Robert Lowery Movies

In this humorous murder mystery, a woman is wrongfully accused of poisoning her uncle when he died after she gave the ailing fellow a pill that she believed was aspirin. To prove her innocence, the woman must find the strange lady that gave her the pill. A crazy chase ensues. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Columbia Pictures, as usual, cast a lesser-known player -- in this case the handsome but rather stolid Robert Lowery -- in the starring role of The Monster and the Ape, a rough-and-tumble serial released in 15 chapters. Lowery played Ken Morgan, an agent for a company manufacturing the newly invented Metalogen, a metal that can render a robot invincible. An evil professor (the wonderfully hammy Ralph Morgan, brother of Frank) attempts to steal the metal, using a trained gorilla as his weapon. Not one of the studio's better chapterplays -- to put it mildly -- The Monster and the Ape stayed mercifully forgotten until reappearing on early-morning television in the late '60s. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

In this WW II drama, American POWs aboard a Japanese ship revolt when they learn that their vessel is to used as a decoy for an American submarine. The rebellion is quite bloody and 30 women and children die before the Yankees break into the radio room and announce their presence to the oncoming submarine. Shots are fired, but at last the Americans beat the Japanese and are rescued. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Surprisingly, leading lady Marjorie Weaver isn't the Fashion Model in this tongue-in-cheek Monogram meller. When two employees of a clothing factory are murdered, the shadow of suspicion falls upon lowly stock boy Robert Lowery. One of the victims (Lorna Gray) was the titular model, whom Lowery may or may not have been romancing. The hero's loyal girlfriend (Weaver) sleuths around until she comes face to face with the real killer. Fashion Model was co-written by Tim Ryan, who plays the irascible detective assigned to the case. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

No production unit at Paramount Pictures was busier in 1944 than the Pine-Thomas unit-and few were as bankable at the box-office. In Pine-Thomas' Dangerous Passage, Joe Beck (Robert Lowery), an easygoing resident of Central America, is summoned to Texas to claim his share of an inheritance. Making the journey by boat, Beck finds himself the target of several attempts on his life. He also forms a more than professional relationship with his attorney, Nita Paxton (Phyllis Brooks). En route to Galveston, Beck and Nita are shipwrecked and forced to swim for their lives. The identity of their mystery assailant is revealed in the last reel, though for a while it doesn't look like either the hero or the heroine will survive long enough to profit from this knowledge. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This Pine-Thomas actioner stars Robert Lowery as two-fisted forest ranger Don Bradley. Promoted to supervisor, Bradley finds his success hollow when his childhood sweetheart Kay (Ellen Drew) marries big-time gangster Steve Downey (Regis Toomey). In soon develops that Kay has wedded Downey against her will, and is being held prisoner in a remote mountain cabin. Bradley then dashes to the rescue, which culminates in a perilous car chase through dangerous mountain passages. Eddie Quillan provides comic relief as Bradley's pal Willie. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The still very undead mummy experiences insane jealousy in this the third of Universal's Kharis thrillers. Although he was thought to have perished in a fire in The Mummy's Tomb (1942), Kharis (Lon Chaney Jr.) is once again wreaking havoc in the town of Mapleton, MA. Sent by the High Priest (George Zucco) to retrieve both Kharis and his ancient love interest, the Princess Ananka, from their resting places at New York's Scripps Museum, Yousef Bey (John Carradine) learns that the princess has turned to dust. Her soul, however, seems to have been reincarnated as Amina Mansouri (Ramsay Ames), an Egyptian exchange student studying with Mapleton Egyptologist professor Norman (Frank Reicher). The latter's experiments with brewing tanna leaves turn ugly when Kharis appears. Soon after, Amina's hair develops grey streaks and she experiences strange and unsettling trances, unsettling especially for boyfriend Tom Hervey (Robert Lowery). Investigating Professor Norman's strange death, Inspector Walgreen (Barton MacLane) sets a trap for Kharis, but the crafty mummy escapes with a prostrate Amina. Hiding in an abandoned mineshaft, Kharis, to his distress, learns that Yousef harbors more than a religious interest in the beautiful Amina and promptly kills him. With the reincarnated but rapidly decaying princess in his arms, the mummy, to the horrors of the townspeople in general and Tom in particular, blithely walks into a nearby swamp and slowly sinks into the quagmire. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

In this bit of WWII propaganda (designed to boost support of America's alliance with Russia against Germany), Kolya (Dana Andrews), Kurin (Walter Huston), Damian (Farley Granger), and Marina (Anne Baxter) are members of a farming collective in the Ukraine known as the North Star. The hard-working but happy members of the North Star find their way of life shattered when Germany, in defiance of previous treaties, storms the nation and begins a brutal occupation. Dr. Otto Von Harden (Erich Von Stroheim) begins gathering children -- who are to be used for blood transfusions and medical experiments. Many of the outraged farmers take to the hills to fight with the anti-Nazi resistance, while those who stay behind bravely destroy precious crops and materiel rather than turn them over to the Nazi war machine. Producer Samuel Goldwyn made The North Star at the request of President Franklin D. Roosevelt (whose son James was an executive at Goldwyn's studio). Ironically, several members of the film's creative team (including screenwriter Lilian Hellman) later found their motivations for making the film questioned by the House Un-American Activities Committee, who declared it Communist propaganda. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

"It'll make you yell SOLID!" boasted the ads for the Monogram musical Campus Rhythm. Johnny Downs stars as Scoop, a rather long-in-tooth college newspaper correspondent who suspects something when a vaguely familiar-looking young lady enrolls in school. The girl is Joan (Gale Storm), a popular radio singer, who has walked out on her sponsor and returned to college under a pseudonym. Joan becomes the campus pariah when she is forced to drop out of a fund-raising college variety show because of her radio contract. But all is forgiven by the final reel, wherein Joan and the entire ensemble participate in a huge, cathartic production number. The film's biggest laughs are engendered by Candy Candido, he of the astonishigly versatile trick voice ("Ah'm feeelin'?mighty?.lowwwww"). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The second of Monogram's "zombie" thrillers, Revenge of the Zombies is better than the first, if only because of its powerhouse cast. John Carradine does his usual as Von Alltermann, a mad scientist in the employ of the Nazis. Commissioned to create a race of "living dead" warriors for the Third Reich, Von Alltermann takes time out to attempt to revitalize his deceased wife Lila (Veda Ann Borg). Stumbling into the doc's laboratory is heroine Jen (Gale Storm), who is rescued in The Nick by undercover FBI agent Larry (Robert Lowery). As in King of the Zombies, Mantan Moreland provides his patented bug-eyed comedy relief; good taste aside, he's the best thing in the picture. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

No relation to the 1935 Lon Chaney Jr. vehicle of the same name, Republic's A Scream in the Dark is based on The Morgue is Always Open, a novel by Jerome Odlum. Robert Lowery plays Mike Brooker, a police reporter and amateur sleuth. Mike finds himself up to his neck in danger and intrigue when tracking down an elusive killer. The murders are committed by a stiletto-tipped umbrella, and there is no shortage of suspects. With only 53 minutes' running time, Mike is forced to assemble the clues in record time, with nary a pause for breath or logic. Marie "The Body" McDonald is better than usual as the hero's sweetheart, while Elizabeth Russell, a fixture of Val Lewton's RKO horror films, is suitably sinister as an oft-widowed suspect. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The Rough Riders--Buck Jones, Raymond Hatton and Rex Bell--endeavor to provide a wagon train safe passage through Indian country. With Jones heading the caravan and Bell and Hatton working undercover, the threesome discover that the "savages" planning to attack the settlers are actually renegade whites. The criminals' target is the shipment of railroad supplies being carried in one of the wagons. Normally, the third "Rough Rider" would have been played by Colonel Tim McCoy, but when McCoy was called to active duty in World War II, he was hastily replaced by old-time western star Rex Bell. Dawn on the Great Divide was the last film for Buck Jones, who was killed in the infamous Coconut Grove fire shortly before the film was released. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide