Hazel Keener Movies

The Milkman is a low-key variation of a theme explored in such slapstick festivals as The Fuller Brush Man and The Yellow Cab Man. Donald O'Connor plays Roger Bradley, who hopes to become a top-flight milkman to please his father (Henry O'Neill), the owner of the milk company. Jimmy Durante co-stars as Breezy Albright, the older milkman who teaches Roger the ropes. After several comic set pieces, the plot rears its ugly head in the form of John Carter (Jess Barker), the nephew of rival milk-company proprietress Mrs. Carter (Elizabeth Risdon). Carter has gotten mixed up with a nasty bunch of gamblers, led by Mike Morrel (William Conrad). This leads to an exciting, albeit chucklesome finale wherein Roger, Breezy and ingenue Chris Abbott (Piper Laurie) combine forces to rout the bad guys. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Director Victor Fleming's final film features Ingrid Bergman as a vivid and luminous Joan of Arc, the 15th-century French peasant girl who led the French in battle against the invading English, becoming a national hero. When she was captured, tortured, and ultimately executed by the English, she was made a Catholic saint. Bergman's Joan is a strong and spiritual figure who proves her devotion to the Dauphin (Jose Ferrer), later to become the King of France. Joan is compelling as she wins an alliance with the Governor of Vaucouleurs and the courtiers at Chinon, leads her army in the Battle of Orleans, is betrayed by the Burgundians, and edicts that "our strength is in our faith." ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

A change of pace for both director Vincente Minnelli and star Katharine Hepburn, this taut drama features the latter as Ann Hamilton, the daughter of a scientist (Edmund Gwenn), who after a whirlwind romance marries handsome but slightly mysterious inventor turned businessman Alan Garroway (Robert Taylor). But wedded bliss proves short-lived when Garroway refuses to discuss his brother Michael, whose presence is felt constantly despite the mystery surrounding his whereabouts. The missing Michael becomes an obsession for Ann, whose curiosity is piqued even more after a chance encounter with Sylvia Burton (Jayne Meadows), a young woman who figures in the lives of both brothers and who displays a strange resemblance to Ann herself. Despite Alan's dire misgivings, Ann feels compelled to solve the mystery of Michael, until, that is, she discovers that Alan may very well have murdered his own brother. Undercurrent marked the screen debut of Jayne Meadows and a breakthrough of sorts for Robert Mitchum, whom M-G-M borrowed from David O. Selznick for a reputed $25,000. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Stars-on-the-downslide Wallace Ford and Marian Marsh briefly rallied in the above-average Monogram melodrama Murder by Invitation. Ford is cast as usual as a wisecracking reporter, this time christened Bob White. Our hero is one of several acquaintances and relatives invited to an old dark house to attend the reading of a will. At the stroke of midnight, one of the guests is murdered?and then another. The most obvious suspect is Aunt Cassie (Sarah Padden), the slightly daft owner of the mansion, but Bob suspects that she's being framed, and with the help of heroine Nora O'Brien (Marsh) he sets about to prove it. Some of the film's best moments are suppled by beetle-browed Herb Vigran, a busy supporting actor whose best professional days were still to come.Murder by Invitation closes with one of those "It's only a movie, folks" gags indigenous to the Monogram product of the 1940s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Those popular MGM co-stars William Powell and Myrna Loy take a break from their usual Thin Man duties to star in the zany comedy I Love You Again. The film opens with Loy prepared to divorce her dull businessman husband Powell. A blow on the head causes Powell to remember his former life as a notorious con man. No one in town has any knowledge of Powell's criminal past, a fact he hopes to use to his advantage. Loy, astounded at Powell's sudden surge of amorous ardor, reconsiders her divorce. When she learns of his true identity, she is even more fascinated. Another blow on the head restores the non-criminal Powell--at least, that's what he and Loy would like you to believe. The film's highlight is a screamingly funny sequence in which Powell plays scoutmaster to a group of surly youngsters (including Our Gang veterans Carl Switzer and Mickey Gubitosi, aka Robert Blake). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Bert Lytell stars as Richard Band, a handsome doctor specializing in women's ailments. One of Band's more impressionable patients, Doris Frazer (Dorothy Devore), falls in love with the doc and gives her boyfriend Jack (Frederick Kovert) the air. In retaliation, Jack spreads rumors that Band has an unsavory past, replete with a "wrong woman." And just to prove that he's not whistling Dixie, Jack dons female garb to pose as Band's "ex-lover" Mimi. Beyond the laughs inherent in the basic plotline, Harry Myers (the unforgettable drunken millionaire in Chaplin's City Lights) provides additional yocks as a flustered detective. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Manhattan debutante Jerry McKay (Jacqueline Logan) heads West with her father J.W. (Montague Love) to inspect some of her family's property. No sooner has she arrived in the wide-open spaces than Jerry has had a confrontation with J.W.'s two-fisted chief engineer James Warren (Robert Frazer). Fascinated by the woman-hating Warren, Jerry vows to get him to propose to her within the week. Sure enough, he does pop the question, but by now he's so in love with her that he doesn't really care that the wily Jerry maneuvered him into marriage. One Hour of Love represents the American directorial debut of Paris-born filmmaker Robert Florey. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

One of Harold Lloyd's best feature-length comedies, The Freshman, features the bespectacled regular guy as Harold Lamb, a naïve young man who heads off to college believing campus life will be just as it is in the movies; he even learns a little dance he saw one of his favorite actors do in a film. However, Harold soon discovers that real life isn't all that much like the pictures, and he quickly becomes the laughing stock of the university. Determined to prove himself, Harold tries out for the football team, but he serves as water boy and rides the pine until he finally gets a chance to redeem himself at the big game. Along the way, Harold also tries to woo a lovely co-ed, Peggy (Jobyna Ralston). 22 years later, writer/director Preston Sturges used the climactic football game as the opening for his collaboration with Harold Lloyd, The Sin of Harold Diddlebock. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

In her pre-Paramount days, Clara Bow was shoved into some pretty dismal pictures. This aimless drama was one of the worst. Marie (Bow) and Armand (Donald Keith) are two lovers who belong to a band of Apaches (members of the Parisian underworld, not the Native Americans). When they believe that wealthy scientist Pierre Marcel (Lou Tellegen) is away from his home, they go with another associate, Knifer (Jean deBriac), to burglarize it. But Marcel is home, and Armand stops Knifer from killing him. The grateful man protects Armand when the police show up. Knifer is killed and Marie escapes. Armand, who has been wounded, is nursed back to health by Marcel, and he goes on to lead an honest life. Marie sees Armand kissing another girl and she becomes bent on revenge. Armand goes away on business, and with the financial aid of the Apache leader (Otto Marieson), Marie poses as a convent-bred girl. She wins Marcel's love and marries him, only telling him of her plot after the ceremony is completed. Armand returns from London and she rushes to him. The Apaches, believing that they are being double-crossed, take a shot at her. Although she is wounded, she recovers. Marcel goes to America and arranges a divorce so that the two lovers can be together. Luckily for Bow, The Plastic Age would be released just a few months later, effectively erasing the memory of poor films like this one. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Lester F. Scott, Jr.'s Action Pictures released this average silent oater directed by the prolific Richard Thorpe. Buffalo Bill, Jr. (aka Jay Wilsey) starred in the title role, a cowboy who goes up against an especially nasty ranch foreman (J. Gordon Russell), his rival for the love of pretty Hazel Keener. Keener, who also worked under the name Barbara Worth, is best remembered for the six Westerns she did opposite Fred Thomson. Voted a 1924 WAMPAS Baby Star by the Western Association of Motion Picture Advertisers, Miss Keener later joined the ranks of Hollywood dress extras. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Western star Fred Thompson was, for many years, the biggest single moneymaker for the small-scale production firm of FBO. The Thompson vehicles enabled the tiny studio to expand to the point that it was attractive enough to be gobbled up by prestigious RKO Radio Pictures. All of this was still five years in the future when, in 1924, Thompson played the title role in Galloping Gallagher. Although released subsequent to The Mask of Lopez and North of Nevada, this fine silent western was most likely the first Fred Thomson oater filmed. Very much in the tradition of Tom Mix, this good-humored little silent melodrama features Thomson as a happy-go-lucky drifter who is elected sheriff of Tombstone on account of his fine horsemanship. He falls for a lady minister (Thomson regular Hazel Keener) and unmasks the town's banker as a notorious bandit known as "Lily Finger." More important than that, Thomson gets to exhibit his much-admired mount Silver King, who plays a major role in the proceedings. Rumor had it in 1920s Hollywood that the consistently high quality of the Fred Thompson westerns was due to the uncredited input of Thompson's wife, award-winning screenwriter Frances Marion. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Claire Endicott (Norma Shearer) throws a wild party and her father (Charles Clary) walks in to find her flirting with the very married Milt Bisnet (Ward Crane). In an attempt to straighten her out, Endicott sends Claire to the Canadian northwoods, where his field engineer, Grimshaw (Jack Holt), is working. While fishing, Claire is swept over the rapids and Grimshaw tries to rescue her. Both of them wind up in a remote gorge, and Grimshaw goes about building a hut as a shelter. Although Grimshaw is strongly attracted to Claire, he turns her down when she offers to make love to him. An airplane finally rescues them, and when they return to New York, Claire finds herself named corespondent in the Bisnet divorce case. A scandal sheet prints a rumor that she is marrying Grimshaw to avoid the divorce scandal. As a result, Claire turns down Grimshaw's proposal, but he won't take no for an answer. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide