Tully Marshall Movies

A clever, slyly self-satirical screenplay by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur helps to make The Unholy Garden seem better than it is. The title refers to a Saharan oasis where a group of international crooks have converged, free from prosecution. Ronald Colman stars as gentleman thief Barrington Hunt, who rallies his fellow crooks together in a plan to divest a wealthy baron (Dudley Digges) of his fortune. Part of the scheme requires Hunt to make love to Fay Wray, the baron's lovely daughter, a task that proves pleasurable indeed. But Hunt hadn't counted on falling in love with Wray -- and when he does, it's "reformation and redemption" time, with our hero turning on and turning in his former pals. Among the reprobates within Hunt's orbit are such veteran screen heavies as Warren Hymer, Lucille LaVerne and Lawrence Grant, the latter chewing the scenery as a discredited doctor who keeps the skull of his murdered wife in a jar! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

George Arliss is the millionaire of the title, a retired auto tycoon who's been ordered by his doctor to rest and avoid exercise. Arliss is shaken out of his sedentary existence by an insurance salesman who advises him to pick himself up and enjoy life. The old man heads to California, where he conceals his identity and goes to work for a service station. Given a new lease on life, the millionaire amuses himself by playing matchmaker with his own daughter (Evelyn Knapp) and the go-getting young service station manager (David Manners). Barely distinguishable from George Arliss' other non-historical vehicles, The Millionaire is given an added dimension by James Cagney, who shows up for three wonderful minutes as the friendly insurance agent. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Ellen Neal (Constance Bennett) is a "nice" girl -- just turned 18 -- who's been picked up in a raid on a speakeasy where she just started working. She pleads guilty to vagrancy, but gets a lecture and warning from the judge to steer clear of places like that, and to try and find honest work. She tries to do precisely that and is hired a year later as a maid in the household of the Fullertons, a wealthy family with roots going back to the English aristocracy. She's very aware of the opportunity she's been given, and tries to lead an honorable life, despite the lecherous inclinations of the household's major domo (Charles McNaughton) and the less obnoxious but equally fervent impulses of their college-age son, Hugh (Lew Ayres), and his friends. Ellen soon finds, however, that for all of their pretensions to greatness, the Fullertons and their friends enjoy exactly the same leisure activities -- including drinking illegal liquor (this is in the middle of the Prohibition era), bought from the same gangsters, dancing the same dances, and singing the same songs that the customers did in the speakeasy where she worked; and that at least one of the close family friends, Bud Coakley (Matty Kemp), was a customer at that same place and remembers her. He tells Hugh what he thinks he knows about Ellen's "past" and soon Hugh is putting moves on her, which she resists anew. When he realizes the kind of woman she really is, Hugh ultimately comes to genuinely love her, and those attentions she is willing to accept and return in kind. He returns to college in September -- before Ellen discovers that she is pregnant -- and when she writes to tell him, he doesn't answer.

Ellen leaves her job and returns to live with her mother (Beryl Mercer), and she has the baby, a boy. Hugh never does reply to her letters, and she is forced to hire an attorney, Yates (Tully Marshall). The Fullerton family, led by the blustery patriarch Richard (Purnell Pratt), wants this case settled quietly, out of court, and so instructs his lawyer, Judge Filson (Hale Hamilton). Filson expects to encounter a cheap gold digger, but when he meets Ellen, he's pleasantly surprised and comes to believe her story about the baby's paternity. Meanwhile, it turns out that Hugh would like to do the right thing by Ellen, but his best impulses have been diverted by his father's advice (always focused on preserving the family's reputation) and Bud, who still thinks of Ellen as the girl from the speakeasy. Complicating matters even further is that Ellen doesn't even want money and never did -- all she wanted is the acknowledgement from Hugh about who she was to him and who the baby's father is. When she's confronted by her "past," it looks as though she may never get a chance to press her case, until her attorney uncovers a fact that gets Bud and Hugh hauled into court. It still looks like the Fullertons will get their way, with a trumped-up session prejudiced in favor of them, when suddenly some truths come out that turn the reputations of all concerned completely on their heads. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Based on Leo Tolstoy's The Living Corpse, this film was originally scheduled as John Gilbert's first talkie, but it was held from release until distribution of his second, One Glorious Night. In the story, the Enoch Arden-style hero, long-presumed dead, commits suicide rather than ruin the happiness of his newly-remarried wife. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide

The popular silent-film screen team of Richard Arlen and Mary Brian was carried over into talkies with such films as Burning Up. In emulation of the late movie idol Wally Reid, Arlen is cast as daredevil race-car driver Lou Larrigan. Much to the dismay of his sweetheart Ruth Morgan (Brian), Larrigan insists upon risking his neck -- and everyone else's -- on a daily basis. After a series of devastating setbacks, our hero finally learns to straighten up and drive right, just in time for the Big Race finale. The racing scenes are excitingly photographed, but the dialogue passages are textbook examples of ennui. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Jack Mulhall stars as Leonard Staunton, a businessman whose future is threatened by a trio of mysterious blackmailers. The villains will stop at nothing to get what they want -- not even murder. From all appearances, the blackmailers are members of a Chinese Tong, but Staunton, teamed with dedicated detective Lt. Caundon (Noah Beery), proves that the dastardly trio are all Caucasians. The film comes to an exciting climax as Staunton, Caundon and heroine Jeanne Baldwin (Lila Lee) rescue the hero's Aunt Pat (Hedda Hopper) from the bad guys' clutches. Like many early Warner Bros. talkies, Murder Will Out was remade more than once by Bryan Foy's "B" unit. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Comedian Frank Fay and director Michael Curtiz reportedly despised one another at sight, and their mutual animosity tends to seep through every frame of Under a Texas Moon. The vainglorious Fay is cast as Don Carlos, a gay caballero ("gay" meaning "carefree") whose serenades every senorita he meets. When a group of ranchers post a $7000 dollar reward for the capture of the Bad Man of the Pool (Fred Kohler), a notorious bandit, Don Carlos passes himself off as a daring cattle rustler and promises to bring the Bad Man to heel within 10 days. Characteristically, he spends nine of those ten days romancing such lovelies as Raquella (Raquel Torres), Lolita (Myrna Loy) and Dolores (Armida). All of this was played for laughs, but Frank Fay's special brand of quiet put-down humor didn't play quite as well on screen as it did on stage. Under a Texas Moon was originally released in Technicolor, but try finding a color print today. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Its breezy, upbeat title notwithstanding, She Couldn't Say No leans heavily toward the melodramatic. Winnie Lightner plays Winnie Harper, a brassy cabaret singer who falls in love with gentleman gangster Jerry Casey (Chester Morris). So smitten is Jerry that he sets up Winnie in her own nightclub, for which she is eternally grateful. But Jerry can't keep his eyes -- or his hands -- away from society gal Iris (Sally Eilers), sending Winnie into a professional and personal funk. Our hero wises up long enough to help restore Winnie to stardom, but a happy reunion is prevented by the bullets of a rival gangster. Students of 1930s movie stereotypes are advised to scrutinize the "pansy" portrayal offered by Johnny Arther and the traditional malaprop-spouting black maidservant impersonated by Louise Beavers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The title alone should clue the reader that Numbered Men is a prison picture. Based on the stage play Jail Break, the film is hardly a paragon of credibility: more than one critic noted that the prison depicted herein is more like a country club than a house of corrections. The party-like atmosphere and casual camaraderie between prisoners and guards is spoiled when hard-boiled King Callahan (Ralph Ince) insists upon trying to escape. Before this problem can be resolved, there's the little matter of innocent counterfeiting suspect Bud Leonard (Raymond Hackett), who is finally sprung when the guilty party Bertie Gray (Conrad Nagel) graciously confesses. The film's most (unintentionally) amusing moment finds a prison road gang enjoying a pleasant luncheon in the home of sociable heroine Mary Dane (Bernice Claire). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Intended as a follow-up (and improvement upon) the 1926 epic western The Vanishing American, Redskin was partially filmed in two-color Technicolor -- and, during its first big-city road show engagements, was shown in Magnascope, an early wide-screen process. Written by Elizabeth Pickett, an expert on the Pueblo Indian tribe of New Mexico, the film is in part an indictment of the government's ham-handed efforts to "civilize" the Native American population. Dragged off his reservation by Indian agent John Walton (Larry Steers), Wing Foot (Philip Anderson), the 9-year-old son of a Navajo chief, is forced to speak English and acclimate himself to the ways of the white man. When Wing Foot refuses to salute the American flag, he is brutally whipped by Walton, earning himself the unenviable nickname of Do-Atin, or "The Whipped One." Overcoming his initial resentments, the grown-up Wing Foot (now played by Richard Dix) becomes the first Indian to attend Thorpe College. He excels scholastically and also distinguishes himself as a star athlete, yet still he is subjected to the bigotry of his snobbish classmates. Nor are things any better when Wing Foot graduates from medical school and returns to his own people, hoping to replace their ancient superstitions with modern medical advances. Banished from his tribe for being "too white," Wing Foot finds himself literally a man without a country. Only when he discovers oil on the reservation and manages to avert a tribal war between the Pueblo and Navajo is Wing Foot fully accepted by the two worlds he now straddles. Far superior to The Vanishing American, Redskin is well worth seeing again, if only for the documentary value of its location-filmed Technicolor sequences. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Though filmmaker Erich Von Stroheim's notorious profligacy had made him virtually unhirable in the US by 1929, screen-star Gloria Swanson still had faith in him. She poured a great deal of her own money in Von Stroheim's last silent film, Queen Kelly, and agreed to play the leading role to insure box-office success. When production began, Stroheim had not quite completed his script: all he had was the premise of a young Irish convent girl named Kitty Kelly (Gloria Swanson) being seduced by a German nobleman (Walter Byron) who was slated to marry the mad Queen (Seena Owen) of a tiny European principality. Brandishing a whip, the loony Queen drives the hapless Kitty from the palace. It was after shooting had started that Von Stroheim filled Swanson in on the rest of the plot: Kitty was to inherit all the worldly possessions of her aunt in German East Africa. Arriving to take charge of the estate, Kitty would learn that she was proud possessor of a string of brothels. Realizing that such a plot device would never get past the American censors, Swanson reacted in horror; she frantically called her money men in America and screamed "There's a madman in charge!" In the final release version of Queen Kelly, hastily completed by Swanson to recoup her losses and ultimately released in Europe, Kitty Kelly was forced into a marriage with brothel manager Tully Marshall, a tobacco-juiced stained degenerate. She ultimately returns to the nobleman who'd seduced her, is driven from the palace by Queen Owen, and commits suicide. This version contained dialogue sequences, and one musical interlude, sung by star Swanson. Despite its tawdry plot, Queen Kelly was beautifully photographed; its most famous shot, of Swanson praying in church, her face framed by flickering candles, was excerpted in the actress' much-later talkie Sunset Boulevard. The currently available restored version of Queen Kelly uses still pictures and explanatory titles to fill in the footage that has decomposed over the years. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Warner Oland makes the first of four screen appearances as Sax Rohmer's insidious oriental Dr. Fu Manchu.The film makes an effort to explain Fu's hatred of all whites by showing the death of the Doctor's family during the Boxer Rebellion. Twenty years later, Fu Manchu is a full-blooded villain, using a hypnotized Jean Arthur to help wipe out the British family Fu holds responsible for the deaths of his loved ones. But when Arthur falls in love with potential victim Neil Hamilton, Dr. Fu is forced to add her to his death-list. Weakened only by the excessive "silly-ass Englishman" comedy relief of William Austin, The Mysterious Dr. Fu Manchu is a rapid-fire adventure devoid of early-talkie clumsiness. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide