John F. Hamilton Movies
- 1960
While vacationing with his wealthy and much-older wife Gladys (Vivienne Segal), Ray Marschand (Robert Horton) meets and falls in love with Nyla Foster (Anne Francis), the young daughter of trailer-camp owner Floyd Foster (John F. Hamilton). Deciding that he'd be better off trading his wife for a younger model, Ray begins plotting Gladys' demise. The episode climaxes as Ray and Gladys embark on a fateful fishing excursion, with the requisite surprising results. This final episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents' fifth season was originally telecast two days before the series switched networks and time slots for the inauguration of season six. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1949
Eliot Ness may have gotten lots of publicity (especially long after the fact) for breaking the Capone mob, but as Joseph H. Lewis' The Undercover Man reminds us, it was the accountants and the numbers-crunchers that brought down Capone and his mob. Frank Warren (Glenn Ford) started out as an accountant, but now serves as an investigator for the Treasury Department. His job has frequently required him to go undercover, masquerading as a criminal to get the goods on the top-level tax-law violators that his unit targets. But now his assignment is to gather evidence on the operations of the nation's number-one crime boss and get proof of the income that he and his lieutenants are not declaring, and this proves not only frustrating but dangerous. Potential stoolies are murdered and witnesses intimidated, and when one otherwise "respectable" lawyer (Barry Kelley) starts mentioning Warren's wife (Nina Foch) in casual conversation, he takes the hint. He's ready to quit until the mother (Esther Minciotti) of a witness-turned-victim tells him about what life was like in Italy under the Black Hand, and why she came to America to raise her sons. Warren and his men (James Whitmore, David Wolfe) make one last attempt to get the proof they need, tracing signatures and handwriting to get evidence implicating a small man in the operation, using it to turn him and going for bigger fish. Finally, even the shyster lawyer who has been dogging Warren every step of the way ends up in the sights of the feds, and the mob turns its attention to getting rid of this new "liability" and taking care of Warren as well. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Glenn Ford, Nina Foch, (more)
- 1940
Responding to star George Sanders' complaint that his role of "modern Robin Hood" Simon Templar was becoming a bore, RKO Radio permitted Sanders to essay a duel role in The Saint's Double Trouble. This one finds Templar, aka the Saint, heading to Philadelphia to catch a gang of diamond smugglers. It so happens that the head of the criminals, Duke Plato, is an exact double for Templar (so guess who plays Plato?) Bela Lugosi is wasted in the role of a secondary hoodlum, though it is amusing to watch his double--take when he's confronted with two Sanders. Based on characters created by Leslie Charteris, The Saint's Double Trouble was the fourth entry in RKO's Saint series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George Sanders, Helene Whitney, (more)
- 1940
This third installment in MGM's "Maisie" series finds eternally stranded showgirl Maisie Revere (Ann Sothern) stuck in a deserted mining camp. Here she links up with Davises, an impoverished migrant family which hopes to strike gold somewhere in the neighboring hills. Their efforts are resisted by hard-hearted local rancher Bill Anders (Lee Bowman), who orders the family off his property. With Maisie's assistance, the Davises are offered the opportunity to launch a cooperative farming project, with Anders' blessing. Evidently inspired by The Grapes of Wrath, Gold Rush Maisie is hardly in the same league, but it passes the time painlessly. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ann Sothern, Lee Bowman, (more)
Films set during America's colonial era seldom did well at the box office, and Allegheny Uprising was no exception. John Wayne and Claire Trevor, stars of the recent western hit Stagecoach, are reteamed herein as 18th
century adventurer James Smith and his spitfire sweetheart Janie. Taking every opportunity to defy the edicts of the King of England, Smith and his ragtag followers, "The Black Boys," undermine the despotic regime of provincial governor Captain Swanson (George Sanders). To quell Smith's uprising, Swanson arrests nearly half the colonists and holds them without trial or recourse (he doesn't sport a black mustache and shout "Seig Heil", but audiences in 1939 knew exactly who Swanson was supposed to be). In depicting the English in an unsympathetic light, RKO Radio Pictures committed a major political blunder, inasmuch as the British were then engaged in their own struggle against Nazi tyranny. Fearful that the film would offend English viewers, RKO president George J. Schaefer consulted British producer Herbert Wilcox, who suggested a number of judicious cuts and line alterations in the film. Even so, Allegheny Uprising (originally The Last Rebel, also the title of the Neil H. Swanson novel on which it was based) failed to make a dent in the box-offices on either side of the Atlantic. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
century adventurer James Smith and his spitfire sweetheart Janie. Taking every opportunity to defy the edicts of the King of England, Smith and his ragtag followers, "The Black Boys," undermine the despotic regime of provincial governor Captain Swanson (George Sanders). To quell Smith's uprising, Swanson arrests nearly half the colonists and holds them without trial or recourse (he doesn't sport a black mustache and shout "Seig Heil", but audiences in 1939 knew exactly who Swanson was supposed to be). In depicting the English in an unsympathetic light, RKO Radio Pictures committed a major political blunder, inasmuch as the British were then engaged in their own struggle against Nazi tyranny. Fearful that the film would offend English viewers, RKO president George J. Schaefer consulted British producer Herbert Wilcox, who suggested a number of judicious cuts and line alterations in the film. Even so, Allegheny Uprising (originally The Last Rebel, also the title of the Neil H. Swanson novel on which it was based) failed to make a dent in the box-offices on either side of the Atlantic. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claire Trevor, John Wayne, (more)
- 1929
Viewers familiar with the exotic (if toned-down) 1942 MGM film version of Leon Gordon's lurid stage play White Cargo might be surprised to discover that the property was previously filmed in England in 1929. A young and handsome Maurice Evans stars as Langford, the wimpish naif who arrives in Africa to take charge of a rubber plantation. Despite warnings from his superior Weston (Leslie Faber) not to "mammy-palaver" with the native girls, Langford falls madly in love with the sexy, near-savage Tondelayo (played by one Gypsy Rhouma, whose only film this was). After a few nights in the sack with the girl, Langford goes quickly to hell in a handbasket, just as his predecessor had done. Upon learning that Langford may be returned to England, the jealously possessive Tondelayo contrives to keep him by her side by slowly poisoning him to death -- but she's not clever enough to hide her crime from the wily Weston. Gypsy Rhouma's ludicrous performance as Tondelayo is enough to make Hedy Lamarr's performance in the 1942 remake look like Academy Award material. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Leslie Faber, Maurice Evans, (more)
- 1927
Based on the magazine story "Still Face" by pulp writer Clarence Buddington Kelland, The Masked Menace, released by the Pathé organization in ten chapters in October of 1927, proved a flop at the box office despite an unusual plot that had Keats Dodd (Larry Kent) coming to the aid of an elderly woman (Laura Alberta) and her pretty ward, Faith (Jean Arthur), whose mill is terrorized by a masked villain known only as "Still Face." The criminal's identity is finally revealed in the tenth chapter, entitled, not too surprisingly, "The Menace Unmasked." A very young and still brunette Jean Arthur had just been signed by Paramount when she appeared in this serial, which also featured Tom Holding, John F. Hamilton, William Norton Bailey, and Edward Roseman. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- 1926
Although it had its laughs, this picture had an awful lot of drama for the usual Johnny Hines vehicle. Hines plays Steve "Rainbow" Riley, a cub reporter who is first seen trying to land an interview with a man who refuses to talk to anyone. It turns out the guy is deaf and dumb -- amusing in 1926 if not exactly politically correct humor nowadays. Riley is given another assignment and sent down to the Kentucky mountains to cover a feud. Once he gets there, he falls in love with Alice Ripper (Brenda Bond) and earns the enmity of both warring clans. A mentally unhinged character (John Hamilton) runs off with Alice and takes her to his mountain stronghold. Riley's heroic measures save her, but after he has subdued the madman, he finds himself surrounded by the angry mountain clans. Luckily, he has sent a wire to the newspaper that has been misinterpreted -- instead of thinking that Riley is in trouble, they believe that it's the president who is in danger. As a result, the whole army and navy come to the rescue. The mountain men run off, and Riley and Alice are saved. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- 1925
Released in Great Britain as The Mountain Eagle, Fear o' God was Alfred Hitchcock's second directorial effort, as well as his second collaboration with Hollywood star Nita Naldi. The story is set in Kentucky, with the Austrian Tyrol incongruously standing in for the Kentucky hills and hollows. Naldi plays a schoolteacher who is caught in the middle of a village feud. Wrongly accused of immorality, the woman is driven into the woods, where she's rescued by mysterious mountain man Fearogod (Malcolm Keen). Screenwriter Elliot Stannard obviously had no idea how Kentuckians acted or behaved, but Hitchcock, despite acute health problems, breathed life into silly goings-on. Despite its flaws, Fear o' God was a hit; more importantly, the film's success allowed Hitchcock to direct a story of his own choosing: The Lodger (1926). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
