Wallace Ford Movies
Once there was a film historian who opined that Wallace Ford was in more movies than any other character actor of his prominence. This is unlikely, but Ford was certainly kept busy in roles of all shapes and sizes during his 35-year movie career. Orphaned in infancy, Ford grew up in various British orphanages and foster homes (his search in the mid-1930s for his natural parents drew worldwide headlines). He first set foot on stage at age 11, playing in vaudeville and music halls before working his way up to Broadway. His inauspicious feature-film debut was in Swellhead (1931), a baseball melodrama which lay on the shelf for nearly five years before its release. He went on to play wisecracking leading roles in such "B"s as Night of Terror (1933), The Nut Farm (1935) and The Mystery of Mr. Wong (1935); the critics paid no heed to these minor efforts, though they always showered Ford with praise for his supporting roles in films like John Ford's The Informer (1935) and Alfred Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt (1943). He occasionally took a leave of absence from films to accept a stage role; in 1937, he created the part of George in the original Broadway production of Of Mice and Men (1937). As he grew balder and stockier, he remained in demand for middle-aged character roles, often portraying wistful drunks or philosophical ne'er-do-wells. Wallace Ford ended his film career with his powerful portrayal of Elizabeth Hartman's vacillating father in A Patch of Blue (1965). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide- 1946
In this drama, a husband becomes a single parent after his wife dies in childbirth. He is so engrossed in his newspaper career that he pays little attention to his daughter. He then meets and falls for a woman who chastises him for ignoring the child. He has just begun reestablishing his relationship with his daughter and is about to marry the woman when a convict escapes from prison and goes looking for the woman, who testified against him in court, to exact his murderous revenge. Fortunately, her fiance saves her and happiness ensues. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jane Frazee, Twinkle Watts, (more)
Up until its surisingly mundane finale, A Lawless Street is one of the best of the Randolph Scott westerns of the 1950s. Scott plays famed marshal Calem Ware, whose strenous activities on behalf of law and order have exacted a toll on his personal life. Keeping the peace in the town of Medicine Bend, Ware hopes to someday be reconciled with his ex-wife Tally Dickinson (Angela Lansbury), now a touring musical comedy star. Just as Tally arrives in Medicine Bend, Ware is forced to deal with big-time criminals Thorne (Warner Anderson) and Clark (John Emery), not to mention their hired gun Baskam (Michael Pate). Will he do his duty and rid the town of his outlaw element, or will he hang up his guns as Tally wants him to? One of the highlights of A Lawless Street is a lively saloon-hall number performed by Angela Lansbury, who is quite a dish in her revealing stage wardrobe. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Randolph Scott, Angela Lansbury, (more)
- 1941
Bucolic lawyer John Wayne takes on big-city corruption in A Man Betrayed. He sets out to prove that an above-suspicion politician (Edward Ellis) is actually a crook. The price of integrity is sweet in this instance, since Wayne happens to be in love with the politician's daughter (Frances Dee). Man Betrayed can be viewed from the vantage point of the 1990s as an attempt by Republic Pictures to broaden the range of its biggest star, John Wayne. That it doesn't quite work is forgotten as the audience luxuriates in the sheer professionalism of the whole endeavor--and besides, the Duke does get to put up his dukes on more than one occasion. Man Betrayed has been released under two alternate titles: Wheel of Fortune for American television, and Citadel of Crime (coincidentally the title of a like-vintage Republic "B" picture) for British audiences. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Wayne, Frances Dee, (more)
Shelley Winters won an Academy Award for her searing performance as Rose-Ann d'Arcy in A Patch of Blue. The star, however, is not Winters but Elizabeth Hartman, cast as d'Arcy's blind, sensitive daughter, Selina. A venomous prostitute, Rose-Ann treats both Selina and grandfather Ole Pa (Wallace Ford) like dirt. Fortunately, Selina finds a way out via the kindly Gordon Ralfe (Sidney Poitier), who befriends Hartman and tries to open up doors for her previously closed by her selfish mother. Despite the objections of the bigoted Rose-Ann and of Gordon's brother Mark (Ivan Dixon), a bond stronger than physical love is forged between Gordon and Selina. Brilliantly avoiding gooey sentiment throughout, A Patch of Blue was adapted for the screen by director Guy Green, from the novel Be Ready with Bells and Drums by Elizabeth Kata. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sidney Poitier, Shelley Winters, (more)
- 1936
This crime drama is set in the fictional San Francisco eatery, Mary Grady's Chowder House which is presided over by the crusty Mary, a tough broad with a marshmallow heart. One of her regulars is a newspaper reporter who decides to write about the widow Grady's long lost son who disappeared 15-years-ago. The trouble begins when a vagabond fugitive, who got in trouble after trying to prevent a murder, learns of the reporter's search and decides to pretend to be the prodigal son. At first the gruff Mary and her adopted daughter are skeptical. But later when the detective who pursues the killer closes in, they end up defending the young man. When the fugitive sees a picture of Mary's late husband, he realizes that the real killer is Mary's estranged son. Soon the widow and the reporter begin putting things together and find themselves closer to finding her real son. They do not know what he has done so the good-hearted fugitive tries to thwart them at every turn. This puts him in grave danger, but this doesn't sway him. Unfortunately, he fails and Mary finds her long-lost offspring, and just after he admits that he is her son, he is killed in a police shoot out. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mary Boland, Julie Haydon, (more)
- 1936
Despite its title, things get pretty noisy in MGM's Absolute Quiet. Lionel Atwill heads the cast as reclusive financier G. A. Axton, who squirrels himself away at a remote ranch to recuperate from an illness. The only other person at the ranch is Axton's secretary Laura Tait (Irene Hervey), but there's no hanky-panky; Laura is happily (or at least contentedly) married to Barney Tait (Harvey Stephens). Axton's solitude comes to an end when a plane makes a forced landing near his property. The passengers are herded into the ranch house by Jack (Wallace Ford) and Judy (Bernardine Hayes), a pair of inept bandits who'd been holding up the plane when it developed engine trouble. Seeking an opportunity to overpower the crooks are unemployed actor Gregory Bengard (Louis Hayward), crooked governor Pruden (Raymond Walburn) and newspaper reporter Chubby Rudd (Stuart Erwin). It soon develops that the passengers -- and Laura -- have more to fear from the mysterious G. A. Axton than they do from the gun-wielding Jack and Judy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lionel Atwill, Irene Hervey, (more)
- 1941
Humphrey Bogart plays Gloves Donahue, a rough-hewn but essentially decent New York gambler. The Runyonesque plot gets moving when Gloves tries to find out what's holding up his favorite restaurant's daily shipment of cheesecake. Paying a call on the bakery, Gloves stumbles into a Nazi spy ring, masterminded by Conrad Veidt. Mixed up in all this is nightclub singer Kaaren Verne, whose loyalties are in question in her early scenes but who turns out to be as true-blue as the patriotic Gloves. Combining a quick wit with quicker fists, Gloves and his "mob" thwart the Nazis before they're able to skip the country. The cast is a movie buff's dream, ranging from Jane Darwell as Bogart's mom to Peter Lorre as a cynical Nazi flunkey to William Demarest, Frank McHugh, Phil Silvers and Jackie Gleason as Bogie's favorite cohorts. The film's best scene would have us believe that Bogart could confound a gang of erudite Nazis with a steady stream of Manhattan slang. One shudders to think how leaden All Through the Night would have been had George Raft accepted the role of Gloves Donahue. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Humphrey Bogart, Conrad Veidt, (more)
- 1935
Charming but ruthless fugitive gangster Dutra (Brian Donlevy) demands that a doctor (Oscar Apfel) perform plastic surgery upon him. Emerging from the bandages with a new face, Dutra murders the doctor, changes his name to Dawson, and heads to California, secure in the belief that no one who can identify him is still living. Unfortunately for him, the sole link to Dawson's past, nurse Molly Lamont, is now working in Hollywood -- where Dawson is enjoying a whole new career as a movie star! Things move along comically until Dawson tips his hand by taking his leading lady Sheila (Phyllis Brooks) hostage. Salvation comes in the unlikely form of obnoxious studio-press-agent Joe Haynes (Wallace Ford). Also released as It Happened in Hollywood, Another Face is a very uneven blend of comedy and melodrama, making up in energy what it lacks in coherence. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Wallace Ford, Brian Donlevy, (more)
- 1932
"Are you listening?" was the catchphrase of early-1930s radio personality Tony Wons. Though Wons does not appear in the 1932 MGM programmer Are You Listening?, the film is concerned with the burgeoning broadcast industry. William Haines plays a wise-cracking radio writer who is tricked into confessing on the air that he murdered his wife. Whenever an actor normally associated with comedy roles plays a murderer (either actual or implied) in a film, it's usually a sign that his studio contract has come to an end. Such was the case of Are You Listening?, which proved to be William Haines' swan song at MGM, where he'd been employed since 1925. Perhaps as a going-away present, J.P. McEvoy's script contrives to give Haines three leading ladies: Madge Evans, Anita Page and Karen Morley (nobody outside the industry knew that Haines was in fact a homosexual, and MGM was determined to keep it that way). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- William Haines, Madge Evans, (more)
William K. Howard, a once-prestigious director fallen on hard times in 1939, proved that he still had the "right stuff" with the modest tearjerker Back Door to Heaven. Wallace Ford stars as Frankie, a pugnacious drifter stigmatized by his reform-school upbringing. Frankie and his former "classmate" Jud (Stu Erwin) try to go straight, but get mixed up in a robbery, during which a man is killed. Though not responsible for the murder, it is Frankie who is railroaded to the death house. Nonetheless, he manages to bust out -- just in time for his grammar school class reunion, presided over by teacher Miss Williams (Aline MacMahon), the only person who ever tried to give Frankie a break. Despite severe storytelling shortcomings and gaping logic holes, director Howard managed to make a silk purse out of the critically acclaimed Back Door to Heaven. However, what may once have been social realism, now seems more like a sentimental, mawkish melodrama. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Wallace Ford, Aline MacMahon, (more)
- 1947
A young woman rides out for vengeance against the marshall who killed her notorious outlaw mother in this western sequel to 1941's Belle Starr. Once in the rough-and-tumble town where he works she learns the surprising truth. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George Montgomery, Rod Cameron, (more)
In his first film in two years, James Cagney stars as Nick Condon, the American editor of a pre-WW2 Tokyo newspaper. When two of his best friends are horribly murdered, Condon suspects that the "peaceful" Japanese military government is up to no good. He dedicates himself to getting his hands on the "Tanka Plan," a Japanese blueprint for conquering the world, and bringing this document to the attention of the Free World. As a result, he is targeted for persecution by the corrupt Tokyo police and betrayed by a traitorous fellow journalist. On a pleasanter note, Condon makes the acquaintance of half-Chinese Iris Hilliard (Sylvia Sidney), who agrees to help him foil the Japanese High Command. As was customary in wartime films, virtually all the Japanese characters in Blood on the Sun are played by Chinese, Korean, and Caucasian actors; for example, Robert Armstrong is cast as Colonel Tojo, while Premiere Tenaka is enacted by John Emery. Having lapsed into the public domain, Blood on the Sun is available from several distributors and also exists in a computer-colorized version. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- James Cagney, Sylvia Sidney, (more)
The big-band mystique of the 1940s was explored by Blues in the Night. Future directors Richard Whorf and Elia Kazan star as, respectively, a neurotic band-leader and a carefree clarinettist. Their jazz band travels from one small-time gig to another, always hoping for their big break but always denied fame thanks to their own personal demons. Priscilla Lane and Betty Field portray (again respectively) the good and bad girls in the musicians' lives. While we're never treated to a full rendition of the title song, Blues in the Night scores with its melodramatic set pieces, including a gutsy climactic murder/suicide sequence involving Betty Field and escaped convict Lloyd Nolan. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Priscilla Lane, Betty Field, (more)
- 1932
Two small-town youths head for the Big Apple and somehow get mixed up with mobsters during a visit to the title park in this episodic comedy drama filmed on location. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1948
Randolph Scott is a single-minded gunman bent on tracking down and killing the white man responsible for an Indian raid on a stagecoach. Scott's fiancee was killed in the raid and a large army payroll was stolen. The villain is George Macready, a "solid citizen" with fingers in several dirty pies. The film's highlight is not the final confrontation with Macready but a brutal fistfight between Scott and minor heavy Forrest Tucker. Filmed in Cinecolor (a pleasing if limited two-color process), Coroner Creek was based on a novel by western specialist Luke Short. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Randolph Scott, Marguerite Chapman, (more)
- 1946
- NR
Art critic and forgery expert George Steele (Pat O'Brien) is apprehended by the police as he desperately tries to break into the Manhattan Museum in the opening scene of Crack-Up, a noir mystery directed by Irving Reis. Steele does not understand his own bizarre actions, but explains that he was in a train wreck and had to get back to the museum. Questioned by Lt. Cochrane (Wallace Ford), who tells him there have been no train wrecks in months, Steele relates, in flashback, the events leading up to the incident. Earlier in the day the head of the museum had suspended him for alienating wealthy patrons by criticizing "art snobs" in a lecture. He then received a phone call informing him that his mother was sick, and caught the train to the hospital, but never got there. Though suspicious of Steele, Cochrane is persuaded by the shadowy Mr. Traybin (Herbert Marshall) to release him so he can follow Steele. The next day Steele retraces his steps and discovers that someone had set him up to be discredited, though he knows neither who nor why. Following the murder of a friend who was trying to help him, he discovers that forgeries of some very famous paintings are at the heart of the matter, but getting to the culprit is a more difficult task. ~ Steve Press, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pat O'Brien, Claire Trevor, (more)
- 1950
Although Marie Windsor plays the title role in Dakota Lil, she is shunted away to third billing, right after male leads George Montgomery and Rod Cameron. Montgomery is cast as a secret service agent Tom Horn, sent West to round up a gang of counterfeiters. He starts by gaining the confidence of dance-hall girl Lil (Windsor), one of the ringleaders. She, in turn, leads Horn to the brains of the operation, Harve Logan
(Cameron). When Lil finds out that Horn is a Fed, she's tempted to fill him full of holes; instead, having fallen in love with him, she tries to help him get the goods on Logan. Dakota Lil was based on a story by Frank Gruber, later one of the leading lights of the TV-western craze. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
(Cameron). When Lil finds out that Horn is a Fed, she's tempted to fill him full of holes; instead, having fallen in love with him, she tries to help him get the goods on Logan. Dakota Lil was based on a story by Frank Gruber, later one of the leading lights of the TV-western craze. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George Montgomery, Rod Cameron, (more)
In Dead Reckoning, Rip Murdock (Humphrey Bogart) recites the film's plotline to a priest in the confessional. Murdock and Johnny Drake (William Prince) are Congressional Medal of Honor recipients, en route to Washington by train. Drake hops off and disappears, leading Murdock on a hectic manhunt. Upon meeting Drake's former girlfriend Coral Chandler (Lizabeth Scott), Murdock is thrown into a maelstrom of intrigue involving a crooked gambler (Morris Carnovsky) and a complex blackmailing scheme. The upshot of this is that Murdock finds himself the prime suspect in a murder. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Humphrey Bogart, Lizabeth Scott, (more)
- 1954
The third and (as of 1998) final film version of Max Brand's Destry Rides Again, this 1954 Audie Murphy vehicle owes more to the 1939 Jimmy Stewart version than it does to the Brand original. Murphy plays Tom Destry, the peace-loving son of a notorious gunslinger. Destry is summoned to a wide-open western town in hopes that he can stem the villainies of saloon owner Decker (Lyle Bettger) and crooked mayor Sellers (Edgar Buchanan). Though he prefers to talk rather than slap leather, Destry manages to keep the bad guys at bay. But when his best friend, town-drunk-turned-sheriff Rags Barnaby (Thomas Mitchell), is killed by Decker's minions, Destry straps on the shootin' irons and goes to work. Mari Blanchard essays the Marlene Dietrich role as vacillating saloon-hall chirp Brandy, while Lori Nelson is the "good"girl with whom Destry ultimately settles down. Though most of the highlights of Destry -- including the all-girl saloon brawl -- are lifted bodily from 1939's Destry Rides Again, the 1954 film lacks the light touch of the earlier picture, despite the fact that comedy craftsman George Marshall directed both pictures. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Audie Murphy, Mari Blanchard, (more)
- 1933
This drama, set within a boarding house, centers around a pregnant show girl abandoned by her boyfriend, a married man who conveniently returns to his wife. The despairing young woman considers ending her life, but is talked out of it by an aged couple. They themselves end up committing suicide. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Wallace Ford, Dorothy Tree, (more)
- 1948
In this drama, a killer and a driver accidently run over a girl while fleeing a murder scene. The pursuing detective is sure that the driver is guilty, but he cannot prove it. Instead of pressing his case, the detective has the driver begin caring for the victim who received a massive blood clot from the accident and does not have long to live. As time passes, the crook finds himself falling in love with her. To raise the needed money for her care, he starts blackmailing the killer. Eventually, the driver marries his victim but his happiness is short-lived. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dane Clark, Geraldine Brooks, (more)
- 1933
Warren William plays a high-powered ambitious executive who unflinchingly steamrolled his way to the top without regard for the havoc he left in his wake. As the manager of a Macy-like department store, he constantly browbeats his flunkies into submission, and ends-up driving at least one to suicide. Loretta Young plays the wife of one of William's minor employees (Wallace Ford), with whom the Big Boss has a brief affair during an office party. Eventually William gets his comeuppance, and Loretta is vindicated in the eyes of her hubby. A terrific example of pre-Motion Picture Production Code raciness, Employees' Entrance still causes audiences to gasp at its audaciousness when seen today--and also invokes loud laughter when William rebukes one of his errant vice presidents, asking him "What am I paying you so much for? Fifteen thousand a year!" ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Warren William, Loretta Young, (more)
Exiled to Shanghai uses the then-waging wars in Spain and China as backdrops for a familiar "rival reporters" yarn. Wallace Ford plays Ted Young, a brash newsreel cameraman who is fired by his dyspeptic editor Fred Sears (Dean Jagger) for photographing the wrong general during the Spanish Civil War. Down but not out, Ted embraces a new form of technology, establishing the first television newsreel service (and this was two years before commercial TV made its "official" American debut at the New York World's Fair). As a result, Ted is rehired and promoted to editor, while poor Fred ends up being transferred to China (hence the film's title). While all this is going on, Ted and Fred still find time to battle over heroine Nancy Jones (June Travis). A pretty good film on its own merits, Exiled to Shanghai has gained curiosity value by virtue of its use of TV journalism as a dramatic device. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Wallace Ford, June Travis, (more)
- 1952
In this boxing drama, a deaf-mute prizefighter whose career is on the rise falls in love with a gold digging singer who only loves him for his potential earnings. He is also loved by a wholesome journalist who loves him for himself. It is she that helps him get the operation that restores his hearing. Unfortunately, upon finally figuring out that it is she who really loves him, the fighter again loses his hearing during a championship bout. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tony Curtis, Jan Sterling, (more)
