Billy Bevan Movies

In this drama, an ingenious journalist finds himself at odds with his brother the district attorney over his unconventional methods of investigating a story; especially when they interfere with the judicial process as they did when he began eavesdropping upon a grand jury. One of the reporter's tricks involves several ham radios strategically placed around the city. With the help of the operators, the journalist is able to get scoops. When he is kidnapped by a crime boss who is sick of his constant snooping, the operators come to his rescue. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A comparatively little-known entry in the "screwball comedy" genre, David O. Selznick's The Young in Heart goes for quiet chuckles rather than bellylaughs. Adapted by Paul Osborn and Charles Bennett from a short story by I. R. Wylie, the film concentrates on a family of confidence tricksters. Paterfamilias Roland Young poses as a veteran of the Bengal Lancers in order to insinuate himself into high society; his birdbrained wife Billie Burke willingly goes along with any scheme her husband cooks up; and their work-resistant offspring Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and Janet Gaynor scheme to marry into weatlth. Right now, Janet's target is Scottish millionaire Richard Carlson (making his screen debut) to fill the family's coffers. The whole family teams up to fleece a wealthy old lady called Miss Fortune,played with showstopping relish by Broadway veteran Minnie Dupree. Through Miss Fortune's sweet, unassuming example, everyone in the family begins to reform. Douglas Fairbanks Jr. makes the supreme sacrifice of taking a job-which has the salutary effect of winning him the affections of poor-but-honest Paulette Goddard. Young in Heart originally ended with Miss Fortune passing away while surrounded by the repentant family; preview audiences hated this denouement, obliging Selznick to film a new ending, with Minnie Dupree joyously tooling about on a motorcyle! Our favorite scene: Roland Young and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. at a construction site, comparing the workers to insects. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The bloom of youth had long faded on actor James Dunn when he starred in Shadows Over Shanghai. Even so, he is fairly convincing as hotshot newspaperman Johnny McGinty, on assignment in war-torn China (courtesy of the General Service Studios backlot). McGinty is one of several interested parties involved in a stolen Chinese amulet, which allegedly provides clues to the location of a treasure buried somewhere in America. Also searching high and low for the amulet and the treasure are refugee Russian schoolteacher Irene Roma (Linda Gray) and shady munitions dealer Howard Barclay (Ralph Morgan). To add a bit of versimilitude to the proceedings, newsreel footage of the Sino-Japanese war (from both sides) is inserted into the action, none too convincingly. Its seedy production values aside, Shadows Over Shanghai is reasonably exciting nonsense. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A golddigger finds that romance doesn't always equal finance in this comedy. Crystal Wetherby (Jean Harlow) is an American widow left stranded in London with a stack of debts incurred by her late husband and barely a shilling to her name. Raymond Dabney (Robert Taylor) is the black sheep of a formerly wealthy family who has just been released from prison for fraud and is looking for work. Crystal hires Raymond to watch over her home so that her creditors won't repossess her belongings; Raymond soon learns that Crystal is being courted by his brother Claude (Reginald Owen), much to Raymond's amusement, since both Crystal and Claude are motivated less by love than the mistaken belief that the other has money. However, Crystal and Raymond become increasingly fond of each other, even though they know they're both flat broke. The supporting cast features two of Old Hollywood's favorite U.K. expatriates, E.E. Clive and Una O'Connor. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

In this crime drama, a young couple decides to rob the bank where the woman works as a teller. They get 100,000 dollars and hide it in a music box. Unfortunately, they are caught and sentenced to prison. Upon their release, the two hope that the money will still be in the little box, which they left with an antique dealer. Unfortunately, the dealer died and they must frantically scramble to find the missing fortune. In the end, they do find it, but decide to turn it in to the authorities and go straight. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Rivalry, romance, and brotherly love in logging camps are chronicled in this drama. The trouble begins when the brother of a lumber company owner arrives from Paris to work for him. Upon seeing the beautiful owner of the rival logging camp, the newly arrived brother immediately defects to begin working for her. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this romantic comedy, an aspiring socialite heads for a vacation in Monte Carlo where she befriends a wealthy widowed duchess and then begins blackmailing her after she steals a scandalous letter. This letter could destroy her upcoming nuptials to a stuffy Englishman. The duchess enlists the aide of an American thief to get the damning letter back. Meanwhile, her English lover continues to ardently pursue her; he is blissfully unaware that something is amiss. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Lloyds of London traces the rise to prominence of the venerable British insurance company, as seen through the eyes of fictional 19th-century Londoner Jonathan Blake (Tyrone Power, in his first starring role). A lifelong friend of naval hero Lord Nelson, Blake puts his job (and the future existence of Lloyds) on the line when he announces Nelson's victory at Trafalgar -- before it takes place. For those not interested in policies and premiums, the script serves up a romance between Blake and the lovely Lady Elizabeth (Madeleine Carroll), the unhappily married spouse of snotty aristocrat Lord Everett Stacy (George Sanders). Among the few real-life historical personages depicted in the film is Lloyds founder John Julius Angerstein, played by Sir Guy Standing. A box-office bonanza, Lloyds of London proved that 23-year-old Tyrone Power could carry a picture -- and that the recently-formed 20th Century-Fox was truly a major Hollywood studio. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

It may be sacrilege to say so, but Dracula's Daughter is an immense improvement over the original 1931 Dracula, despite the absence of Bela Lugosi in the cast. Gloria Holden is first-rate as the title character, alias "Countess Marya Zaleska," who after stealing her father's body from the authorities with the help of her faithful hunchbacked assistant Sandor (Irving Pichel), sets fire to the corpse in hopes of obliterating the family curse of vampirism. Try as she might, though, the "Countess" is unable to resist the temptation to go for the jugular vein; in one of the kinkier plot developments, she seems to favor the blood of female victims. Lest anyone read anything into this, however, it is established that she is hopelessly in love with handsome scientist Jeffrey Garth (Otto Kruger), and by film's end she has kidnapped Garth's sweetheart Janet Blake (Marguerite Churchill), hoping to lure him to Transylvania where he will be forced to become her mate throughout Eternity. Edward Van Sloan returns in his Dracula role as tireless vampire hunter Van Helsing, who once again comes to the rescue with a generous supply of garlic necklaces, crucifixes and wooden stakes. Full of clever and often surprising little touches (few other films of the mid-1930s would kill off a comedy-relief character in the second reel!), Dracula's Daughter is among the best of the vintage Universal horror films. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

When a car crash ends the life of a fabulously wealthy patron of the arts, the decedent's $20,000,000 fortune is inherited by one Longfellow Deeds (Gary Cooper) of Mandrake Falls, Vermont. Already a reasonably successful local businessman, Deeds doesn't really feel the need for anything extra in his life: he just wants enough time to practice his tuba and compose greeting-card doggerel. When Deeds is convinced to move to New York, hard-boiled newspaper reporter Babe Bennett (Jean Arthur) is dispatched to get the inside scoop on "The Cinderella Man." Babe's stories of Deeds' eccentricities and no-nonsense dealings with phonies and poseurs provide excellent headline fodder; but she begins to regret her actions, having fallen in love with the big lug. Deeds ultimately sets up a foundation to dispense his fortune to the country's neediest souls, on the proviso that the recipients do their best to get back on their feet, a turn of events that leads his lawyer John Cedar (Douglas Dumbrille) to try to have him declared insane. By the end of the sanity hearing, the judge (H. B. Walker) declares: "Not only are you sane, but you're the sanest man who ever walked in this courtroom!" A joyously unadulterated hunk of Frank Capra-corn, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town was adapted by Robert Riskin from Clarence Buddington Kelland's short story "Opera Hat." In addition to the pleasure of watching the country bumpkin outwit city slickers, the movie is a film buff's dream, boasting one of the best character-actor casts ever assembled for a single film. Nominated for four Academy Awards, the film won Frank Capra his second Oscar (out of three) as Best Director. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

It is a tale known well, filmed many times over the years, but never better than this early black and white version from the MGM Studios, David O. Selznick producing. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times"-- Charles Dickens juxtaposes England and France, George and Louis, tradition and revolution. One of the most beloved of Dickens' stories, finding not only countries and conditions compared, but also two individuals thrown up in stark contrast to one another: -- the dissolute barrister Sydney Carton (Ronald Colman) and the young, somewhat callow aristocrat Charles Darnay (Donald Woods), both in love with Lucie (Elizabeth Allan), daughter of a victim of the French Regime. Their lives intertwine until the violent revolution that overtook an entire nation engulfs them all as well.

Dickens' story has stood the test of time; remade frequently since the release of this1935 version. It is this version by director Jack Conway's that is best remembered and to which all others are compared. The settings, cinematography, and direction are all right on the mark, recreating the streets of London and of Paris with great skill and realism. The supporting cast, filled with faces we have grown to cherish-- Reginald Owen, Edna May Oliver, Claude Gillingwater, Walter Catlett, H. B. Warner, Basil Rathbone, and E. E. Clive-comes through with crystalline performances which add substance to the inexorable stream of events. Blanche Yurka's bravura turn as Therese de Farge delights us even as we shudder at her intensity. Second unit directors Jacques Tourneur and Val Lewton, who would both go on to memorable careers as leading directors in their own right, staged the storming of the Bastille and other "revolutionary" scenes brilliantly, managing to combine fervor with panache. It is, however, Colman's portrayal of the lonely man redeemed by love and sacrifice which stands at the center of the story.

Sydney Carton first saves Charles Darnay from a charge of treason, thereby meeting those who care for him: the beautiful Lucie Manette, her father, Doctor Manette (Henry B. Walthall), released from the Bastille after many years of unjust incarceration; Lucie's servant Miss Pross, (Oliver) and Mister Lorry (Claude Gillingwater), an functionary of Tellson's Bank. His relationship with this circle of kind friends grows rocky when Darnay marries Lucie, whom Carton has loved from afar, but even this turn of events cannot change his feelings for them all and he grows to love them even more when daughter Lucie comes along. He reforms, leaving old ways behind and enjoying a familial warmth he has never known. This happy life is shattered when Darnay returns to France during the first revolutionary struggles, intent on saving his old tutor from the guillotine. He soon finds himself behind bars and facing the blade instead. The Revolution does not forget an aristocrat, even one who has recanted and lived life abroad as a commoner. The whole family makes the channel crossing to come to the young man's aid and Carton seeks a way to save him, discovering only one path to free Darnay and return everyone to safety. It is a sacrifice easily promised and quickly made.

Ronald Colman had long wanted to make a film of this story and, when he finally got his chance, he happily shaved off his signature mustache in an appropriate gesture to historical realism. Reviews of his work indicate his portrayal of Sydney Carton surpassed all his previous endeavors; he had been accused of walking through light parts, once he started making "talkies," and not putting his many talents to good use. "A Tale of Two Cities" put rest to those complaints. He dominates completely the scenes he which he does appear, and his skill gives substance to a literary achievement, a melancholy man of intelligence and wit, given to drink and despair, whose life seems to attain meaning only when it is given up for someone else. It is one of the portrayals for which Ronald Colman has come to be remembered.

There are various remake versions of A Tale of Two Cities. Dirk Bogarde played Carton in 1958 and Chris Sarandon starred in a television remake in 1980. While these and other versions have all been good films, none has achieved the stature of the 1935 version and its excellent combination of star power, technical brilliance and great storytelling. ~ All Movie Guide

It's "Never the twain shall meet" time again, this time in London's Limehouse district. George Raft stars as Harry Young, a half-caste saloonkeeper who shelters beleaguered white girl Toni (Jean Parker) from her tormentors (shades of Broken Blossoms). Harry falls in love with the girl, but mixing of the races was still a Hollywood no-no in 1934, so tragedy results -- except for Toni, who finds happiness in the arms of Eric Benton (Kent Taylor), a man of "her own kind." The highly eclectic cast includes Anna May Wong as Raft's obligatory cast-off sweetheart Tu Tuan, former 2-reel comic Billy Bevan, and in a tiny uncredited role, Ann Sheridan. To avoid confusion with another Limehouse Blues, this one was retitled East End Chant for television. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Previously filmed in 1929, Philip MacDonald's novel Patrol was lensed by director John Ford as The Lost Patrol in 1934. Sergeant Victor McLaglen is in charge of a World War I-era British cavalry regiment, stranded somewhere in the Mesopotamian desert. McLaglen hasn't asked for the responsibility: the commanding officer has been killed by an Arab sniper, leaving McLaglen to take over. One by one, McLaglen's men are picked off as they desperately fend off the enemy, waiting for reinforcements to arrive. The most spectacular death scene goes to Boris Karloff, playing a religious zealot who goes insane and begins marching towards the Arabs while bearing a makeshift cross. Max Steiner's relentless musical theme for The Lost Patrol would later be adapted into his score for Warner Bros' Casablanca. Lost Patrol would itself be adapted as the 1939 western Bad Lands. Originally running 74 minutes, Lost Patrol is now generally available only in its 69-minute reissue form. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide