Don C. Harvey Movies

With this all-star Cinerama epic, producer/director Stanley Kramer vowed to make "the comedy that would end all comedies." The story begins during a massive traffic jam, caused by reckless driver Smiler Grogan (Jimmy Durante), who, before (literally) kicking the bucket, cryptically tells the assembled drivers that he's buried a fortune in stolen loot, "under the Big W." The various motorists setting out on a mad scramble include a dentist (Sid Caesar) and his wife (Edie Adams); a henpecked husband (Milton Berle) accompanied by his mother-in-law (Ethel Merman) and his beatnik brother-in-law (Dick Shawn); a pair of comedy writers (Buddy Hackett and Mickey Rooney); and a variety of assorted nuts including a slow-wit (Jonathan Winters), a wheeler-dealer (Phil Silvers), and a pair of covetous cabdrivers (Peter Falk and Eddie "Rochester" Anderson). Monitoring every move that the fortune hunters make is a scrupulously honest police detective (Spencer Tracy). Virtually every lead, supporting, and bit part in the picture is filled by a well-known comic actor: the laughspinning lineup also includes Carl Reiner, Terry-Thomas, Arnold Stang, Buster Keaton, Jack Benny, Jerry Lewis, and The Three Stooges, who get one of the picture's biggest laughs by standing stock still and uttering not a word. Two prominent comedians are conspicuous by their absence: Groucho Marx refused to appear when Kramer couldn't meet his price, while Stan Laurel declined because he felt he was too old-looking to be funny. Available for years in its 154-minute general release version, the film was restored to its roadshow length of 175 minutes on home video; the search goes on for a missing Buster Keaton routine, reportedly excised on the eve of the picture's premiere. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this routine western set in 1864 in Montana, U.S. Marshal Jim McDowell (James Philbrook) is trying to safely get a treasure-trove of gold bullion out East, where it will help the Union cause in the Civil War. Standing in his way are first a band of Native Americans and then some crafty outlaws headed by double-dealing sheriff Henry Plummer (Marshal Reed). Since the sheriff has insider information, he and his band of bad guys have a special hot line to what happens next. Meanwhile, Marshal McDowell is aided and abetted by his wife Rose (Nancy Kovack), a woman who married him for her own particular reasons. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Carter Gilman (Walter Kinsella) abruptly vanishes from his home while he is having breakfast with his daughter Muriell (Kaye Elhardt). Investigating Gilman's disappearance, Perry Mason (Raymond Burr) finds evidence of a struggle in the man's workshop. He also finds a great deal of money--and before long a greater deal of money, specifically two million dollars, will enter into the proceedings, along with such diverse elements as blackmail and false identities. Ultimately, Perry must defend Gilman on a charge of murder. This episode is based on a 1960 novel by Perry Mason creator Erle Stanley Gardner. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this run-of-the-mill western, one of the few films directed by producer Wallace MacDonald, a rancher has been falsely accused of murdering his wife and escapes from prison to seek revenge. Robert Knapp is the rancher Gil Reardon who knows that the saloon owner Ben (Walter Coy) and his cohorts are responsible for his wife's violent death. After he escapes from a New Mexico jail, Gil is helped by a Native American woman (Jana Davi) to cross the desert and arrive back home in Laredo, though that does not happen without incident. All that remains is the final showdown. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

No sooner has he arrived in the town of Hollow Rock than Bret (James Garner) loses his money in a crooked poker game. Unfortunately, Bret can't go to the sheriff for help, since the sheriff was in on the swindle. But Bret is determined to get his money back, and he intends to use an upcoming Fourth of July horse race--and a stopwatch--to achieve his goal. This episode was originally slated to air on December 14, 1958. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Adapted from his own TV play by Reginald Rose, Dino stars Sal Mineo (who also appeared in the TV version) in the title role. Sent to reform school for his complicity in a gang killing, Dino is released in the custody of kindly settlement worker Sheridan (Brian Keith). Despite the efforts by Sheridan and parole officer Mandel (Frank Faylen) to set the boy on the right path, sullen Dino intends to rejoin his old gang at the first opportunity. Only when he realizes that his younger brother Tony (Pat DeSimone) is in danger of becoming an irredeemable juvenile delinquent does Dino gets wise to himself. It also helps when he falls in love with Shirley (Susan Kohner), a "plain-Jane" girl he meets at Sheridan's settlement house. Rarely seen today, Dino is one of the better "j.d." films of its era. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Produced by Bert I. Gordon, The Beginning of the End a menacing onslaught of giant-sized grasshoppers. Department of Agriculture functionary Peter Graves and photojournalist Peggie Castle discover that the huge grasshoppers are the product of a gone-awry experiment in radioactivity. Before the Army can neutralize the green monstrosities, Chicago has been besieged by the ravenous insects. Beginning of the End was one of two horror films produced by American Broadcasting-Paramount Theatres; the other was The Unearthly (1957). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this action melodrama, the troubled lives of three young robbers are presented. One of these is a college dropout and draft dodger who plans to rob a supermarket so he can purchase a boat and escape his problems. He enlists the aid of two others: one is an indebted man who is responsible for the high medical bills of a con woman who hurt herself while on a date with him, the other is a pathological liar who cannot cope with his failed marriage and writing career. During the robbery, the dropout gets too wired and kills the manager. They flee, but his cohorts are captured by the cops while he steals a truck and heads screaming down the road for Mexico. A great chase ensues until the truck's brakes fail and he suffers a fatal, fiery crash. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The second-to-last American serial ever made, this film series very uneasily combined two popular genres: The Northwest Mounted Police melodrama and Science Fiction. The mix of Medicine Men and airplane dog fights were too ridiculous even for the small fry who, by the '50s, had become the sole audience for this sort of fare. Dennis Moore played an undercover deputy marshal posing as an outlaw in order to infiltrate a gang headed by the nefarious Kenneth MacDonald, a self-styled "Gun Emperor of the Northwest," whose stirring up of the Indians proves a diversion from his smuggling activities. A dark-haired, tight-lipped also-ran cowboy star of the late '40s, Dennis Moore earned the dubious distinction of starring in the two last action serials made in America: Perils of the Wilderness and Blazing the Overland Trail, both low budget affairs heavily padded with stock footage from the genre's glory days in the '30s and '40s. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

A juvenile delinquent in the "holding tank" lets slip that his older brother is planning to rob a loan office. Though Friday (Jack Webb) and Smith (Ben Alexander) do their best to head off the holdup man, the robbery goes off exactly as scheduled. All the detectives can hope for is that the outlaw's limp will slow him down long enough to be arrested. Iconic 1940s "pin-up girl" Mary Beth Hughes has a flashy role as the perpetrator's fed-up wife. This episode was adapted from the Dragnet radio broadcast of June 7, 1955. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Even though it's Thanksgiving Week, all days off at the LAPD are cancelled in hopes of capturing a brutal holdup man who preys upon helpless women. Knowing that the perpetrator has been haunting the streetcar routes and bus stops, the department assigns several policewomen decoys throughout the city--with each female cop backed up by two males. Meanwhile, Friday (Jack Webb) and Smith (Ben Alexander) are kept busy following up a number of false leads. Ultimately, the criminal is put out of business permanantly...but success comes at a terrible price for young police officer Barney Swanson (Norman Bartold). Adapted from the Dragnet radio broadcast of May 20, 1954, this classic black and white episode is readily available on a multitude of public-domain VHS and DVD collections. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Blackjack Ketchum, the real-life gunslinger who'd previously been a peripheral character in several westerns, is herein afforded his own feature-length "vehicle". Howard Duff plays the title role, who at the beginning of the film is doing his best to live down his reputation. This proves impossible when land baron Jared Tetlow (Victor Jory) and his brood muscle into the territory. Hoping to champion the cause of his fellow ranchers, Ketchum once more straps on his guns and prepares to do battle against Tetlow's henchmen. Naturally, Ketchum's sweetheart Nita Riordan (played by Maggie Mahoney, the mother of actress Sally Field) would prefer that Our Hero abstain from gunplay, but.Blackjack Ketchum, Desperado was based on a novel by Louis L'Amour. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The Bowery Boys--Slip (Leo Gorcey), Sach (Huntz Hall) et. al.--are suckered into buying a uranium mine near the western town of Panther Pass. Though the boys find none of the precious mineral, a gang of bad guys, led by Ron Haskell (Harry Lauter), are led to believe that mine is valuable. The crooks try to chase our heroes off their property, but before long the tables are turned, and the film wraps up with a zany jeep pursuit. Director Edward Bernds and screenwriter Elwood Ullman reuse several old Three Stooges gags in Dig That Uranium, including the poker game routine from the Stooges' Out West (1947). The film's best bit is an extended parody of High Noon, replete with really slow bullets. Incidentally, the doofus who sells the boys the uranium mine in the opening scene is none other than Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer. Filmed at Iverson's Ranch in the San Fernando Valley, Dig That Uranium was the final "Bowery Boys" outing for Bernard "Louie Dumbrowski" Gorcey, who died in a traffic accident shortly after filming was completed. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide