Jo Ann Marlowe Movies

Based on an old Gene Stratton Porter story, Keeper of the Bees was a shade too bucolic for postwar audiences. Michael Duane stars as an artist who has lost confidence in humanity. He regains it with the help of a faith healer and her two daughters. One of the girls is played by Gloria Henry, later "Alice Mitchell" on Dennis the Menace. One of the earliest directorial efforts of John Sturges, Keeper of the Bees was previously filmed by Monogram in 1935, with Neil Hamilton in Duane's role. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Running a mere 56 minutes, Little Iodine was the first of five "streamliners" produced by Comet Productions, a company formed by Mary Pickford, her husband Charles "Buddy" Rogers, and former Columbia exec Ralph Cohn. Based on the comic strip by Jimmy Hatlo, the film stars Jo Ann Marlowe as Iodine, the bratty daughter of Henry and Cora Tremble (Hobart Cavanaugh, Irene Ryan). The story gets under way when Iodine mistakenly believes that Mrs. Tremble is romantically involved with French professor Simkins (Leon Belasco). Iodine's misbegotten efforts to break up the nonexistent affair causes friction between her father and his bombastic boss Mr. Bigdome (Emory Parnell), but the little darling comes to the rescue at fadeout time. Thanks to legal entanglements, Little Iodine has never been released to television, but that's no great loss. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A Scandal in Paris is a liberal adaptation of the life story of Eugène François Vidocq, who was French prefect of police during the Napoleonic era. George Sanders stars as Vidocq, who spends most of the film as an aimless rogue willing to lie, cheat, and steal for his own comfort. The women who affect Vidocq's life include a saucy cabaret entertainer (Carole Landis) for whom Vidocq steals, and a good woman (Signe Hasso) for whom he straightens himself out. Fledgling director Douglas Sirk displayed his love of the Baroque (both in decor and characterizations) that would distinguish his later high-budget Universal soap operas. Most prints of A Scandal in Paris bear the film's alternate title, Thieves' Holiday. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A New-York-bound hitchhiker is hit by a car. The driver, a successful art dealer, stops and finds that he has hit a beautiful girl. He takes her to his home and later learns that she was to be a dancer. As she recovers she cannot help but notice that her benefactor and his stepdaughter both seem a little touched. The suspense comes in when she figures out that the greedy dealer is planning to kill all his female relatives in order to receive a large inheritance. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Yankee Doodle Dandy is no more the true-life story of George M. Cohan than The Jolson Story was the unvarnished truth about Al Jolson -- but who the heck cares? Dandy has song, dance, pathos, pageantry, uproarious comedy, and, best of all, James Cagney at his Oscar-winning best. After several failed attempts to bring the life of legendary, flag-waving song-and-dance man Cohan to the screen, Warners scenarist Robert Buckner opted for the anecdotal approach, unifying the film's largely unrelated episodes with a flashback framework. Summoned to the White House by President Roosevelt, the aging Cohan is encouraged to relate the events leading up to this momentous occasion. He recalls his birth on the Fourth of July, 1878; his early years as a cocky child performer in his family's vaudeville act; his decision to go out as a "single"; his sealed-with-a-handshake partnership with writer/producer Sam Harris (Richard Whorf); his first Broadway success, 1903's Little Johnny Jones; his blissful marriage to winsome wife Mary (a fictional amalgam of Cohan's two wives, played by Joan Leslie -- who, incredibly, was only 17 at the time); his patriotic civilian activities during World War I, culminating with his writing of that conflict's unofficial anthem "Over There" (performed by Nora Bayes, as played by Frances Langford); the deaths of his sister, Josie (played by Cagney's real-life sister Jeanne), his mother, Nellie (Rosemary DeCamp), and his father, Jerry (Walter Huston); his abortive attempt to retire; and his triumphant return to Broadway in Rodgers & Hart's I'd Rather Be Right.

His story told, Cohan is surprised -- and profoundly moved -- when FDR presents him with the Congressional Medal of Honor, the first such honor bestowed upon an entertainer. His eyes welling up with tears, Cohan expresses his gratitude by invoking his old vaudeville curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you." Glossing over such unsavory moments in Cohan's life as his bitter opposition of the formation of Actor's Equity -- not to mention George M.'s intense hatred of FDR! -- Yankee Doodle Dandy offers the George M. Cohan that people in 1942 wanted to see (proof of the pudding was the film's five-million-dollar gross). And besides, the plot and its fabrications were secondary to those marvelous Cohan melodies -- "Give My Regards to Broadway," "Harrigan," "Mary," "You're a Grand Old Flag," "45 Minutes from Broadway," and the title tune -- performed with brio by Cagney (who modifies his own loose-limbed dancing style in order to imitate Cohan's inimitable stiff-legged technique) and the rest of the spirited cast. Beyond its leading players, movie buffs will have a ball spotting the myriad of familiar character actors parading before the screen: S.Z. Sakall, George Tobias, Walter Catlett, George Barbier, Eddie Foy Jr. (playing his own father), Frank Faylen, Minor Watson, Tom Dugan, John Hamilton, and on and on and on. In addition to Cagney, music directors Ray Heindorf and Heinz Roemheld also won Oscars for their efforts. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide