Bobby Gordon Movies

This drama is set at a struggling radio station. To drum up more listeners, the station owner dredges up an old mystery and tells her announcer to make it into a serial. He and his secretary are against the idea because the story is true. The broadcasts create problems for the woman originally acquitted of the charge. Over the last two decades, she has married and raised a daughter who is getting ready to marry the son of a prominent industrialist. The airing of her mother's old dirty laundry threatens to destroy her upcoming nuptials. The mother and her husband are so distraught that they kill themselves. The bereaved daughter, blaming the radio station for her parents' demise, goes there to kill the announcer. Her fiancé follows and mayhem ensues. The story is also called One Fatal Hour. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Student Tour looks like an MGM musical two-reeler that was expanded to feature length as it went along. Charles Butterworth and Jimmy Durante are teamed respectively as fey philosophy professor Lippincott and brash athletic coach Hank. The two comics shepherd a co-ed college rowing team on a world tour, with orders to keep the team's rowdy captain Bobby (Phil Regan) out of trouble. Lackluster leading lady Maxine Doyle co-stars as Ann, a plain-jane who takes off her glasses at a Monte Carlo masquerade ball and wins BMOC Bobby for her very own. Ann also brings the story to a rousing conclusion by substituting for the cockswain in the climatic rowing race, urging the team to victory with a peppy song-and-dance. Nelson Eddy also shows up to sing "The Carlo," a pulsating number obviously inspired by "Bolero." The film's giddy highlight is "Taj Mahal," in which a group of pretty students (including a young Betty Grable) go swimming in the pool of the famous Indian shrine! According to studio publicity, a crop of genuine college coeds were hired to play the students in Student Tour, but to the trained eye they sure look like standard Hollywood extras and bit players. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Blessed Event is one of several early-1930s films inspired by the meteoric rise to fame of gossip columnist Walter Winchell--and like most such films, its title is based on a Winchell tag line. Lee Tracy plays a glib-tongued reporter who is conducting a feud with popular singer Dick Powell (making his film debut). Along the way, Tracy offends a powerful gangster, and in so doing becomes entangled with chorus girl Mary Brian. The film is at its best when parodying commercial radio of the era (notably an inane jingle for "Shapiro Shoes" warbled by Dick Powell). The original Broadway stage version of Blessed Event was written by Manuel Seff and Forrest Wilson--and reportedly inspired by the career of Ruby Keeler, who rose to stardom thanks in part to the patronage of a New York mobster. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this sweet comedy, a meek and clumsy employee of a large firm is filled with useful ideas, but is too shy to present them. He gets involved with the boss's straight-forward daughter who helps get his ideas across. Mayhem ensues and the company's superintendent is fired. The employee's ideas are then implemented. As the frosting on his cake, the mild-mannered fellow also gets to marry the boss's daughter. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

On the verge of receivership in 1926, Warner Bros. studio decides to risk its future by investing in the Vitaphone sound system. Warners' first Vitaphone release, Don Juan, was a silent film accompanied by music and sound effects. The studio took the Vitaphone process one step farther in its 1927 adaptation of the Samson Raphaelson Broadway hit The Jazz Singer, incorporating vocal musical numbers in what was essentially a non-talking film. Al Jolson stars as Jakie Rabinowitz, the son of Jewish cantor Warner Oland. Turning his back on family tradition, Jakie transforms himself into cabaret-entertainer Jack Robin. When Jack comes home to visit his parents, he is warmly greeted by his mother (Eugenie Besserer), but is cold-shouldered by his father, who feels that Jack is a traitor to his heritage by singing jazz music. Several subsequent opportunities for a reconciliation are muffed by the stubborn Jack and his equally stubborn father. On the eve of his biggest show-business triumph, Jack receives word that his father is dying. Out of respect, Jack foregoes his opening night to attend Atonement services at the temple and sing the Kol Nidre in his father's place. Through a superimposed image, we are assured that the spirit of Jack's father has at long last forgiven his son. Only twenty minutes or so of Jazz Singer is in any way a "talkie;" all of the Vitaphone sequences are built around Jolson's musical numbers. What thrilled the opening night crowds attending Jazz Singer were not so much the songs themselves but Jolson's adlibbed comments, notably in the scene where he sings "Blue Skies" to his mother. Previous short-subject experiments with sound had failed because the on-screen talent had come off stilted and unnatural; but when Jolson began chattering away in a naturalistic, conversational fashion, the delighted audiences suddenly realized that talking pictures did indeed have the capacity to entertain. Despite its many shortcomings (the storyline goes beyond mawkish, while Jolson's acting in the silent scenes is downright amateurish), The Jazz Singer was a box-office success the like of which no one had previously witnessed. The film did turn-away business for months, propelling Warner Bros. from a shoestring operation into Hollywood's leading film factory. Proof that The Jazz Singer is best viewed within its historical context is provided by the 1953 and 1980 remakes, both interminable wallows in sentimental goo. Worse still, neither one of those films had Al Jolson--who, in spite of his inadequacies as an actor, was inarguably the greatest musical entertainer of his era. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This drama about a Jewish family on New York's Lower East side marked the screen debut of respected stage actor Rudolph Schildkraut (whose son, Joseph Schildkraut, would also become a stage and screen star). Rabbi Cominsky (Schildkraut) has been reduced to working as a pushcart peddler, but he and his wife, Rosie (Rosa Rosanova), scrimp and save so that their two sons can get an education. Morris (Arthur Lubin) grows up to become a successful lawyer, but Sammy (George Lewis) displeases his father by becoming a pugilist. Cominsky throws him out of the house, not realizing that Morris is the ungrateful one -- he has become engaged to his boss' daughter and, ashamed of his humble family, says he is an orphan. The old man becomes very ill and Sammy wins enough money in a prize fight to send him away to get well. While the father is away, Sammy confronts his brother, and Morris begs his family for forgiveness. Cominsky realizes that he misjudged Sammy and takes him back into the fold. Sammy, meanwhile, finds romance with Mamie Shannon (Blanche Mehaffey), a pretty Irish girl. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Vitagraph had already made successful pictures out of two of A.S.M. Hutchinson's novels when they filmed this one. Because of his father's secret marriage, Ralph (Malcolm McGregor) is cheated out of his inheritance. Nevertheless, his Aunt Maggie (Mary Alden) prepares him to someday take the place of those who usurped his title and estate. Ralph decides to build his strength by becoming a prize fighter and joining a circus. He falls in love with Dora (Alice Calhoun), the pretty daughter of the circus owner. Finally Ralph is ready and he vanquishes the enemy from his boyhood -- but he also becomes friends with his son. Because of his affection for the boy, he renounces his claim to the estate. In the end, he has found something far more valuable in Dora's love. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Penrod (Ben Alexander) and his pal Sam (Joe Butterworth) are the all-American boys growing up in a small town in this comedy drama taken from Booth Tarkington's popular novel. The boys form an exclusive club and conspire to keep the neighborhood wimp and his toady companion away from their clubhouse. Penrod's beloved pet terrier Duke dies and is buried in a somber ceremony on the vacant lot. When the wimp's father buys the land, the boys are kicked off what they consider to be hallowed ground. Perod's mother (Gladys Brockwell) convinces his father (Rockcliffe Fellows) to buy back the land to make the boy happy. Mary Philbin, Gareth Hughes, and William V. Mong appear along with Buddy and Gertrude Messinger. Martha Mattox plays the schoolmarm Miss Spence, and Vic Potel is the town drunk. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide