Raymond Hatton Movies

District attorney Walter Pidgeon pursues the conviction of criminals so diligently that word has gone out in the state prison to "get" Pidgeon at the first opportunity. The DA has several enemies on the outside as well, one of whom frames him on a bribery charge. Pidgeon is sentenced to the prison where he has sent so many miscreants in the past. Dodging attempts on his own life, Pidgeon makes several valuable convict friends and manages to clear himself during a climactic jailbreak. 6,000 Enemies runs only 61 minutes--an average of about 100 enemies per minute. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Reportedly, director Cecil B. DeMille and leading lady Mary Pickford did not see eye to eye during the making of this lavish Western melodrama filmed on location among the giant redwoods in northern California. "Little Mary" actually plays a female her own age this time (maybe that was the trouble) as a young woman whose father is killed in an Indian raid. Pickford falls for a dashing outlaw (Elliott Dexter), whom she later frees after his inevitable capture by persuading the sheriff (Walter Long) that she is pregnant. Amazingly, the ruse works and they are allowed to plan a future together in freedom. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Set in the new state of Alaska, this 1959 "B" drama features both a romantic quadrangle, if not pentagon, and a failing trucking company. Al (Bill Williams) manages the company out of a small town where the trucks make regular runs to Fairbanks. On top of rock slides and bad weather, he now has to handle the visit of his off-site partner Mason (Leslie E. Bradley) and his wife Janet (Lyn Thomas). This is more complex than usual because the company is in the red, and Janet was Al's former girlfriend -- she left him for Mason and his money. Add in the attractive Tina (Nora Hayden) who has her own interest in Al, who is interested in Janet, who is not that interested in Mason anymore, and the story could be set anywhere. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

This star-laden version of Lewis Carroll's novel combines elements of both the title novel and Carroll's sequel, Through the Looking Glass. In England of the 19th century, young Alice finds that the mirror over the library fireplace opens into a strange world. She has odd adventures and changes size several times both before and after she follows a time-obsessed White Rabbit (Skeets Gallagher). Soaked after nearly drowning in a pool of tears, Alice is helped to dry off by a Dodo (Polly Moran), and encounters a caterpillar (Ned Sparks), whose mushroom also changes Alice's size. In a noisy home where the Cook (Lillian Harmer) and the Duchess (Alison Skipworth) are always fighting, Alice takes care of the Duchess' baby, but it turns into a pig and runs away. Asking directions of the Cheshire Cat (Richard Arlen) is no help, and a tea party with the Mad Hatter (Edward Everett Horton), the March Hare (Charlie Ruggles) and the Dormouse (Jackie Searl) is confusing and annoying.

Alice meets the Queen of Hearts (May Robson), and encounters the Duchess again; while strolling with her, Alice meets the Gryphon (William Austin) and the Mock Turtle (Cary Grant). The twins Tweedledum (Jack Oakie) and Tweedledee (Roscoe Karns) recite a poem about a Walrus and a Carpenter (seen as an animated cartoon), but when they decide to go to battle, they're chased off by a crow. Humpty Dumpty (W.C. Fields) relates the poem "Jabberwocky" to Alice, then falls off a wall and breaks. The mournful White Knight (Gary Cooper), unable to put Humpty Dumpty together again, escorts Alice for a while, but she tumbles down a hill and finds she's become a queen. At a party in Alice's honor, the Red Queen (Edna Mae Oliver) becomes furious at Alice, who then wakes up to find herself in the library, with her kitten Dinah in her lap. ~ Bill Warren, All Movie Guide

Finishing out her Paramount Pictures contract, opera star Gladys Swarthout sings not a single note in the tense little thriller Ambush. After pulling off a bank robbery, a clever gang of thieves squirrels itself away in a rural hideout. Complicating matters is the unexpected arrival of Jane Hartman (Swarthout), the sister of one of the crooks. Hoping to keep her brother and herself alive, Jane is obliged to coerce an honest truck driver named Tony Andrews (Lloyd Nolan) into helping the fugitives escape. Ambush is distinguished by the bravura performance of Ernest Truex, usually cast in milquetoast roles, as the brilliant but deadly "brains" of the outlaw gang. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Monogram Pictures launched its lucrative "Rough Riders" western series with 1941's Arizona Bound. Producer Scott Dunlap hoped to attract new customers by teaming two of the most popular cowboy stars in the movies, Buck Jones and Tim McCoy, throwing in another old favorite, Raymond Hatton, as grizzled comedy relief (ironically, Hatton was actually younger than his two costars!) The first entry set the pattern of all the "Rough Riders" entries to follow: Apparently retired, gunslinger Buck Roberts (Buck Jones) is galvanized into action when an old friend asks him to help rid Mesa City of a scurrilous outlaw gang. Upon his arrival, Buck makes the acquaintance of local parson Tim McCall (McCoy) and itinerant ranchhand Sandy Hopkins (Hatton). It soon becomes obvious that Buck, Tim and Sandy have been working together all along, with Roberts doing most of the shootin' and fightin' while Tim and Sandy operate undercover and undetected. Their job finally done, our three heroes bid farewell to one another and go their separate ways, with the promise that they'll join up again whenever its becomes necessary. Though it seldom deviated from this basic formula, the "Rough Riders" series was a hit, and remained so until Buck Jones' untimely death in 1942. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

One of the more prestigious films of its time, John Ford's film adaptation of Sinclair Lewis' Pulitzer Prize-winning novel has a sleek Art Deco look strangely out of tune with its tale of moral struggle. Ronald Colman stars as Martin Arrowsmith, an idealistic young doctor, who, after graduating from medical school, must forego a research position with Dr. Max Gottlieb (A.E. Anson) due to his marriage to nurse Leora Tozer (Helen Hayes). He returns to her rural hometown and establishes a small practice, and in his spare time eventually develops a serum for a deadly cow disease. Based on this work he is able to return to work under Dr. Gottlieb. When Dr. Gustav Sondelius (Richard Bennett), a friend of the researchers, informs them about a plague devouring the West Indies, Arrowsmith decides to travel to the area to test whether the serum he's working on might be effective in combatting it. The white citizens of the area refuse to allow themselves to be the subjects of an experiment, but black Harvard-educated Dr. Oliver Marchand (Clarence Brooks) persuades the island's native population to go along with Arrowsmith's plan. ~ Michael Costello, All Movie Guide

This sentimental rural drama was based on the poem by John Greenleaf Whittier. Frankie Lee plays Dick Alden, the barefoot boy of the title. He is abused by his stepfather and his only friends in the village where he lives are his mother, a little girl named Mary Truesdale (Gertie Messinger), and Tom Adams (Tully Marshall), the town drunkard. One day, he has to help Adams out of the cellar of the schoolhouse. Later, when the schoolhouse catches fire because of a careless smoker, Dick is blamed. No one believes his innocence and his father beats him, so he runs away. Many years later he returns (to be played by John Bower), a successful manufacturer who owns the mill that keeps the village alive. He plans to get revenge for his treatment as a boy by shutting the mill down, thus causing a financial disaster. But he's talked out of the scheme by Mary (played as an adult by Marjorie Daw). The mill is blown up anyhow by Dick's enemies, but he becomes determined to build a bigger, better plant in its place. This film, incidentally was released by C.B.C., derisively called "Corned Beef and Cabbage" by its competitors. Later on, the firm would change its name to Columbia and emerge from its Poverty Row beginnings. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

The Rough Riders-Buck Jones, Tim McCoy, and Raymond Hatton-go through their customary paces in the Monogram western Below the Border. Once again, the three stars play characters who are outwardly strangers to one another, but who are secretly working together to defeat a common enemy. This time around, Buck Roberts (Jones), Tim McCall (McCoy) and Sandy Hopkins (Hatton) are in hot pursuit of the desperado who murdered a US marshal and then skeedaddled South of the Border. To keep the villain off track, Buck poses as an ex-convict, Tim pretends to be a wealthy cattle buyer, and Sandy impersonates a saloon handyman. By film's end, however, the three heroes have united as one, and it's curtains for bad guy Slade (Charles King). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A popular comedy duo towards the end of the silent era, Wallace Beery and Raymond Hatten once again join forces for this rollicking comedy concerning a pair of nitwits who unwittingly become embroiled in an age old feud between two mountain families. When snake-oil salesmen Pete (Beery) and Gus (Hatten) accidentally stumble directly into the battleground of the warring Hicks and Beagle clans, it appears as if our bumbling heroes may have hocked their last bottle of the elixir. Though Pete continually interrupts Gus in his attempts to perform his latest magic trick, Gus eventually gets his moment in the spotlight to predictably disastrous results. Will the feud finally be resolved by the prospect of an impending marriage between members of the warring clans, or Pete and Gus' lame brained antics simply serve to add more fuel to the fire? ~ All Movie Guide

Blazing Guns is the television title of the Lippert Studios western Marshal of Helldorado. Jimmie Ellison and Russell Hayden star as perennial frontier do-gooders Shamrock and Lucky. This time, our heroes come to the assistance of banker Raymond Hatton, who is being blackmailed by an outlaw band that is savvy to Hatton's past life as a desperado. Fuzzy Knight co-stars as comedy relief, while Betty Adams provides the feminine interest. Marshal of Helldorado was one of a quartet of "Four Star Westerns" filmed back to back in the space of a single month: all four films starred Ellison, Hayden, Hatton, Knight and Adams. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Another entry in Paramount's long-running "Zane Grey" series, Born to the West represented the first directorial effort of John Waters. The story concerns the lifelong rivalry between two men over the love of one woman. Most of the action takes place in Nevada during the Gold Rush, where trail boss "Colorado" Dale Rudd (Jack Holt) again confronts his longtime rival Bate Fillmore (Bruce Gordon), who has drifted to the opposite side of the law. Fillmore's father Jesse (George Siegmann) runs all illegal activities in the territory, meaning that Rudd is going to have a hard time rescuing his sweetheart Nell Worstall (Margaret Morris) from this dangerous environment. Born to the West was remade in 1937, with John Wayne and Johnny Mack Brown as Rudd and Fillmore -- whose good guy/bad guy roles were reversed for the occasion. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Bunty Pulls the Strings was adapted from the immensely popular stage farce by Graham Moffat. Leatrice Joy stars as a Scottish lassie who has her hands full solving various domestic problems. Her brother Raymond Hatton faces a prison term, and she herself is in danger of losing boyfriend Cullen Landis. All ends happily with a double wedding ceremony, with Leatrice's father (Russell Simpson) not only giving the bride away but taking a bride himself. Surprisingly, comic actor James Finlayson, who co-starred in both the British and American stage versions of Bunty Pulls the Strings, does not participate in the film version. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide