PR man's renegade production makes a major star out of his sweetheart (June Clyde). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

His Glorious Night, the 1929 film version of Ferenc Molnar's Olympia, proved an embarrassment for MGM due to the starring performance of silent-screen idol John Gilbert. Legend has it that audiences laughed at Gilbert's high-pitched, girlish voice; the truth is that Gilbert's vocal timbre was acceptable enough, but the dialogue written for him was horrendous, and his delivery of that dialogue even worse. One suspects that José Crespo, who played Gilbert's role in Olimpia, the Spanish-language version of One Glorious Night, fared somewhat better than his American counterpart, if only because the florid dialogue might have played better in a different language. Substantially, the Spanish version is the same as the original: Young Captain Kovacs, in love with the beautiful Princess Orsolini, is thwarted by the princess' mother, who has promised her daughter's hand to another. In retaliation, Kovacs begins spreading rumors that he himself is a no-good swindler, and that he has a packet of the princess' love letters which he will make public unless the girl is allowed to spend the night with him. She does, but before anything untoward can happen, hero and heroine are married -- which is what Kovacs intended all along. Olimpia was out of date even in 1929 and wasn't any more effective when it was remade as A Breath of Scandal in 1960. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Mexican-born Dolores Del Rio is convincingly cast as a fiery Hungarian lass in Revenge. Yet another variation on The Taming of the Shrew, the film concentrates on the tempestuous relationship between whip-wielding Rascha (Del Rio), the daughter of a bear tamer, and virile Hussar officer Jorga (Leroy Mason). Kidnapping Rascha, Jorga demands that she become his wife -- and a docile, obedient one at that. The more Rascha protests against this set-up (and she puts up quite a fight!), the more Jorga falls in love with her. By film's end, Rascha is as sweet and subservient as any of her daddy's trained bears, but one still wonders how long this will last. A silent film, Revenge was released with a synchronized musical score. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide