Ralph Forbes Movies

Daphne du Maurier's novel formed the basis for this romantic adventure saga. Lady Dona St. Columb (Joan Fontaine), an English noblewoman, is unhappily married to the weak-willed Harry St. Columb (Ralph Forbes), while Harry's sinister best friend Lord Rockingham (Basil Rathbone) makes no secret of his desire for her. When she discovers the ship of a French pirate, Jean Benoit Aubrey (Arturo DeCordova), docked near her estate, she makes the acquaintance of the dashing buccaneer, and she soon finds herself infatuated with him. Dona impulsively joins Jean as he stages a raid against wealthy landowner Lord Godolphin (Nigel Bruce); when Dona learns that Harry and Rockingham plan to capture the pirate, she stages a dinner party to distract them and then sends word to Jean that he is in danger. Jean soon appears at the St. Columb estate, putting Harry and Rockingham behind bars and urging Dona to run away with him. She declines, choosing not to follow her heart but to instead stay home to raise her children; however, Rockingham overhears this conversation and uses it to blackmail Dona into having his way with her. Frenchman's Creek earned an Academy Award for Sam V. Comer's set decoration and design. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

British army pilot Stephen (George Brent) falls in love with jewel-thief Felice (Isa Miranda), tricking her out of some stolen diamonds. Stephen and South African Police Commissioner Lansfield (Nigel Bruce) set a trap for her partner Barclay (John Loder), but Felice falls for it instead. She's given parole in order to help Stephen and Lansfield trap a new, murderous ring of thieves, and she and Stephen start to fall in love. ~ Bill Warren, Rovi

Though it takes a few liberties with the Arthur Conan Doyle original -- not the least of which is turning Sherlock Holmes into the second lead -- The Hound of the Baskervilles ranks as one of the best screen versions of this oft-told tale. After learning the history of the Baskerville curse from the hirsute Dr. Mortimer (Lionel Atwill), Sherlock Holmes (Basil Rathbone) takes upon himself the responsibility of protecting sole heir Henry Baskerville (top-billed Richard Greene) from suffering the same fate as his ancestors: a horrible death at the fangs of the huge hound of Grimpen Moor. Unable to head to Baskerville mansion immediately, Holmes sends his colleague Dr. Watson (Nigel Bruce) to act as his surrogate. What Watson doesn't know is that Holmes, donning several clever disguises, is closely monitoring the activities of everyone in and around the estate. Meanwhile, young Henry falls in love with Beryl Stapleton (Wendy Barrie), sister of the effusively friendly John Stapleton (Morton Lowry). Holmes and Watson compare notes, a red herring character (John Carradine) is eliminated, Henry Baskerville is nearly torn to shreds by a huge hound, and the man behind the plot to kill Henry and claim the Baskerville riches for himself is revealed at the very last moment. The Hound of the Baskervilles "improves" upon the original with such embellishments as turning the villain's wife into his sister, and by interpolating a spooky séance sequence involving mystic Beryl Mercer. In other respects, it is doggedly (sorry!) faithful to Doyle, even allowing Holmes to bait the censor by asking Dr. Watson for "the needle" at fadeout time. A big hit in a year of big hits, The Hound of the Baskervilles firmly established Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce as moviedom's definitive Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this lively programmer a con man hires a character actor to masqueraded as the recently assassinated dictator of a tiny Latin American country so he can bilk an arriving American ambassador out of his fortune. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Zany actress Annabel goes on a promotional tour in this lively comedy, the second in the Annabel series. During her tour, she allows her promoter to "leak" a story that she is having a romantic fling with a famous romance novelist. The ploy is successful, until she really does fall in love with the writer and decides to abandon her acting career to be with him. Unfortunately, he is already married. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

If I Were King is a delightful costume adventure tale set in 14th century France, during the reign of Louis XI, and inspired by the legend of the rebel poet François Villon, whose exploits were filmed earlier as The Beloved Rogue (1927) with John Barrymore, and later transformed into the musical The Vagabond King on Broadway and onscreen. The movie opens with Paris surrounded by the forces of the Duke of Burgundy, whose armies have laid siege to the city in hopes of starving out King Louis XI (Basil Rathbone, in a riveting performance), a wily, cruel monarch who distrusts all around him -- mostly, however, Burgundy has succeeded in forcing Louis to hunker down and in starving the common people of Paris, whose well-being their king can't be bothered about.

The one man in Paris with the courage to raise a hand to ease the suffering is François Villon (Ronald Colman), a gifted poet and glib orator who understands the common people far better than Louis. We first meet him leading a raid on the king's storehouse for sorely needed food and wine. Pursued by the king's guards, he accidentally crosses paths with Louis himself -- trying to uncover a nest of traitors -- at a tavern, and is captured. Louis would normally have Villon put to death without a second thought, but the rebel poet has done him the service of killing a treasonous officer, and has also piqued the king's interest with his notion of inspiring loyalty rather than fear in his subjects. The king also wishes to show Villon that it isn't always easy, even with all of the power of the crown on one's side, to rule a kingdom, or even the capitol city of a kingdom. Louis appoints Villon to the post of Constable of France, in command of all military and police authorities, and nominally in charge of the army, and leaves it to him to do his job -- with the provision that, at the end of a week in so powerful a position, Villon will, indeed, hang. Villon does a very good job of dispensing justice in a way that makes his followers love the king, and even turns one traitor into a loyalist. He is less successful at getting the titled nobility on his side, or the generals to rally their armies for the task at hand, breaking the siege, and is further distracted from his task by his romantic entanglements, with Ellen Drew as the girl of the streets who loves Villon and Frances Dee as the lady-in-waiting to the queen who has stolen his heart.

Director Frank Lloyd uses the same sure hand that propelled his Oscar-nominated Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) to weave together the telling of this lusty and witty tale (from a clever screenplay by Preston Sturges, who added his own translations of Villon's poetry to the original script); but the real interest for most viewers will reside with the sparks that fly from the performances of Colman and Rathbone as the two equally matched antagonists, each toying with the other's perceived weaknesses (especially their vanity) while, in his way, secretly admiring elements of the other's character. In the end, Sturges' script cleverly interweaves their common interests, Villon realizing that he must save Paris in order to keep from losing his head. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

In this crime drama, an escaped prisoner forces a dim-bulbed architect to exchange clothing with him. Later the bungler ends up on the seedy side of town in a dive where he inadvertently gets involved with dangerous jewel thieves, the mob, and a beautiful singer. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Based on a popular drawing-room drama by Frederick Lonsdale, The Last of Mrs. Cheyney stars Joan Crawford as a jewel thief who poses as an aristocrat. It is Crawford's intention to pilfer a valuable pearl necklace while attending a society party in the company of partner-in-crime William Powell. Here she attracts the attention of Robert Montgomery, a young nobleman who is amused by Crawford's wittiness in the face of the haughty bitchery of Benita Hume. When Montgomery turns out to be a bounder and Powell and Crawford are revealed to be criminals, Crawford does some quick thinking that not only gets her off the hook but puts the two-faced Montgomery in his place as well. Previously filmed in 1929 with Norma Shearer in the lead, The Last of Mrs. Cheyney would itself be remade in 1951 as The Law and the Lady, with Greer Garson as the heroine. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The 1937 Thirteenth Chair was the third film version of the 1919 stage melodrama by Bayard Veiller. Dame Mae Whitty dominates the proceedings as Mme. La Grange, a phony mystic who is on hand when a man is killed during one of her seances. The killing takes place in the home of a provincial British Indian governor, and the victim was a blackmailer whom everyone present had good reason to despise. Complicating matters for Mme. La Grange is the fact that one of the suspects, Nell O'Neill (Madge Evans) is her own daughter. Dissatisfied with the manner in which brusque Scotland Yard inspector Marney (Lewis Stone) is investigating the case, La Grange takes matters in her own hands, stage-managing a second seance so that the guilty party will be frightened into a confession. More slickly produced than the 1929 version of Thirteenth Chair, the remake isn't quite as enjoyable, lacking two vital ingredients: Margaret Wycherly and Bela Lugosi, the earlier version's Mme. LaGrange and Inspector Marney. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Maxwell Anderson's blank-verse play Mary of Scotland was adapted for the screen by Dudley Nichols and directed with a surprising paucity of verve by John Ford. Katharine Hepburn, in one of the "icy" roles that would later earn her the onus of "box office poison", stars as Mary Stuart, who serves as the Queen of Scotland until she is jealously put out of the way by her British cousin, Queen Elizabeth I (Florence Eldredge). Sold out by the Scots nobles, Mary is sentenced to the chopping block for treason. Elizabeth is willing to pardon Mary if only the latter will renounce all claims to the British throne, but Mary refuses, marching to her death with head held high (the Mary/Elizabeth confrontation scene was purely the product of Maxwell Anderson's imagination; in real life, the two women never met). RKO contractee Ginger Rogers dearly coveted the role of Queen Elizabeth, but the studio refused to allow her to play so secondary a role. To prove to the RKO executives that she would be ideal for the part, Ginger secretly arranged for a screen test, in which she was convincingly made up as Elizabeth (even to the point of cutting her hair into a high-foreheaded widow's peak). Contemporary reports indicate that Ginger's audition was brilliant; still, RKO would not consider casting her in the part, so the role of Elizabeth went to Florence Eldridge, the wife of Fredric March, who was cast in Mary of Scotland as Mary's fearless protector the Earl of Bothwell. On the whole, Mary of Scotland is a snoozefest, save for the scenes featuring Douglas Walton as Mary's cowardly husband Darnley. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Universal contractee Henry Hunter never became a big star, but during his brief stay at the studio he appeared in a quite a few interesting films. Adapted from a novel by Rufus King, Love Letters of a Star casts Hunter as John Aldrich, the husband of the unfortunate Jenny Aldrich (Mary Alice Rice). When Jenny dies under mysterious circumstances, it is revealed that she was being blackmailed with a packet of love letters she'd written to Broadway celebrity Meredith Landers (Ralph Forbes). No sooner has Jenny's death been ruled a suicide than her blackmailer is murdered, immediately casting suspicion about the girl's grieving husband John. For a while, wealthy Artemus Todd (Samuel S. Hinds) is led to believe that he was the killer, but there's many another surprise twists before the final fadeout. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Director George Cukor and producer Irving G. Thalberg's adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, a lavish production of Shakespeare's tale about two star-crossed lovers, is extremely well-produced and acted. In fact, it is so well-done, that it is easy to forget that Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer are too old to be playing the title characters. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi