Vince Barnett Movies

Dangerous Game was a 61-minute entry in the off-and-on Universal "B" adventure series starring Richard Arlen and Andy Devine. The emphasis is on laughs as the pair infiltrate a suspicious lunatic asylum. Amidst the genuine assorted nuts (all of whom behave "cuckoo" in 2-reel comedy fashion) are several perfectly sane criminals, using the asylum as headquarters. Arlen and Devine rout out the crooks, winning a huge cache of money in so doing. Jeanne Kelly, who later enjoyed a brief leading-lady career as Jean Brooks, provides the heart interest in A Dangerous Game. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A Star is Born came into being when producer David O. Selznick decided to tell a "true behind-the-scenes" story of Hollywood. The truth, of course, was filtered a bit for box-office purposes, although Selznick and an army of screenwriters based much of their script on actual people and events. Janet Gaynor stars as Esther Blodgett, the small-town girl who dreams of Hollywood stardom, a role later played by both Judy Garland and Barbra Streisand in the 1954 and 1976 remakes. Jeered at by most of her family, Esther finds an ally in her crusty old grandma (May Robson), who admires the girl's "pioneer spirit" and bankrolls Esther's trip to Tinseltown. On arrival, Esther heads straight to Central Casting, where a world-weary receptionist (Peggy Wood), trying to let the girl down gently, tells her that her chances for stardom are about one in a thousand. "Maybe I'll be that one!" replies Esther defiantly. Months pass: through the intervention of her best friend, assistant director Danny McGuire (Andy Devine), Esther gets a waitressing job at an upscale Hollywood party. Her efforts to "audition" for the guests are met with quizzical stares, but she manages to impress Norman Maine (Fredric March), the alcoholic matinee idol later played by James Mason and Kris Kristofferson. Esther gets her first big break in Norman's next picture and a marriage proposal from the smitten Mr. Maine. It's a hit, but as Esther (now named Vicki)'s star ascends, Norman's popularity plummets due to a string of lousy pictures and an ongoing alcohol problem. The film won Academy Awards for director William Wellman and Robert Carson in the "original story" category and for W. Howard Greene's glistening Technicolor cinematography. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

One of the most powerful anti-war statements ever put on film, this gut-wrenching story concerns a group of friends who join the Army during World War I and are assigned to the Western Front, where their fiery patriotism is quickly turned to horror and misery by the harsh realities of combat. Director Lewis Milestone pioneered the use of the sweeping crane shot to capture a ghastly battlefield panorama of death and mud, and the cast, led by Lew Ayres, is terrific. It's hard to pick a favorite scene, but the finale, as Ayres stretches from his trench to catch a butterfly, is one of the most devastating sequences of the decade. The film won Oscars for Best Picture and for Milestone's direction -- and trivia buffs should note that the actors were coached by future luminary George Cukor, while Ayres became a conscientious objector in World War II. The Road Back (1937) followed, and the film was remade for television in 1979. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide

Bank Alarm was one of four low-budget but high-entertainment crime melodramas starring Conrad Nagel and Eleanor Hunt as Federal agents Alan O'Connor and Bobbie Reynolds. On this occasion, the two G-people are on the trail of a gang of desperate bank robbers. Making their job slightly easier is the fact that the crooks are leaving behind a trail of counterfeit money. Unfortunately, they're also leaving a trail of corpses, meaning that Alan and Bobbie had better get a move on before someone else gets bumped off. Bank Alarm was the last of the Nagel-Hunt crime series, all of which were produced by the financially canny George A. Hirliman. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Like many 1930s Warner Bros. films, Black Fury drew its inspiration from the headlines. The story is adapted from a true-life incident from 1929, wherein a striking Pennsylvania coal miner was beaten to death by three company detectives; this served as the focus for Henry R. Irving's stage play Bohunk as well as Judge M. A. Musmanno's story Jan Volkanik, both of which were woven into Black Fury's screenplay. Using a Polish accent so thick one can cut it with scissors, Paul Muni plays an illiterate miner, happy in his job and his company-town surroundings until his girl Karen Morley deserts him for policeman William Gargan. A disconsolate, drunken Muni stumbles into a labor meeting, where his loud, unthinking outbursts win him the leadership of the new miner's union. When the company locks out the strikers and brings in scabs, the angry miners hold the thick-headed Muni responsible. Fellow miner John Qualen, Muni's best friend, is then killed by a gang of rampaging hired goons. Vowing to "feex" the situation, Muni kidnaps head goon Barton MacLaine and takes him into the bowels of the mine with several sticks of dynamite in tow. Muni threatens to blow himself, MacLaine, and the mine to smithereens unless management comes to terms with the union. Thanks to overwhelming public support, the owners capitulate, and Muni is the hero of the hour. Though it seemed uncompromising in 1935, Black Fury obviously pulls its punches when seen today; for example, it is suggested that the mine owners are guiltless regarding violence against the strikers, laying blame on the hired detectives, who are shown to be in the employ of a crook who plays both sides against the other. Even allowing for this, Black Fury is one of the most powerful of Warners' "social conscience" films. Although the Academy gave Muni a Best Supporting Actor nod for this film, the AMPAS database indicates that it wasn't an "official nomination" - he was a write-in candidate, and came in second. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

For a Tim Holt western, Border Treasure is surprisingly light on action scenes. The plot is the main consideration, as Ed Porter (Holt) and his saddle pal Chito Rafferty (Richard Martin) set about collecting money for an earthquake relief fund. The donations are stolen by the villains, whereupon Porter and Rafferty take chase. They nearly ride into an ambush, but are saved by Stella (Jane Nigh), the repentant girlfriend of one of the outlaws. Before the film's six reels have run their course, Our Heroes find themselves being accused of the robbery. Tim Holt fans won't believe that for a minute! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Bowery at Midnight casts Bela Lugosi as Professor Brenner, a psychology instructor at New York University (which looks a lot like Berkeley in the exterior shots!). When not enlightening his students -- most of them buxom Monogram starlets -- Brenner is engaged in charitable work, running a mission in the Bowery. In truth, however, the kindly professor is a fiend in human form, who uses his mission as a front for a vast criminal empire. When Judy (Wanda McKay), one of Brenner's students, stumbles onto the truth, she's targeted for extermination by the Dr. Jekyll-and-Mr. Hyde prof. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Burt Lancaster had one of his first starring roles in this hard-hitting prison drama. Capt. Munsey (Hume Cronyn) is a cruel, corrupt prison guard who has his own less-than-ethical ways of dealing with inmates, enough so that Joe Collins (Lancaster) -- the toughest inmate in the cell block -- has decided to break out. Collins tries to persuade Gallagher (Charles Bickford), the unofficial leader of the inmates and editor of the prison newspaper, to join him, but Gallagher thinks Collins' plan won't work. However, Collins does have the support of his cellmates, most of whom, like himself, wandered into a life of crime thanks to love and good intentions. Tom Lister (Whit Bissell) was an accountant who altered the books so he could buy his wife a mink coat. Soldier (Howard Duff) fell in love with an Italian girl during World War II and took the rap for her when she murdered her father. Collins pulled a bank job to raise money to pay for an operation that could possibly get his girl out of a wheelchair. And Spencer (John Hoyt) made the mistake of getting involved with a female con artist. After Munsey drives Tom to suicide and prevents Gallagher from obtaining parole, Gallagher joins up with Collins and his men in the escape attempt. Director Jules Dassin would next direct the influential noir drama The Naked City; six years later, he would move to Europe after political blacklisting prevented him from continuing to work in the United States. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A mad scientist turns a gorilla into a beautiful young woman in this well-made Universal potboiler, the first of three films featuring Paula Dupree, the Ape Woman. John Carradine stars as Dr. Sigmund Walters, whose Crestview Sanitarium witnesses strange and unsettling experiments. The doctor's newest scheme concerns Cheena (Ray "Crash" Corrigan), a female gorilla that he has stolen from the Whipple Circus. Injecting the ape with sex hormones obtained from Dorothy Colman (Martha Vickers), the evil medico attempts to turn the animal into a semi-human creature. When Dr. Walter's longtime nurse, Miss Strand (Fay Helm), objects to this blasphemy, she is summarily murdered and her brain transplanted into the ape woman's skull. The result is named Paula Dupree (Acquanetta), a beautiful but mute creature. At the circus, Paula rescues lion tamer Fred Mason (Milburn Stone) from an attacking animal and a grateful Fred makes her his assistant. The team is highly successful but a lovesick Paula becomes jealous of Fred's girlfriend, Beth Colman (Evelyn Ankers), a condition that turns her into a half-ape, half-woman. Failing to kill Beth, Paula returns to the sanitarium, where Dorothy is being prepared for more experiments. The girl is rescued in the nick of time and an enraged Paula, now completely returned to simian form, kills Walters. Escaping, the ape once again saves Fred's life before being put down by an arriving police officer. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

A pre-Charlie Chan Sidney Toler stars in Champagne for Breakfast as The Judge, a philosophical racetrack tout. Though eternally broke, the Judge manages to smooth the path of life for Vivian Morton (Joan Marsh), a nice girl to whom he's taken a fancy. By and by, the Judge brings together Vivian and handsome young Bob Bentley (Hardie Albright), then rescues Vivian's sister Natalie (Lila Lee) from the clutches of lecherous villain Osborne (Bradley Page). Though top-billed, Mary Carlisle has comparatively little to do as socialite Edie Reach. All things considered, Champagne for Breakfast is really Sidney Toler's film, and it's nice to see this perennial supporting player in a major role for a change. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Cloris Leachman stars as Melba, a woman with whom violence is a way of life, in Jonathan Demme's high-pitched "B"-movie Crazy Mama. The film spans three decades in the violent life of Melba, beginning in Jerusalem, Arkansas in 1932, when law enforcers kill her father (Clint Kimbrough), turning her mother Sheba (Ann Sothern) into a bitter widow. Mother and daughter take off to Long Beach, California, and the time jumps to 1958, when the two are thrown out of their beauty salon for non-payment of back rent. Melba now has an attractive (and pregnant) teenage daughter Cheryl (Linda Purl). The three generations take to the road, stealing cars and creating general mayhem across the United States, robbing a motorcycle racetrack box office and a bank. But in 1959, Melba and Cheryl are picked up again, running a Miami Beach snack bar, their lives wasted in free-living terror. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Dancing Feet stars Joan Marsh as Judy, a society deb who lands a job as a dime-a-dance girl to spite her wealthy grandfather (Purnell Pratt). While her fiancé Peyton (Ben Lyon) stews, Judy strikes up a friendship with Jimmy (Eddie Nugent), a bellhop who aspires to become a vaudeville dancer. Judy and Jimmy enjoy success as a dance team, falling in love as an afterthought. As for Peyton, he finds consolation with Judy's brassy friend Mabel (Isabel Jewell). The musical highlights in Dancing Feet include a specialty number by Nick Condos of the Condos Brothers (and future husband of comedienne Martha Raye). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A young woman and her two buddies team up to run her newly inherited trucking company. In this comedy, the trouble begins when they agree to haul some gambling equipment to Vegas, get caught and tossed into the hoosegow. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide