Gertrude Messinger Movies

Substantially, Lupe Velez' Columbia vehicle Redhead from Manhattan was the same as her previous RKO starrers-boisterous, unsubtle, and immensely profitable. La Lupe plays a dual role, as twin sisters named Rita and Elaine. Escaping from a torpedoed ship, Rita shows up in New York, where she takes the place of her Broadway-star sister Elaine, who's having problems with her marriage and needs to make a short but quick getaway. Naturally, neither Elaine's husband (Gerald Mohr) nor Rita's saxophone-player boyfriend (Michael Duane) are aware of the switch. Anyone who can't figure out what happens next should be drummed out of the theater in disgrace. And as always, a little of Lupe Velez goes a long, long way. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The Gambling Daughters of the title are Gale Storm and Janet Shaw. Students in an exclusive girl's school, Storm and Shaw fall under the spell of suave, secretive gambler Roger Pryor. It isn't long before the girls have depleted their family's finances, and have enmeshed the other students in their speculative spree. Robert Baldwin is featured as a comic-relief insurance inspector who turns private eye when a murder takes place. Among the scenarists of this PRC programmer is future best-selling novelist Sidney Sheldon. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The first of eight Bob Steele Westerns from Gower Gulch producer Harry S. Webb's Metropolitan Pictures Corp., Feud of the Range had been filmed as The Kanab Kid in Kanab, UT, in the fall of 1938. An ignominious beginning of an justly infamous series, the Western starred the diminutive Steele as a cowboy returning to the old homestead along with his pal, Happy (Budd Buster). They arrive in the middle of a range war that ultimately separates father and son. But as Bob quickly learns, the troubles are caused by greedy Clyde Barton (Jack Ingram), who is hoping to drive the local ranchers off their valuable land. A rough hewn affair that depended too much on stock footage, Feud of the Range was further handicapped by the amateurish performance of its nominal leading lady, former child actress Gertrude Messinger, who, for most of the duration, had eyes only for villain Jack Ingram. The series proved the nadir for the veteran Steele, who next starred for yet another Poverty Row company, the much derided PRC. Coming from Metropolitan, however, even PRC was actually a step up. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Akim Tamiroff, Paramount Pictures' resident crime lord, runs all illegal gambling activities in a major city. Reporter Lloyd Nolan struggles to get the goods on Tamiroff, but runs up against a stone wall until he meets nightclub singer Claire Trevor. Trevor is anxious to avenge the death of her sister (Helen Burgess), who was done in by Tamiroff's minions. Though only a "B" picture, King of Gamblers was given "A" treatment by director Robert Florey. The film was part of an unofficial Paramount series based on the J. Edgar Hoover book Persons in Hiding. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The penultimate Bill Cody Western in a series of nine produced by Gower Gulch company Spectrum Pictures, Blazing Justice featured its weatherbeaten star as a lawman mistaken for an outlaw by pretty Gertrude Messinger. Naturally, the real culprit is the very man Cody was trailing in the first place. Whew the girl's father (Budd Buster) is found murdered, Cody becomes an obvious suspect but a $10,000 insurance settlement eventually lures the real killer (Gordon Griffith) into a trap. A holdover from the silent era, Cody cut a rather dismal figure at this point in his career and was beaten not once but twice by villain Griffith in Blazing Justice. Producer Ray Kirkwood announced in late 1935 that Cody would nevertheless star in a second series for Spectrum, but following Outlaws of the Range (1936) the veteran performer found himself replaced with crooner Fred Scott. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Working on the theory that the only thing funnier than Laurel and Hardy is two sets of Laurel and Hardys, Our Relations milks its central mistaken-identity situation for all it's worth. Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy are two solid citizens, happily married and highly respected in their community. One morning, Hardy receives a letter from his mother, containing an old photo of himself and Laurel with their twin brothers, Alf Laurel and Bert Hardy. Mamma also reveals that Alf and Bert turned out to be "bad lads" and ran off to sea, and that reportedly they'd been hanged for taking part in a mutiny. "Isn't that calamitous!" remarks Hardy, who conspires with Laurel to hide the facts about their no-good brothers from their wives. Meanwhile, in another part of town, the S.S. Periwinkle pulls into port. Among the crew members are the selfsame Alf and Bert, who have decided to entrust their pal Fin (James Finlayson) with their month's salary. Fin has promised to invest the dough so that the boys will become millionaires "before you can say Jack Robinson". Alf and Bert are then summoned to the cabin of their captain (Sidney Toler), who orders them to pick up a valuable package for him, then meet him later at Denker's Beer Garden. While waiting for the captain at Denker's, Alf and Bert are captivated by a pair of waterfront floozies, Alice (Iris Adrian) and Lily (Lona Andre). Talked into buying the girls a huge meal for which they haven't the necessary funds, Alf and Bert decide to go back to Fin and reclaim their money, leaving the contents of the captain's package-a valuable pearl ring-with tough waiter Joe Groagan (Alan Hale) as security. Later, Laurel and Hardy take their wives Betty (Betty Healy) and Daphne (Daphne Pollard) to lunch-and, inevitably, they end up at Denker's Beer Garden, where the equally inevitable mix-ups begin to occur. Things snowball from bad to worse before both sets of twins, an angry captain, a disgruntled Fin, the wives, the floozies, a genial drunk (Arthur Housman) and a brace of smooth gangsters (Ralf Harolde and Noel Madison) all converge at the upscale Pirate Club. Several slapstick complications later, Laurel and Hardy are captured by the gangsters, who threaten to dump the boys in the river with their feet encased in cement if they don't cough up the pearl ring. Alf and Bert come to the rescue, and all is well, at least until the film's boffo punchline. Based on W.W. Jacobs' short story The Money Box, Our Relations is perhaps the most plot-heavy of Laurel and Hardy's features for Hal Roach Studios. It is also one of their funniest, as well as their most lavishly produced. The film was officially listed as "A Stan Laurel Production"-as if Laurel hadn't been the prime creative force behind all of the team's previous films. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

An apparently lost entry in the long-running Bob Steele Western series produced by A.W. Hackel, The Rider of the Law presented the diminutive Steele as an Arizona lawman trailing the Tolliver brothers, a gang of outlaws. Steele catches up with the brothers in Apache City, where they are blackmailing the local bank president. As he has done so many times before, our hero then engages in a bit of subterfuge by pretending to be an Easterner. Thus catching the Tollivers off guard, he manages to discover their mountain hideout and there is a final shootout. Like all of Steele's early Westerns for Hackel's Supreme Pictures, The Rider of the Law was directed by his real-life father, Robert North Bradbury. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Weatherbeaten western star Harry Carey is the glue that holds the low-budget Wagon Trail together. Carey plays a sheriff who is forced to pay dearly for crimes allegedly committed by his son Ed Norris. The actual miscreant is "solid citizen" Earl Dwyre, who is given Carey's job. With only 55 minutes' worth of screen time at his disposal, Carey must wrap this one up at double speed. The script's disposal of villain Dwyre is a novelty for a B western, and one that shouldn't be given a try at home. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Gene Autry's second starring western for Republic was the well-named Melody Trail. Unlike Autry's inaugural vehicle Tumbling Tumbleweeds, which offered an equal blend of action and music, this second effort is virtually all music, with occasional comedy relief from Smiley Burnette. The story finally takes flight when a baby left in Gene's care is kidnapped, and travelling gypsy Frantz (Willy Castello) is suspected. All turns out okay, albeit with a minimum of fisticuffs and gunplay. The film's mass-wedding finale (an intriguing precursor to Seven Brides for Seven Brothers) features several lovely starlets who figure significantly in the storyline, the most prominent of whom is 18-year-old Ann Rutherford. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The fifth of eight low-budget Westerns starring Lane Chandler, this Willis Kent production was apparently filmed at Hollywood's International studios in 1932 but not released until 1934. Chandler plays Bob Rand, an investigator for the Cattleman's Association hired to capture El Lobo, a notorious rustler. Bob quickly learns that the wanted outlaw is actually Big Mike Carter (J.P. McGowan, who also directed) and that he is holed up with his gang on a deserted ranch. Left to die in the desert by "Bull" LeMoyne, one of El Lobo's henchmen (Rychard Cramer), Bob is rescued by lovely Rosita (Gertrude Messinger), whose father (Si Jenks) convinces the investigator to go undercover. But in spite of his disguise, Bob and Rosita are captured by El Lobo who, unbeknownst to Bob, is his own father. To save his son from the vicious gang members, El Lobo sacrifices his own life by dynamiting the ranch. Written by the prolific Oliver Drake, Lawless Valley bore a strong resemblance to a previous Chandler Western, Guns for Hire, also written by Drake, in which a young gunfighter discovers that his enemy is his teacher and foster parent. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Some people never know what they have until someone else is about to get it as can be seen in this romance that centers upon a city slicker who returns home to finally marry the woman he's been engaged to for 16 years. When he sees her, he is disappointed to find her a tad matronly looking. His roving eye quickly falls upon a sweet young thing to whom he proposes. He then becomes engaged to every woman he kisses leading the original fiancee to drop him, take her substantial savings, and move into a posh apartment. She later goes home and falls in love with another causing her old fiancee to return and marry her. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Confidence woman Martha Hicks (Alison Skipworth), better known to those who know her at all as "the Countess," is a career criminal who has just been paroled. She would like to slip away from the authorities and leave the country, but first she wants to look in on the only decent, respectable part of her life, the two daughters whom she left behind with her onetime husband, Elmer Hicks (Richard Bennett), a small-town hotel owner. She arrives to find that Elmer, in his well-meaning but dithering way, has let their younger daughter (Gertrude Messinger) fall in with the wrong crowd, including a two-bit criminal, Jack Houston (George Raft). He has filled her head with stories about what a big man he is and plans to take her to Chicago with him, until Martha intervenes -- she manages to turn the interest of veteran lawman John Adams (J. Farrell MacDonald) to her advantage and nearly gets Houston thrown in the slammer. When he proves tougher to get out of the way than she'd thought he'd be, Martha has to choose between freedom or the well-being of her daughter, and gets some unexpected help from Elmer. Skipworth is charming and the rest of the cast is first-rate in this sly, fast-paced, and enjoyable comedy drama. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

Filmed on glorious locations at the foot of California's Mount Whitney by ace cinematographer Archie Stout, this above-average Monogram B-Western starred wiry, little Bob Steele in an offbeat story of a cowboy searching for a lost tribe of Indians. Surviving in the seemingly impassable Hidden Valley, the tribe and its gold is threatened by villainous Kenneth McDonald and his gang. One of the gang members is heroine Gertrude Messenger's young brother, Jimmie (Ray Hallor), who is captured by the wild Indians and is about to be sacrificed to their god when rescued by Steele and the sheriff (Arthur Millett), who arrive, not with the cavalry, but in the Goodyear Blimp. The latter is piloted by Captain Verner L. Smith who, as George Turner and Michael H. Price so aptly put it, "plays himself with adequate conviction." The fantastic story was produced by Trem Carr and directed by Bob Steele's father, Robert N. Bradbury. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi