Joe Gray Movies

This documentary explores the specifically masculine characteristics of military service, war and combat. Using interviews with American soldiers from as early as World War I on through the Vietnam era, gender issues relating to aggression are explored. Among the topics covered: the implicit command to commit rape in certain situations, the close buddy relationships in wartime, and the desensitization to violence leading to atrocities. Stock footage from the conflicts being described underscores the soldiers' stories. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

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

The Accused is a mystery melodrama with a predictable plot involving blackmail, attempted rape and murder. Loretta Young stars as Wilma Tuttle, a prim and proper college professor who unwittingly arouses the libido of student Bill Perry (Douglas Dick). When Perry tries to rape Wilma under cover of darkness, she beats him to death with a tire iron. Appalled by her own rash behavior, she tries to cover up her crime by making it seem as though Perry was killed while diving into the sea from a precipitous cliff. But as she follows the police investigation of Perry's death, Wilma realizes that she'll never be able to escape the prison of her own conscience -- especially when she falls in love with Warren Ford (Robert Cummings), the dead boy's guardian. Wendell Corey delivers the film's best performance as a quietly efficient homicide lieutenant who suspects that Wilma knows more than she's letting on. The Accused was adapted by Ketti Frings from the novel by June Truesdell. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Mr. Hex was the first Bowery Boys epic in which the goofy Sach (Huntz Hall) is given superhuman powers. Hypnotized by a carnival magician (Ian Keith), Sach becomes a powerful boxer. Head Bowery boy Slip (Leo Gorcey) parlays this talent into a lucrative ring career for Sach, culminating in the championship bout. A gangster (Ben Welden) learns Sach's secret and hires his own hypnotist to put the "whammy" on the would-be champ. The fantastic elements of the story come crashing to earth when Sach's pal Gabe (Gabriel Dell) is shot by the gangster, but all ends sappily ever after. Mr. Hex was the fourth in Monogram's "Bowery Boys" series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Director Rouben Mamoulian often claimed that he'd been inspired to make Golden Boy after reading a newspaper clipping about a recently deceased boxer. While Mamoulian may have genuinely believed that he was the true "auteur" of Golden Boy, he probably wouldn't have made the picture at all had not Clifford Odets started the ball rolling by writing the property for the stage in 1936. In his first starring role, William Holden plays Joe Bonaparte, a promising young boxer. While boxing promoter Tom Moody (Adolphe Menjou) and Menjou's mistress Lorna Moon (Barbara Stanwyck) urge Joe to pursue a ring career, Joe's Italian father (played with a surfeit of Chico Marx by 27-year-old Lee J. Cobb) wants his boy to become a famous violinist. Moody tells Lorna to romance the boy to get him into the ring. She does so, but regrets her callous actions when she genuinely falls in love with Joe. Having already broken his father's heart, Joe is further devastated when he accidentally kills a ring opponent. In the original play, both Joe and Lorna pay for their "sins" by dying in an auto accident. This would never do in Hollywood, so at fadeout time the chastened Joe returns to his forgiving father, with a tearful Lorna by his side. Clifford Odets' overrated purple prose seems to flow naturally from the actors, though it is obvious that William Holden had a long way to go. Still, Holden is pretty good in his first bonafide lead, a fact that he would ever after attribute to the patience and encouragement of his co-star Barbara Stanwyck; each year on the anniversary of Golden Boy's Hollywood premiere, Holden would send Stanwyck flowers as a sign of his eternal gratitude. While much of Golden Boy seems like a cliche-ridden museum piece when seen today, the film comes to life during the boxing sequences, helmed in exciting montage fashion by the always innovative Rouben Mamoulien. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide