J. Carrol Naish Movies
Though descended from a highly respected family of Irish politicians and civil servants, actor J. Carroll Naish played every sort of nationality except Irish during his long career. Naish joined the Navy at age sixteen, and spent the next decade travelling all over the world, absorbing the languages, dialects and customs of several nations. Drifting from job to job while stranded in California, Naish began picking up extra work in Hollywood films. The acting bug took hold, and Naish made his stage debut in a 1926 touring company of The Shanghai Gesture. Within five years he was a well-established member of the theatrical community (the legendary actress Mrs. Leslie Carter was the godmother of Naish's daughter). Naish thrived during the early days of talking pictures thanks to his expertise in a limitless variety of foreign dialects. At various times he was seen as Chinese, Japanese, a Frenchman, a South Seas Islander, Portuguese, an Italian, a German, and a Native American (he played Sitting Bull in the 1954 film of the same name). Many of his assignments were villainous in nature (he was a gangster boss in virtually every Paramount "B" of the late 1930s), though his two Oscar nominations were for sympathetic roles: the tragic Italian POW in Sahara (1943) and the indigent Mexican father of a deceased war hero in A Medal For Benny (1954). Naish continued to flourish on radio and television, at one point playing both a priest and a rabbi on the same anthology series. He starred in both the radio and TV versions of the melting-pot sitcom "Life with Luigi," essayed the title role in 39 episodes of "The New Adventures of Charlie Chan" (1957), and played a comedy Indian on the 1960 sitcom "Guestward Ho." Illness forced him to retire in 1969, but J. Carroll Naish was cajoled back before the cameras by quickie producer Al Adamson for the 1970 ultracheapie Dracula vs. Frankenstein; even weighed down by bad false teeth, coke-bottle glasses and a wheelchair, Naish managed to act the rest of the cast right off the screen. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide- 1938
Sarong-clad Dorothy Lamour made her Technicolor debut in this follow-up to her earlier starrer Jungle Princess. After crash-landing on a tropic isle, aviator Bob Mitchell (Ray Milland) and his mechanic Jimmy Wallace (Lynne Overman) make the acquaintance of the lovely Tura (Lamour). While Bob enthusiastically teaches Tura how to kiss, Jimmy tangles with comic-relief chimpanzee Gaga and playful tiger cub Meewa. The villain of the piece is megalomanic witch doctor Kuasa (J. Carroll Naish), who hypnotizes Tura into assisting him with his periodic human sacrifices. Just as Bob, Jimmy and Tura are about to meet their doom at the hands of Kuasa, a timely volcanic eruption saves the day. Any hints of miscegenation (a big no-no for 1938 movie censors) are swept away when it is revealed that Tura is the daughter of white parents, enabling her to find connubial bliss in the arms of Bob. In his autobiography, Ray Milland recalled the filming of Her Jungle Love in vivid detail, devoting special attention to the time that he relieved himself during a swimming sequence ("No wonder the water was so warm" was Dorothy Lamour's only comment). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dorothy Lamour, Ray Milland, (more)
- 1938
Hunted Men is part of Paramount's unofficial B-picture series based on the J. Edgar Hoover book Persons in Hiding. Lynne Overman stars as a middle-class family man whose even-keel lifestyle is shattered when he brings home an affable stranger (Lloyd Nolan) to dinner. The stranger turns out to be an escaped killer, who repays Overman's hospitality by holding his family prisoner. Both criminal and hostages tensely count the hours as the rest of Nolan's gang (including J. Carroll Naish and Patricia Morrison) formulates an escape plan. Hunted Men has earned a latter-day reputation for its accurate portrayal of a suburban household of the 1930s, and for its surprisingly sympathetic portrayal (without overtly pleading for sympathy) of head crook Lloyd Nolan. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mary Carlisle, Lloyd Nolan, (more)
- 1938
Tip-Off Girls is a worthwhile entry in Paramount's "FBI" series, based on the various writings of
J. Edgar Hoover. The title refers to a group of pretty young women who are ordered by their gangster bosses to pick up tips on incoming merchandise shipments, thereby expediting a sophisticated hijacking operation. The girls are also expected to keep the freight drivers occupied while the crooks go about their business. G-Man Bob Anders (Lloyd Nolan) eventually smashes the racket with the help of decoy Marjorie Rogers (Mary Carlisle). Equipped with a Greek accent this time out, J. Carrol Naish plays the supposedly respectable head of the hijackers, while the rest of the cast is populated with such reliable Paramount stock-company players as Roscoe Karns, Buster Crabbe, Anthony Quinn, Benny Baker, Evelyn Brent, Irving Bacon and Stanley Andrews. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
J. Edgar Hoover. The title refers to a group of pretty young women who are ordered by their gangster bosses to pick up tips on incoming merchandise shipments, thereby expediting a sophisticated hijacking operation. The girls are also expected to keep the freight drivers occupied while the crooks go about their business. G-Man Bob Anders (Lloyd Nolan) eventually smashes the racket with the help of decoy Marjorie Rogers (Mary Carlisle). Equipped with a Greek accent this time out, J. Carrol Naish plays the supposedly respectable head of the hijackers, while the rest of the cast is populated with such reliable Paramount stock-company players as Roscoe Karns, Buster Crabbe, Anthony Quinn, Benny Baker, Evelyn Brent, Irving Bacon and Stanley Andrews. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lloyd Nolan, Mary Carlisle, (more)
- 1937
Thunder Trail is a thoughtful, intelligent adaptation of the Zane Grey yarn. Arizona Ames. The storyline is a Grey favorite, concerning a pair of brothers separated at birth. One of the boys grows up to be an outlaw, while the other remains on the right side of the law. Meeting in adulthood as enemies, the brothers bury the hatchet when the "good" one kills the man responsible for the death of their father. The two heroes are played by Mexican actor Gilbert Roland and North American Native James Craig (to "explain" Roland's pronounced accent, it is shown that he is raised by Mexican J. Carroll Naish -- in real life an Irishman!) If the music score sounds familiar, it's because it was originally composed for Cecil B. DeMille's The Plainsman. Thunder Trail was reissued to television as Thunder Pass. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gilbert Roland, Marsha Hunt, (more)
- 1937
Its title notwithstanding, We Who Are About to Die has nothing to do with Roman Gladiators. Rather, the film is based on the true story of San Quentin inmate David Lamson, who spent 13 agonizing months on Death Row before the Supreme Court reversed his conviction. Renamed John (and played by John Beal), the Lamson character knows he's innocent but also knows that the date of his execution is drawing ever nearer. Meanwhile, his sweetheart Connie (Ann Dvorak), in collaboration with private eye Matthews (Preston S. Foster), races against time to unearth new evidence and expose the guilty party. Rather pokey for the most part, We Who Are About to Die turns into a real nail-biter during the final 15 minutes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Preston S. Foster, Ann Dvorak, (more)
- 1937
Anna May Wong, who cornered the 1930s market in Eurasian heroines, stars in Daughter of Shanghai. Wong is on the trail of the criminals who murdered her father. The villains are running an illegal-alien operation, smuggling cheap Chinese and Mexican labor into San Francisco and killing those unlucky souls who prove "inconvenient". Wong takes a job as an exotic dancer in a Central American nitery, hoping to trap the murderers in the act. Though J. Carroll Naish and Buster Crabbe are top-billed, the actual hero of Daughter of Shanghai is Chinese actor Philip Ahn, playing an FBI agent protecting Wong from the bad guys. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anna May Wong, Philip Ahn, (more)
- 1937
Weldon Heyburn never did become Republic's answer to Clark Gable, though he always aimed to please. In Sea Racketeers, Heyburn is cast as Jim, a courageous Coast Guard officer whose legions of lady friends includes the pert and perky Pat (Jeanne Madden). Jim leaves the ladies behind when he takes on the challenge of rounding up a gang of seafaring crooks who use a floating casino as a cover for their piratical activities. J. Carroll Naish plays Durant, head of the modern-day buccaneers, and he proves quite a worthy adversary for the plucky Pat. Hoydenish comedy relief is handled by the vivacious Dorothy McNulty, who within a year would change her name to Penny Singleton and headline Columbia's "Blondie" series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Weldon Heyburn, Jeanne Madden, (more)
- 1937
In this crime comedy, a lazy feller and his family take-up residence in an abandoned house. The squatters have no idea that the owners, a gang of crooks, are just about to return and use it as their hide out. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Fred Stone, Emma Dunn, (more)
- 1937
The cattle rustlers in Border Cafe, a modern-day western from the RKO B-unit, are Eastern gangsters headed by none other than that old reprobate J. Carrol Naish. After having landed in jail for drunken driving for the umpteenth time, young Bostonian Keith Whitney (John Beal callously leaves his fiancé (Marjorie Lord) behind and takes off on a whim for Verde, Texas, where he inhales huge amounts of scotch and plays the honky tonk. In the mistaken belief that his son is operating a cattle ranch, Senator Whitney (George Irving) announces his arrival in Verde but Keith is rescued in the nick of time by Tex Stevens (Harry Carey), a leathery cattle baron who has taken a liking to the youngster. Things get dicey when New York gangster Rocky Alton (Naish) arrives to extract protection fees but Keith, who has taken to the wide open spaces like the proverbial fish to water, saves the day for all and sundry. Dumped on the B-Movie market with little fanfare in June of 1937, Border Café marked the screen debut of Marjorie Lord, mother of screen actress Anne Archer. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Harry Carey, John Beal, (more)
- 1937
Think Fast, Mr. Moto was the first of 20th Century-Fox's movie series based on the wily Japanese sleuth created by J. P. Marquand. Moto (Peter Lorre) seems to be a criminal this time around, involved with a gang of international smugglers. Virginia Field is a White Russian expatriate who likewise appears to be an agent of the criminals. The adventure takes Moto, Ms. Field and the son of a legitimate gem dealer (Thomas Beck) from San Francisco to Shanghai. During the inevitable showdown with the head of the smugglers (Sig Rumann), Virginia turns out to be an unwilling pawn of the crooks, while the inscrutable Mr. Moto reveals himself to be a special agent of the International Police. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Lorre, Virginia Field, (more)
- 1937
A remake of 1932's Guilty as Hell, Night Club Scandal also borrows a page from 1934's Murder at the Vanities by depicting the "friendly adversary" relationship between a reporter (Lynne Overman) and a cop (Charles Bickford). Top-billed John Barrymore plays a respectable doctor married to a nightclub singer (Evelyn Brent), who murders his wife and frames the victim's lover for the crime. Overman and Bickford spot holes in Barrymore's story, bringing him to justice by Reel Seven. The murder plot is standard stuff, but the main attraction of Night Club Scandal is the aggressively masculine love/hate byplay between tipsy Lynne Overman and flint-eyed Charles Bickford. The best moment occurs at the end, when the wide-eyed ingenue (Louise Campbell) doesn't marry the fellow the audience expects her to! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Barrymore, Lynne Overman, (more)
- 1937
Test pilot Brian Donlevy works for a major aircraft plant where a hush-hush project is in progress. Peter Lorre is a deceptively shy plant technician who is actually the head of a foreign spy ring. Eager to get his hands on the plans of a new, secret aircraft, Lorre bribes Donlevy to help him steal the blueprints. Donlevy agrees, and the theft is carried out. But while the conspirators are making their escape by airplane, the plane develops motor trouble and crashes--exactly the intention of Donlevy, who isn't as dishonest as he seems. Crack-Up isn't very deep, but Peter Lorre plays his limited role with a refreshing sense of sardonic humor. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Lorre, Brian Donlevy, (more)
- 1937
In the second of Paramount's "Bulldog Drummond" thrillers, Hugh "Bulldog" Drummond (John Howard) is finally about to marry longtime fiancée Phyllis Clavering (Louise Campbell) when the girl is kidnapped. The hijackers, Mikhail Valdin (J. Carroll Naish) and his sister, Erena Soldanis (Helen Freeman), are wanted for the murder of an American millionaire, and Scotland Yard Inspector Neilson (John Barrymore) warns Bulldog that he may be next. But the intrepid hero pays no heed and is soon off on a dangerous journey that culminates at the Mere, a supposed haunted house. Bulldog Drummond Comes Back was based on H.C. "Sapper" McNeile's 1928 novel The Female of the Species, who, an opening credit warns, is "more deadly than the male." ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Barrymore, John Howard, (more)
- 1937
In this drama, a milque-toast socialite is drowning in San Francisco Bay. Fortunately, he is saved by a kindly Italian fisherman who takes him in and teaches him how to be manly. During his slow recovery, the wimpy fellow is cared for by the fisherman's lovely daughter who is studying to become an opera singer. Trouble ensues when they all find themselves entangled with mobsters. Suddenly the boy becomes a real man and saves them. While San Francisco burns to the ground, he and the daughter finally acknowledge their love. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Margaret Lindsay, J. Carrol Naish, (more)
- 1936
When David O. Selznick produced the film version of the 1000-plus page novel Gone with the Wind, he declared he could not make a film running any less than 222 minutes. When Warner Bros. adapted the even longer Hervey Allen best-seller Anthony Adverse, the studio managed to pack everything--except the most censorable passages, which had made Allen's novel a best-seller in the first place--into 139 minutes. Surprisingly, the film version of Anthony Adverse moves rather smoothly, though it is nowhere near as involving (or as much fun) as Gone with the Wind. Fredric March stars as Anthony Adverse, the illegitimate offspring of Anita Louise, the wife of Spanish nobleman Claude Rains. When Adverse comes of age, he inherits the prosperous business run by his kindly foster father Edmund Gwenn, which he abandons for an aimless trip around the world after his heart is broken by childhood sweetheart Olivia De Havilland. Sinking deeper into the morass of alcohol and degeneracy in the West Indies, Adverse is regenerated when he is reunited with De Havilland, now the mistress of Napoleon Bonaparte. Suddenly enervated, Adverse battles the efforts of Claude Rains and Gwenn's duplicitous former assistant Gale Sondergaard to take over Gwenn's business. Along the way, he learns that Gwenn was actually his grandfather and that De Havilland has born him a son (Scotty Beckett). Instead of dying, as he does in the novel, Anthony Adverse takes his son to America to start life anew. Whew! Though no award winner itself, Anthony Adverse enabled Gale Sondergaard to win the first-ever "best supporting actress" Oscar. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Fredric March, Olivia de Havilland, (more)
- 1936
Former newspaperman Martin Mooney based his script for Exclusive Story on the racket-busting activities of New York district attorney Thomas E. Dewey. Franchot Tone plays the lawyer for a major newspaper which is conducting a campaign against gang boss Joseph Calleia. The paper can't get any charges to stick, thanks to Calleia's clever legal maneuvers. Tone takes matters in his own hands and nails down the evidence to convict Calleia. The gangster retaliates by kidnapping Tone's girlfriend (Madge Evans), leading to a climactic burst of violence. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Franchot Tone, Madge Evans, (more)
- 1936
Richard Dix is as stalwart and oaklike as ever in Special Investigator. Here he plays courtroom-movie cliche #22B: The wealthy attorney who keeps mobsters out of prison. When Dix's brother, a G-Man, is killed by one of his ex-clients, the attorney switches sides and joins the Department of Justice. Dix uses his inside knowledge on the criminal element to avenge his brother's death. Special Investigator was adapted from a novel by Perry Mason creator Erle Stanley Gardner. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Dix, Margaret Callahan, (more)
- 1936
Moonlight Murder takes place virtually in its entirety at the Hollywood Bowl. Despite dire warnings by a sinister mystic (Pedro de Cordoba), opera-star Gino D'Acosta (Leo Carrillo) insists that he will sing in the Bowl's current production of Il Trovatore. He gets no farther than the "Anvil Chorus" before he drops dead in full view of the audience. It turns out that D'Acosta was murdered, placing everyone in the cast under suspicion. As night segues into morning, detective Steve Farrell (Chester Morris) -- whose past mistakes have put him in hot water with his boss -- teams up with lady-scientist Toni Adams (Madge Evans) to piece the clues together. The hot-potato issue of euthanasia is raised during the course of Moonlight Murder, and as a result the film turns out to have one of the most sympathetic and reasonable culprits in "B"-picture history. Trivia alert: One of the suspects is played by Duncan Renaldo, who later co-starred with "victim" Leo Carrillo on TV's The Cisco Kid. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Chester Morris, Leo Carrillo, (more)
- 1936
Enjoying a break from crime-solving, oriental sleuth Charlie Chan (Warner Oland) takes his 12 children to the circus. It isn't long, however, before he's sucked into yet another murder case, with a more colorful array of suspects than usual. Meanwhile, Number One Son Lee Chan (Keye Luke) tries to make time with pretty Chinese lass Su Toy (Shia Jung), a task made difficult by his morbid fear of the circus animals. One of the secondary villains, sinister lion tamer Tom Holt, is played by J. Carroll Naish, who later portrayed Charlie Chan on a late-1950s TV series. Some of the best moments in Charlie Chan at the Circus are contributed by brother-and-sister midget performers George and Olive Brasno. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Warner Oland, Keye Luke, (more)
- 1936
Impressed by the popularity of radio program about the exploits of legendary safecracker Jimmy Valentine, advertising man Gary Howard (Roger Pryor) posts a huge reward for anyone who knows the whereabouts of real Valentine, who is technically still a fugitive from justice. Following a lead, Howard ends up in a small town, where it appears as though Valentine has been living a respectable pseudonymous life as the town banker (played by Robert Warwick, coincidentally the star of the 1915 film Alias Jimmy Valentine!) Just as Howard is about to "expose" the banker, another old duffer steps forth to claim that he's Valentine. By now, Howard has fallen in love with banker's daughter Midge (Charlotte Henry), so he decides to let sleeping crooks lie. The last-minute introduction of villainous gangsters adds some life to this laid-back yarn. Return of Jimmy Valentine was remade (and significantly improved upon) in 1942 as Affairs of Jimmy Valentine. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Roger Pryor, Charlotte Henry, (more)
- 1936
First filmed in 1910, the venerable Helen Hunt Jackson novel Ramona was remade in 1936 in full Technicolor (20th Century-Fox's first such production). Loretta Young plays Ramona, a half-Indian girl raised by a white family in Spanish California. She falls in love with the young man of the household (Kent Taylor), but her joy turns to sorrow when the matriarch of the household expresses disgust at "race-mixing." Ramona turns instead to the family's Native American servant (Don Ameche), a relationship that proves fatal for him. Ramona is rare for a 1930s film in that it depicts its racist characters as being totally in the wrong, rather than treating them compassionately so as not to offend the bigots in the audience. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Loretta Young, Don Ameche, (more)
- 1936
Warner Baxter does a variation of his Oscar-winning "Cisco Kid" characterization in Robin Hood of El Dorado. Baxter plays the real-life Mexican bandit Joaquin Murietta, which the screenplay depicts as a South of the Border Jesse James. Murietta has turned criminal to avenge the death of his wife and brother at the hands of the Federales, and per the title robs the rich to give to the poor. A bit topheavy in its comic context, Robin Hood of El Dorado works on the level of a good program western. Director William Wellman cowrote the script, which was based on a pulp novel that emphasized the sensuality of Murietta's various lady friends. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Warner Baxter, Ann Loring, (more)
- 1936
Despite its title, things get pretty noisy in MGM's Absolute Quiet. Lionel Atwill heads the cast as reclusive financier G. A. Axton, who squirrels himself away at a remote ranch to recuperate from an illness. The only other person at the ranch is Axton's secretary Laura Tait (Irene Hervey), but there's no hanky-panky; Laura is happily (or at least contentedly) married to Barney Tait (Harvey Stephens). Axton's solitude comes to an end when a plane makes a forced landing near his property. The passengers are herded into the ranch house by Jack (Wallace Ford) and Judy (Bernardine Hayes), a pair of inept bandits who'd been holding up the plane when it developed engine trouble. Seeking an opportunity to overpower the crooks are unemployed actor Gregory Bengard (Louis Hayward), crooked governor Pruden (Raymond Walburn) and newspaper reporter Chubby Rudd (Stuart Erwin). It soon develops that the passengers -- and Laura -- have more to fear from the mysterious G. A. Axton than they do from the gun-wielding Jack and Judy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lionel Atwill, Irene Hervey, (more)
- 1936
- NR
- Add The Charge of the Light Brigade to QueueAdd The Charge of the Light Brigade to top of Queue
Of the many film versions of Alfred Lord Tennyson's narrative poem, 1936's Charge of the Light Brigade has the least relationship to the facts concerning the famous 19th century British military blunder in the Crimea. Reflecting the popularity of 1935's Lives of A Bengal Lancer, the film uses the climactic charge as the culmination of events which begin in British India. Errol Flynn and Patric Knowles are cast as cavalry officers who are also brothers; both love Olivia De Havilland, but it is Knowles who wins out (this should tip us off that the rest of the film is pure fantasy). Indian potentate C. Henry Gordon, angered that the British government has cut off his subsidy, stages a revolt against the English settlements. Ordered on maneuvers, Flynn is unable to bring rescue troops to the besieged fort commanded by De Havilland's father. Gordon supervises the slaughter of every man, woman and child at the fort, then leaves India in the company of his Russian advisors. Flynn and his fellow Light Brigade lancers are then transferred to the Crimea--where, as luck would have it, Gordon is now ensconced with the Russians. Thirsting for revenge, Flynn falsifies an official order so that he and the Light Brigade can battle Gordon and his allies at Balaclava (thus are Britons Lord Cardigan and Lord Ragan, the actual instigators of the doomed charge, exonerated). As passages from the Tennyson poem are superimposed on the action, Flynn leads a suicidal charge against the Russians; he manages to kill the treacherous Gordon before being slain himself. Its dozens of historical inaccuracies aside, The Charge of the Light Brigade is rousing entertainment. Animal lovers be warned, however: several horses were killed during the climactic charge, a fact that compelled Hollywood (under the auspices of the ASPCA) to install safer and more stringent standards concerning the treatment of animals. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, (more)
