Addie McPhail Movies

Kenneth Roberts' fact-based novel Northwest Passage would seem too raw and explicit a book to be considered for an MGM film adaptation-much less one in Technicolor. Amazingly, MGM retained many of the grim episodes from the Roberts' novel, though - thanks to the Hays Code - most are discussed rather than shown. The film is set in 1759, when the headstrong and gifted young artist Langdon Towne (Robert Young) is expelled from Harvard much to the chagrin of his parents and his fiancee, Elizabeth Browne (Ruth Hussey). Towne and his tough-as-nails sidekick, Hunk Marriner (Walter Brennan) get soused one night in a pub and - while intoxicated - viciously insult Elizabeth's father, Rev. Browne (Louis Hector). The two men are nearly arraigned for the incident, but escape just in time and ultimately wind up at the camp of famed Indian hunter Major Robert Rogers (Spencer Tracy). Rogers then invites Towne to join his troupe as a cartographer, and suggests that Marriner tag along. Together, the hundreds of Indian fighters under Rogers's aegis team up and chart their way through the wilderness, headed straight for St. Francis, the base of the French-supported Abenaki tribe, notorious for bloodily wiping out British-controlled colonies, after which they will forge the titular 'northwest passage' to the Pacific. Along the route, the boys counter such obstacles as traitorous Native American guides and exploding gunpowder. Metro Goldwyn-Mayer originally slated this production for Tracy, Wallace Beery, Robert Taylor and Franchot Tone, but only Tracy signed on; the studio reeled in Brennan and Young as last-minute additions, to support Tracy's lead. Northwest Passage marked Vidor's first Technicolor film. William V. Skall and Sidney Wagner received Oscar nominations for their outstanding cinematographic work on the film. Nineteen years after its premiere, Northwest Passage later became an NBC TV series between 1959-60, starring Keith Larsen in the Tracy role, Buddy "Jed Clampett" Ebsen in the Brennan role, and Don Burnett in the Young role. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Paul Muni stars in this drama about a romantic triangle that leads to madness and murder. Overly enthusiastic Mexican attorney Johnny Ramirez (Muni) is disbarred after his first trial for his flagrant disregard of courtroom etiquette. In desperate need of work, he takes a job as a bouncer in a sleazy bordertown night club owned by Charlie Roark (Eugene Pallette). Charlie's wife Marie (Bette Davis) is immediately attracted to Johnny and makes a none-too-subtle play for him. But Johnny has his eye on Dale Elwell (Margaret Lindsay), a socialite who enjoys slumming in low-class dives and admiringly refers to Johnny as a "savage." Johnny tells Marie that it's against his principles to get involved with a married woman, so she decides to do something about that: she traps drunken Charlie in his car while it's locked in a garage, allowing the carbon monoxide to take Charlie out of the picture. When Marie explains that she killed her husband and is now available to him, Johnny wants no part of her; bitter that Johnny has snubbed her, Marie implicates him in Charlie's murder, leading to a dramatic and surprising trial. Paul Muni reportedly moved in with his Mexican chauffeur in order to study his accent and reproduce it accurately for this film. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

In this heartwarming drama, an amiable department store worker gets more than he bargained for when he accidentally slips a $10 tip he'd received into the hands of a nurse looking for donations to an orphanage on the way to the bank. By doing this, he unwittingly committed himself to supporting one of the orphans. As he rather likes the nurse, and his new boy, he takes on another job to fulfill his obligation. He finds himself quite happy with the situation until a wealthy man steps forward claims that he believes the boy is his grandson. He promptly adopts the lad. The distraught clerk then plots to kidnap the youth to get him back. Instead he proves that the boy is not related to the millionaire and regains custody. Then to make it all official, he proposes to the nurse, she accepts and a happy family is born. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

This melodrama follows the lives of three sisters. One dies while giving birth, another gets married and goes to the US, and the last one gets involved with a Viennese musician. The two survivors become wealthy, and seem to forget about their impoverished mother back in Italy. Unbeknownst to any of the parties, the money the good daughters send home is being taken by a third party. That person's identity is discovered when the women and their spouses come to Italy to visit. They later leave the poor woman with a nice retirement fund. Songs include: "Italian Kisses" (L. Wolfe Gilbert, Abel Baer), "Lonely Feet," "Hand in Hand," "Keep Smiling," "Won't Dance," "Roll on Rolling Road," "What Good are Words," "You Are Doing Very Well" (Jerome Kern, Oscar Hammerstein II). ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi