Dick Rich Movies

For years, vicious gunslinger Doggie Kramer (Jack Lambert) has bullied the citizenry of a small town. Unfortunately for Kramer, his most recent shootout has left him gravely wounded. When it becomes obvious that the now-emboldened townsfolk, led by the brother of Kramer's latest victim, plan to enact a violent vengeance against their former tormentor, Kramer hires Paladin (Richard Boone) to escort him safely to Santa Fe. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

One of the best of Elvis Presley's pre-Army films, Jailhouse Rock offers us the sensual, "dangerous" Elvis that had won the hearts of the kids and earned the animosity of their elders. Presley plays a young buck who accidentally kills a man while protecting the honor of a woman. Thrown into prison, Elvis strikes up a friendship with visionary fellow-con Mickey Shaughnessy. Shaughnessy suggests that Elvis perform in the upcoming prison show. Ol' swivel-hips scores a hit, and decides to stay in showbiz after his release. Together with pretty Judy Tyler (the former Princess Summerfall Winterspring on Howdy Doody, who would die in a horrible traffic accident shortly after completing this film), Elvis sets up his own record company. Alas, success goes to his head, and soon Elvis plans to ditch Tyler in favor of signing with a big-time label. Shaughnessy shows up long enough to punch out Elvis for his disloyalty; as a result, Elvis' vocal chords are damaged and he is unable to sing. Deserted by his flunkeys and hangers-on, Elvis learns the value of friendship and fidelity when Tyler and Shaughnessy stay by his side in his darkest hours. His voice restored, Elvis climbs back up the charts--but this time, he's a much nicer fellow, and a lot more committed to Tyler. Usually the musical numbers in a Presley picture (this one has a doozy, complete with chorus boys dressed as convicts!) are more compelling than the plot. Jailhouse Rock is a perfect balance of song and story from beginning to end; seldom would Elvis be so well showcased in the future. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

When an entire family is slaughtered in an open field, it appears to be the work of Pawnee renegades. But as Matt (James Arness) and Chester (Dennis Weaver) prepare to set themselves up as decoys to flush out the killers, some new bits of evidence suggest that the real culprits are a vicious gang of white outlaws. A grim "souvenir" is the key to solving the mystery in this stark, uncompromising episode, adapted from the Gunsmoke radio broadcast of August 2, 1954. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This probing drama offers an inside look into corruption within the United Auto Workers and is loosely adapted from the true tale of the Reuther brothers. The story begins when someone bombs the union headquarters. Blair Vickers (Dennis O'Keefe), the head of the union, is an honest man whose brother is killed during the crime. The man behind the bombing, Gus Linden (Pat O'Brien), a gangster who has just finished serving time for labor racketeering, is determined to gain control of the UAW. Linden's children do not believe their father is capable of such a terrible crime, and accuse Vickers of having framed him. However, Vickers gradually turns them against their father by having them see for themselves that he is a corrupt, murderous thug who is unfaithful to their mother to boot. Eventually, with the reluctant help of Linden's mistress, Joni Calvin (Tina Carver), Vickers defeats the mob, and restores decency to the union. ~ Steve Press, All Movie Guide

After a troubled, seemingly sleepless night, Perry White (John Hamilton) arrives at work at the offices of the Metropolis Daily Planet, only to find that -- as part of a civic program that he himself approved -- his job, like that of the mayor, chief of police, and every other important figure in Metropolis, has been given over for one day to the most junior male employee on the staff, part of what is called "Boys' Day." As a result, cub reporter Jimmy Olsen (Jack Larson) is now editor-in-chief of the newspaper, and vows to make an impact in his one day on the job by breaking the Legs Lemmy case -- seven years earlier, Legs Lemmy (Herb Vigran) pulled off a major armored car robbery, but the police were never able to find enough evidence to arrest him, and the statute of limitations for prosecuting the crime is set to run out in 24 hours. Olsen prints a front-page story about having new evidence in the case, which shakes up the mobster enough so that he and his two henchmen arrive at the Planet offices and take Olsen and Lois Lane (Noel Neill) hostage. Clark Kent (George Reeves) and Perry White discover what is happening in White's office, but are helpless to do anything about it, for fear of Lois and Jimmy getting hurt -- even Superman breaking in might cause the hoods to open fire. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Based extremely loosely on the Stephen Vincent Benet story Sobbin' Women," Seven Brides for Seven Brothers is one of the best MGM musicals of the 1950s. Most of the story takes place on an Oregon ranch, maintained by Adam Pontabee (Howard Keel) and his six brothers, played by Jeff Richards, Russ Tamblyn, Tommy Rall, Mark Platt, Matt Mattox, and Jacques d'Amboise (it is no coincidence that five of those six boys are played by professional dancers). When Adam brings home his new bride Milly (Jane Powell), she is appalled at the brothers' slovenliness and sets about turning these unwashed louts into immaculate gentlemen. During the boisterous barn-raising scene, the brothers get into a scuffle with a group of townsmen over the affection of six comely lasses: Virginia Gibson, Julie Newmeyer (later Newmar), Ruth Kilmonis (later Ruth Lee), Nancy Kilgas, Betty Carr, and Norma Doggett (yep, most of the girls are dancers, too). Yearning to become husbands like their big brother, they ask Adam for advice. Alas, he has been reading a book about the abduction of the Sabine Women (or, as he puts it, the Sobbin' Women); and, in order to claim their gals, Adam explains, the boys must kidnap them--which they do, after blocking off all avenues of escape. Vowing to remain on their best behavior, the boys make no untoward advances towards their reluctant female guests--not even during one of the coldest winters on record. Comes the spring thaw, the angry townsfolk come charging up the mountain, demanding the return of the stolen girls (who, by this time, have "tamed" their men). A happy ending is ultimately had by all in this delightful if politically incorrect concoction. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Clemson Reade (Cary Grant) is the kind of man who wants to marry an old-fashioned girl, one who will stay home and take care of her husband. However, he's fallen in love with Priscilla "Effie" Effington (Deborah Kerr), who has an exciting career with the State Department that she has no intention of giving up. Clemson has the poor timing of proposing marriage to Effie just as she's in the middle of trying to resolve a major political crisis with the Middle Eastern nation of Bukistan; the United States wants to stay on Bukistan's good side, thanks to their plentiful reserves of oil. Tired of waiting for Effie, Clemson decides that he needs to find a potential bride who will follow his lead instead of her own, and he soon meets Princess Tarji (Betta Saint John), daughter of the King of Bukistan, who has spent her life learning to faithfully serve her man. Clemson half-seriously sends a telegram proposing marriage to Tarji, which touches off a political tempest in a teapot when Tarji responds by visiting the United States. The State Department decides that someone should look after Tarji while she's in America, and who should be given the assignment but Effie; to Clemson's chagrin, Effie uses her time with Tarji to enlighten her about the more liberated status of women in the West. By the way, don't bother looking for Bukistan in your atlas, the country doesn't really exist. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

In a mountain home, Dr. Cliff Groves (Robert Shayne) is working hard on the theories that have driven him to the point of overbearing obsession, frightening his sister Jan (Joyce Terry), who lives with him. When the local game warden is shocked to see what looks like a saber-tooth tiger in the area, he consults scientist Dr. Ross Harkness (Richard Crane) about the mysterious animal, and the two men decide to find the tiger and kill it. Meanwhile, Groves' experimentation has escalated. One night he injects himself and turns into a savage Neanderthal man who commits a murder and a rape then quickly returns home and transforms back into Groves. When Dr. Harkness finds evidence to incriminate Groves, he confronts the madman, who transforms again, kidnapping a woman and fleeing into the woods. Unfortunately for Groves, a second saber-tooth tiger, created by injecting a housecat with his own formula, tears him to pieces; transforming back to himself, he murmurs "It's better this way," as he dies.
This wearily routine variation on Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was directed by E.A. Dupont, who once had a substantial reputation, based on his film Variety; his work here is indistinguishable from that of any standard low-budget hack. However, the dialogue by producers Aubrey Wisberg and Jack Pollexfen is, if nothing else, highly identifiable -- they wrote some of the most ponderous, hard-to-say lines in movie history. "All I can say," poor Robert Shayne has to say, "is that I cannot determine now which I admire less in you, your humor or your wit." The makeup transformations are weirdly elaborate, though the end result -- the Neanderthal Man himself -- is rendered by a standard rubber mask. The script is not only badly written, it's clumsily organized, with way too much time spent on the saber-tooth tiger, and very little, relatively speaking, on the menace of the title.
Intrigued, Ross heads up to the town, and meets Ruth Marshall (Dorris Merrick), Groves' fiancee, who has him drive her to the Groves home. Groves himself becomes furious when a group of Los Angeles scientists refuse to believe his theory that Neanderthal Man had a larger brain than human beings today. He stays furious when he meets Harkness, and when the game warden and Ross kill the saber-tooth tiger, he's initially still angry -- but is in a better mood when the body proves to have vanished. ~ All Movie Guide

In the second of Republic Pictures' three "Rocket Man" serials, the government assigns Commando Cody (George Wallace) to look into a series of strange atomic explosions threatening the United States' defense systems. As Cody discovers, the threat comes from the Moon, whose ruler, Retik (Roy Barcroft), is planning an invasion of Mother Earth due to a severe lack of atmosphere on his own planet. Retik works through Krog (Peter Brocco), an inter-planetary henchman who does all the financing and hiring on Earth. Unfortunately, the hooded lunar visitor fails miserably on both fronts: the preparations for the invasion are severely under funded and the hired guns, such as former prison inmate Graber (Clayton Moore), less than competent. But despite these caveats, Commando Cody and his fellow space travelers, Joan Gilbert (Aline Towne) and Ted Richards (William Bakewell), have to suffer through 12 chapters before finally destroying the threat from the planet Moon. Radar Men From the Moon was filmed between October 17, 1951, and November 6, 1951, on a budget of $172,840. Most location filming, not excluding plenty of stock footage from earlier Republic serials, was done at the Iverson Ranch in Chatsworth, California. The serial was followed by a brief television series, Commando Cody: Sky Marshal, which retained Aline Towne as Joan Gilbert but replaced George Wallace and William Bakewell with Judd Holdren and William Schallert. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Billed "Jack Mahoney" for the occasion, former stunt man Jock Mahoney steps up to the plate as a leading man in this average Western originally released in an inexpensive color process. Mahoney plays Ross Granger, a railroad agent masquerading as a telegrapher and looking into a series of Comanche raids on the railroad construction near Oaktown. But as Ross quickly establishes, the raids are sponsored by local businessmen Del Stewart (William Bishop) and Broden (George Eldredge), who want to force the railroad through land they possess. Stewart, an old friend of Granger's, is in love with Ann Dennison (Peggie Castle), the daughter of the railroad surveyor, but not even he can prevent Broden from having old man Dennison (Walter Sande) killed. Jock Mahoney had recently starred on television's Range Rider series when hired by former Columbia Pictures colleague Fred Sears for this independently produced Western. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Another of 20th Century-Fox's Technicolor musical biopics, Oh You Beautiful Doll is allegedly the life story of popular composer Fred Fisher. As played by S. Z. "Cuddles" Sakall, Fisher is a serious musician who yearns to write opera rather than tin pan alley hits. Since the aged, portly Sakall couldn't be the romantic lead, he is third-billed in deference to June Haver as Fisher's daughter and Mark Stevens as a slick song plugger. Despite his shame at being popular, Fisher is gratified when his songs are given a classy symphonic arrangement at Aeolian Hall. Among the tunes heard in Oh, You Beautiful Doll are "Chicago," "Dardanella," "Peg o' My Heart" and the title song. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

With a title like Violence, the audience knew what it was in for from the get-go. Nancy Coleman plays Ann Mason, troubleshooting journalist for an illustrated newsmagazine. Going undercover, Ann infiltrates the United Defenders, a so-called patriotic organization comprised of thugs and extortionists. Preying on disillusioned war veterans, the United Defenders are able to spread their own brand of bigoted propaganda on a wide scale. In the midst of her investigation, Ann is injured in an auto accident, and as a result loses her memory. It's up to government investigator Steve Fuller (Michael O'Shea) to apprise Ann of her true identity, and to rescue her from the clutches of the villains (including such powerhouse "heavies" as Sheldon Leonard and Peter Whitney). Violence would seem to be inspired by the final sequence in RKO Radio's Till the End of Time, wherein a trio of ex-GIs dukes it out with a small band of hate-spouting "patriots". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide