Priscilla Moran Movies
- 1937
After a year-long period of starring in such heavy fare as Maid of Salem, Claudette Colbert returned to comedy with I Met Him in Paris. Colbert plays a successful American fashion designer, squired by three suitors: playwright Melvyn Douglas, playboy Robert Young and hometown lad Lee Bowman. Bowman is fourth-billed, so that lets him out. Young is already married: Strike Two. That leaves Melvyn Douglas, who is indeed the winner of this three-way race. Most of the film takes place at a vacation resort in Switzerland (actually Sun Valley, Idaho), where several minutes of humor is extracted from the three suitors' clumsiness on skis. I Met Him in Paris charmed the critics in 1937; today it seems like just another pleasant diversion, served up by experts in the comedy field. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Melvyn Douglas, (more)
- 1937
In this sports drama, framed by the annual Army-Navy football game, a freshman footballer at the Naval Academy falls in love with a pretty girl who is already going with one of his upper-class team cohorts. Their rivalry creates problems until the day of the Big Game when they unite on the last crucial play. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lew Ayres, Mary Carlisle, (more)
- 1928
While her grandpa is recuperating from an accident, 8-year-old Patsy O'Day (Priscilla Moran) stumbles across an abandoned baby. She "adopts" the kid on the spot, hiding it from the authorities. An evil landlady tries to turn Patsy and the baby over to the orphanage officials, leading to a merry chase throughout the city. The plot is resolved when Patsy's grandfather Michael (William V. Mong) is released from the hospital, whereupon he immediately and legally adopts both children. No Babies Wanted was also released under the title The Baby Mother; by either name, it failed to transform Priscilla Moran into a female Jackie Coogan. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1926
Hungry Arms was written, produced and directed by Anthony Moran. Starred in the leading role was his little daughter Priscilla Moran. Living with her grocer grandpa (William V. Mong), precocious Priscilla O'Day (Priscilla Moran) discovers a baby on her doorstep. She insists on keeping the infant, but Grandad does his civic duty and prepares to inform the authorities. En route, he is struck down by a speeding auto and incapacitated for the rest of the picture. Meanwhile, the baby's mother inaugurates a search for the child. She doesn't have to search long: hoping to raise some extra money, Priscilla enters the kid in a "beautiful baby" contest, winning first prize. When the baby is inevitably taken away from Priscilla, the plucky girl kidnaps the infant -- and on it goes until a happy ending is finally reached, undoubtedly to the relief of the exhausted audience. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Priscilla Moran, William V. Mong, (more)
- 1925
This routine domestic drama was based on a stage play by Owen Davis. Jane Cornwall, a wealthy heiress (Virginia Valli), secretly uses her fortune to help her sweetheart, James Van Clinton (Forrest Stanley), perfect his invention -- a "Tele-Vision-Scope" (a device which enables people to see each other while talking on the phone). After the device succeeds, Jane and Van Clinton wed and begin a family. After a few years of marriage, Van Clinton becomes bored and falls prey to the charms of Helen Newhall (Margaret Livingston). He neglects his business, forcing his partner to sell his half in order to save the company. To Van Clinton's surprise, his partner isn't Judge Seymour (George Fawcett), like he thought -- it's Jane. And Jane, who has discovered the affair (through the use of the Tele-Vision-Scope, no less), refuses to help him out. Now that he's made a royal mess out of his life, Van Clinton buckles down and really gets to work. Once he has learned a bit of humility, Jane and his young daughter return. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Virginia Valli, Forrest Stanley, (more)
- 1922
This tragic tale of the Orient was only the second feature film in which a color film process invented by Technicolor was used throughout (and was the first to use their subtractive two-color process). It stars the stunningly beautiful Anna May Wong as Lotus Flower, a Chinese girl who finds an American sailor washed up on the shore. The sailor, Allen Carver (Kenneth Harlan), professes to love her and they marry. He goes back out to the sea and Lotus Flower has a baby. But Carver is a faithless man, and he returns to China with an American wife, Barbara (Beatrice Bentley). Lotus Flower is devastated. She hands the baby over to Barbara and then "pays her debt to the sea" by throwing herself into it and drowning. Barbara adopts the child, as per Lotus Flower's last wishes. If this story seems to bear some similarities to Madame Butterfly, scenarist Frances Marion didn't exactly deny it. In fact, she later said it was "practically the step-daughter of Madame Butterfly." Despite its lack of an original story, Technicolor made it a success. But the process was so complicated -- in those days, the blue-greens were photographed on one strip of film, and orange-reds on another, to be glued together later -- that it took many more years and innovations before color was commonly used. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anna May Wong, Kenneth Harlan, (more)
