Alan Lee Movies
- 1958
The greedy relatives of wealthy Daniel Reed (Edgar Stehli) want to have him committed to a mental institution, using as evidence the fact that he has been issuing $20,000 checks to strangers. Perry is hired by Reed's girlfriend Millie Foster (Kitty Kelly) to prevent the old man from being put away. Before long, however, Perry is defending Reed on a murder charge--and the victim is the recipient of all those checks, a slimy blackmailer named Maury Lewis (King Calder). In the course of events, Perry is amazed that each and every one of his legal moves has been anticipated by DA Hamilton Burger (William Talman); can it be that Burger has ordered Mason's office to be bugged? This final episode of Perry Mason's first season is based on a 1939 novel by series creator Erle Stanley Gardner. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1957
Journalist Helmut Dantine, having spent eight years as a convict on Devil's Island, devotes his energies to exposing the horrible conditions at the notorious penal colony. The governor of French Guinea is sympathetic but helpless, since the Devil's Island overseer (William Talman) has technically committed no crime. Investigating the situation, Dantine learns that Talman is the mastermind of a gold-smuggling operation run by the owners of a nearby plantation. The reporter catches Talman in the act, breaks up the operation, and claims the governor's daughter (Donna Martell) for the fadeout clinch. Hell on Devil's Island is one of a group of inexpensive second features produced by 20th Century-Fox's Regal Films division in the late 1950s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Helmut Dantine, William Talman, (more)
John Wayne plays anti-Nazi Prussian sea captain Karl Erlich in Sea Chase, one of the many film commentaries released post WWII. Though staunchly opposed to the Nazi regime, Karl (Wayne) feels it would nevertheless be unpatriotic should he refuse to save his ship from destruction. His ship--an old, rusty 5,000 ton freighter named the Ergenstrasse--is being pursued by a British warship on his journey from Australia back to Germany. Captain Erlich does everything he can to save his ship and his crew, but the process is long and dangerous, particularly without a plentiful supply of fuel and provisions. Erlich must face obstacles ranging from horrendous sea storms and shark attacks to false murder accusations, and it seems his only devotee is Elsa (Lana Turner), a beautiful German spy. Despite nearly falling to the determined English ship and a mutiny attempt by his own crew, Captain Erlich manages to survive what was anything but a routine trip back to his home country. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Wayne, Lana Turner, (more)
- 1955
Bearing very little relation to the 1937 Paramount musical of the same name, Artists and Models is a lavish, girl-filled vehicle for the popular team of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. Martin plays Rick Todd, a comic-book artist who is under fire from his publisher (Eddie Mayehoff), who complains that Rick's work isn't gory enough. Lewis plays Eugene Fullstack, Rick's roommate, who while asleep dreams up elaborate comic-book plots and garishly costumed superheroes. Eugene's nightmares help Rick become a success; meanwhile, our two heroes romance their luscious neighbors, artist Dorothy Malone and rambunctious model Shirley MacLaine (who during one song wrestles Eugene to the floor and sits on his chest!) Eugene's overworked imagination somehow attracts the attention of a group of Russian spies, who attempt to abduct Eugene during the annual Artists and Models Ball. Director Frank Tashlin uses Artists and Models as an excuse for some of the wildest sight-gags seen in a mid-1950s film. At one point, the director contrives to stuff a gag in Shirley MacLaine's mouth. Tashlin also exhibits his ongoing fascination with female breasts and legs by giving ample screen time to the natural attributes of co-stars Anita Ekberg and Eva Gabor. One of the best of the Martin/Lewis efforts, Artists and Models suffers only from being about 20 minutes too long. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, (more)
Laid up with a broken leg, photojournalist L.B. Jeffries (James Stewart) is confined to his tiny, sweltering courtyard apartment. To pass the time between visits from his nurse (Thelma Ritter) and his fashion model girlfriend Lisa (Grace Kelly), the binocular-wielding Jeffries stares through the rear window of his apartment at the goings-on in the other apartments around his courtyard. As he watches his neighbors, he assigns them such roles and character names as "Miss Torso" (Georgine Darcy), a professional dancer with a healthy social life or "Miss Lonelyhearts" (Judith Evelyn), a middle-aged woman who entertains nonexistent gentlemen callers. Of particular interest is seemingly mild-mannered travelling salesman Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr), who is saddled with a nagging, invalid wife. One afternoon, Thorwald pulls down his window shade, and his wife's incessant bray comes to a sudden halt. Out of boredom, Jeffries casually concocts a scenario in which Thorwald has murdered his wife and disposed of the body in gruesome fashion. Trouble is, Jeffries' musings just might happen to be the truth. One of Alfred Hitchcock's very best efforts, Rear Window is a crackling suspense film that also ranks with Michael Powell's Peeping Tom (1960) as one of the movies' most trenchant dissections of voyeurism. As in most Hitchcock films, the protagonist is a seemingly ordinary man who gets himself in trouble for his secret desires. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- James Stewart, Grace Kelly, (more)
At the height of their TV fame, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz were contracted by MGM to make two theatrical films. The first of these, The Long, Long Trailer, stars Lucy and Desi as an upwardly mobile couple who decide to buy a trailer so they can live together while his job takes him around the country. Thanks to their naivete in such matters, they end up with a huge, bulky RV that costs five times what they planned. Their "seeing America" trip turns out to be a slapstick disaster, topped by Lucy's foolish decision to hide a heavy rock collection in the trailer; as Desi tries to maneuver a treacherous mountain road, the weighted-down home-on-wheels nearly loses its balance and almost tumbles off a cliff. The story is told in flashback, as Desi 'splains the breakup of his marriage to a motel court manager. Happily, Lucy shows up, goes "Waaaaah" a little, and all is forgiven. Despite the fact that audiences were getting Ball and Arnaz for free each week on television, The Long, Long Trailer was a big hit at the box-office. The film was adapted by Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich from a novel by Clinton Twiss, with uncredited assistance from the I Love Lucy writing staff. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, (more)
- 1953
This remake of John Ford's The Black Watch (29) stars Tyrone Power as British army captain stationed in India in 1857. Shunned by his fellow officers because he is a half caste, Power defies the social structure of the era by falling in love with the daughter (Terry Moore) of his superior officer. Power proves his loyalty to the Crown by quelling an uprising, led by his Indian boyhood friend (Guy Rolfe). The actors do their best, but the storyline is trite and stilted when dwelling on matters of honor and romance. King of the Khyber Rifles works best as an action picture--and in this respect it is immensely superior to the earlier John Ford film, which almost plays like a comedy when seen today. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tyrone Power, Terry Moore, (more)
- 1953
A frantic woman named Harriet Hopper (Vera Marshe) bursts into the offices of the "Daily Planet" demanding to speak to Superman--and makes a beeline to the office of Clark Kent (George Reeves! How has Harriet managed to tumble to Clark's secret identity? Well, it seems that her nephew Alan (played by Billy Gray of Father Knows Best fame) is a camera bug, and has managed to snap an infra-red photo of Clark changing into his Superman outfit. Though Kent manages to alibi his way out of this sticky situation, young Alan is not yet out of the woods: He has also taken a picture of a dangerous criminal named Burnside (John Eldredge) faking his own death in order to defraud an insurance company. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1946
We prefer Rosalind Russell when she's making us laugh; judging by such films as Mourning Becomes Electra and The Velvet Touch, Russell preferred herself in heavy dramatics. In Sister Kenny, Rosalind Russell is all grim determination and pursed lips as Elizabeth Kenny, tireless battler of infantile paralysis. It is in the Australian outback that nurse Kenny first confronts the debilitating illness. Forsaking her private life (as well as any romantic entanglements), Kenny battles with the medical establishment in order to bring her radical theories towards conquering the disease to the public. Her ultimate triumph is solidified upon the formation of Minneapolis' Kenny Institute. Based on Elizabeth Kenny's autobiography, A solid piece of film craftsmanship, Sister Kenny was the sort of glossy prestige picture that always made Hollywood look good in the eyes of its staunchest critics; it was also the sort of picture that almost invariably lost a fortune at the box office (Sister Kenny took a bath to the tune of $660,000). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rosalind Russell, Alexander Knox, (more)
- 1935
Though Busby Berkeley is the director of I Live for Love, there isn't a dancer or dance number anywhere to be seen. Dolores Del Rio stars as hot-tempered South American stage favorite Donna Alvarez, who is brought to America to headline a Broadway show. The film details the backstage romance between Donna and her handsome co-star Roger Kerry (played by Everett Marshall, an opera star who'd last been seen on-screen in 1930's Dixiana). They fight, make up, fight again, make up again, and fight and make up again. And that's all, folks. The film's singular highlight is the barbershop-quartet lampoon "A Man Must Shave". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dolores Del Rio, Guy Kibbee, (more)
