George Sherwood Movies

First staged on Broadway in 1940 with Alfred Lunt, Lynn Fontanne and Montgomery Clift in the starring roles, Robert Sherwood's Pulitzer Prize-winning play There Shall Be No Night was originally set in Finland in the years before the outbreak of WW2. For this Hallmark Hall of Fame presentation, the character names have been altered and the setting changed to Hungary just prior to the 1956 Soviet invasion, but otherwise the plot remains substantially the same. Charles Boyer and Katherine Cornell star as Nobel Prize-winning Hungarian scientist Karoly Valkay and his American-born wife Miranda. Though a fiercely outspoken critic of Communist totalitarianism, Valkay is essentially a pacifist, and hopes that Hungary will someday regain its freedom without bloodshed. But when the Russians start rattling their sabers, Valkay is shamed into renouncing his pacifism by his son Erik (Bradford Dillman), who has joined the Hungarian freedom fighters. Adapted for television by Morton Wishengrad, There Shall be No Night was originally telecast live and in color. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The 3D melodrama Dangerous Mission starts off with a bang when innocent Piper Laurie inadvertently witnesses the murder of her gangster boss. Though she doesn't get a particularly good look at the killer, she knows she's dead meat if she remains in town. Thus, Laurie skeedaddles to Montana's Glacier National Park, where most of the film takes place. Following her westward are Victor Mature and Vincent Price. One of these men is a federal agent, bound and determined to bring Laurie back to the East to testify; the other is the murderer, who intends to silence our heroine for keeps. Laurie doesn't know which is which, but the audience does. A bit poky at times (thanks in part to the uninspired editing of Gene Palmer), Dangerous Mission roars into life during a mid-film forest fire and a climactic chase through the glacier fields. Featured in the cast are William Bendix as a Montana ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Jean Simmons' fascinating interpretation of an uncharacteristic role is the main drawing card of Otto Preminger's Angel Face. The daughter of Charles Treymayne (Herbert Marshall), who remarried a wealthy woman (Barbara O'Neil), Diane Treymayne's (Simmons) angelic countenance masks an unbridled psychotic who'll let nothing stand in the way of her happiness. Diane arranges for Catherine's death, making it look like an auto accident. Coveting family chauffeur Frank Jessup (Robert Mitchum), Diane steals Frank away from his sweetheart Mary (Mona Freeman) and forces him to become her spiritual accomplice in her stepmother's murder. And when Diane finally realizes that she'll never, ever, be able to hold Frank, she... well, enough said. If Angel Face doesn't look like a typical early-1950s RKO Radio film, it may be because its director was borrowed from 20th Century-Fox, and its cinematographer (Harry Stradling) was a loan-out from Sam Goldwyn. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The titular Lusty Men are rodeo riders in this modern-day western, assembled with a touch of the offbeat by director Nicholas Ray. Former rodeo star Robert Mitchum, disabled by a series of accidents, hobbles back to his Oklahoma hometown in hopes of replenishing his bank account. Aspiring bronco-buster Arthur Kennedy hires Mitchum to train him for an upcoming rodeo, promising that they'll split the winnings. It doesn't take a crystal ball to predict that Mitchum will soon fall hard for Kennedy's wife Susan Hayward; she can take Mitchum or leave him, but decides to take him so that he'll continue to train Kennedy. After a falling out, Mitchum quits his job and enters the rodeo himself, hoping to win the prize from the arrogant Kennedy. He proves he still has what it takes, but does so at the price of his life. The Lusty Men was co-adapted by one-time cowboy David Dotort from a Life magazine story by Claude Stannish. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The genesis for Queen for a Day was the Dorothy Parker short story Horsie, all about a homely woman who takes a job as a nanny in the household of a selfish, insensitive couple. Months later, the husband receives a gift of an electric razor from "Horsie," out of gratitude for his kindnesses -- kindnesses which, of course, he never consciously extended. "Horsie" ended up as one of three short stories adapted to film by producer Robert Stillman in 1951. The unifying theme of the film was that each of the three female protagonists were contestants on the TV series Queen for a Day. You may remember that this long-running program was hosted by Jack Bailey, who on a daily basis selected one of three deserving women to be the recipient of fabulous prizes, the decision, which was made by the audience (there was an "applause meter" on the set), was predicated upon which of the three ladies had the saddest or most fascinating life story to tell. In addition to "Horsie," aka Miss Wilmarth (Edith Meiser), the other contestants in the film are Phyllis Avery and Kasia Orzazewski. Avery stars in the vignette titled "The Gossamer World," based on a John Answorth story, this episode concerns Avery's son Rudy Lee, a victim of polio. Orzazewski figures into the Faith Baldwyn story "High Diver," wherein she plays the immigrant mother of a college-bound boy (Adam Williams) who takes a job at a carnival to make ends meet. Queen for a Day was originally released as Horsie, until it was decided that the TV series' title was more saleable. (It wasn't, despite an aggressive ad campaign conducted on the Queen for a Day television program.) ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

MGM's Three Little Words is a "twin" musical biopic, covering the lives and careers of songwriters Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby. Fred Astaire plays Kalmar, a frustrated magician, while Red Skelton is cast as Ruby, a wannabe baseball player. After "meeting cute" during a disastrous vaudeville show, the oil-and-water Bert and Harry become a popular songwriting team, dashing off such favorites as Who's Sorry Now?, Nevertheless, So Long Oo-Long, I Wanna be Loved by You, All Alone Monday and the title song (the film unfortunately skimps on Kalmar and Ruby's Gilbert-and-Sullivan style novelty ditties, with the exception of Hooray for Captain Spaulding, Groucho Marx' signature tune in Animal Crackers). Adhering more to MGM formula than the facts, the script contrives to have Kalmar and Ruby split up over a trivial misunderstanding, only to be reunited by their wives for an "all is forgiven" radio broadcast hosted by bandleader Phil Regan. Vera-Ellen co-stars as Kalmar's vaudevillian wife Jessie Brown, while Arlene Dahl portrays Ruby's movie-star spouse Eileen Percy. Gloria DeHaven is seen as her own mother, Mrs. Carter DeHaven; and Debbie Reynolds plays "boop-a-doop" girl Helen Kane, her singing voice dubbed in by Ms. Kane herself. Though not quite as humorous as the subject matter would seem to dictate (Red Skelton gets his biggest laughs in the scenes wherein he, as Harry Ruby, participates in spring training with his favorite baseball club) Three Little Words is an excellent example of MGM's musical unit at the height of its powers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Blonde good-time girl Vivian Heldon (Jan Sterling), who lives in a cheap rooming house in a working-class section of Boston, run by the inquisitive and neurotic Mrs. Smerrling (Elsa Lanchester), goes out one night after a phone conversation with her boyfriend, proclaiming that she's got big plans and might even move to a nicer place. After putting in her shift as a waitress at a cheap dive called The Grass Skirt, she latches onto Henry Shanway (Marshall Thompson), an innocently drunk patron, who's trying to wash away his sadness over his wife's stillborn child. She uses Henry's car with him in tow to drive out to Cape Cod, then strands him on foot and meets her boyfriend -- but when she arrives, he puts a bullet into her, then strips the body, throws it into the sea, and drops the clothes and the car into a lake. Six months later, an ornithologist from the cape spots the skeleton of a human foot sticking up through the sand.

Enter Lt. Peter Morales (Ricardo Montalban) of the Boston PD; he and his partner on this case, Det. Sharkey (Wally Maher), bring the bones to Dr. McAdoo (Bruce Bennett), of Harvard University's forensic medical laboratory. Over the next few days, McAdoo and his staff are able to determine the gender, age, and general appearance of the person to whom the bones belonged, and that this is a case of murder -- and that the victim was pregnant. Morales and Sharkey, combing through what they know about the victim and the missing persons records of six nearby states, eventually tie the skeleton up with Vivian Heldon, who disappeared on just about the same day the victim was killed, and also to Shanway's car, which he reported stolen that day. The poor slob, who is merely trying to cover up a drunken lapse from his wife (Sally Forrest), acts guilty enough and lies about just enough so that Morales is certain that he's the murderer. His investigation isn't helped by the interference of Mrs. Smerrling, who sold Vivian's belongings when she didn't return to her room, and now seems fixated, even obsessed with the details of the case and its connection to her rooming house. While the police tighten the screws on Shanway, she backtracks Vivian's phone calls and makes contact with the woman's boyfriend, James Joshua Harkley (Edmon Ryan), member of a wealthy Boston family, and a married man; she also manages to steal a vital piece of evidence. But instead of turning it over to the police, she uses it to blackmail Harkley.

Meanwhile, the district attorney sets an early trial date for Shanway, but with the opening arguments only a week away, Morales begins to develop doubts about Shanway's guilt, in addition to harboring his own sympathy for Grace Shanway, whose life is being gradually destroyed by the prosecution on her husband -- not that Morales thinks he's innocent, but there's enough that's not right about the case, including the missing murder weapon, that he's not 100-percent sure. And that's when Vivian's friend and neighbor, Jackie Elcott (Betsy Blair) reports how strangely Mrs. Smerrling is acting, and the fact that she's got a gun. But before they can question her, Harkley kills Mrs. Smerrling -- now it's a race between Morales and Harkley to see who can get to the murder weapon first. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

The hero of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead is Howard Roark (Gary Cooper), a fiercely independent architect obviously patterned after Frank Lloyd Wright. Rather than compromise his ideals, Roark takes menial work as a quarryman to finance his projects. He falls in love with heiress Dominique (Patricia Neal), but ends the relationship when he has the opportunity to construct buildings according to his own wishes. Dominique marries a newspaper tycoon (Raymond Massey) who at first conducts a vitriolic campaign against the "radical" Roark, but eventually becomes his strongest supporter. Upon being given a public-housing contract on the proviso that his plans not be changed in any way, Roark is aghast to learn that his designs will be radically altered. Roark sneaks into the unfinished structure at night, makes certain no one else is around, and dynamites the project into oblivion. At his trial, Roark acts as his own defense, delivering an eloquent paean to individuality. He is acquitted, while the newspaper tycoon, upset that he could offer Roark no help during the trial, kills himself. This clears the way for a final clinch between Roark and Dominique on the skeleton of his latest building project. Ayn Rand's celebration of Objectivism didn't translate very well to film, with Gary Cooper coming off more selfish and petulant than anything else. The Fountainhead's saving graces are the solid direction by King Vidor, the rhapsodic musical score by Max Steiner, and the symbolism inherent in Cooper's manipulation of his power drill when he first lays eyes on Patricia Neal! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Young model Jean Dexter is knocked unconscious and drowned in her own bathtub in her Manhattan apartment, and a lot of jewelry that she supposedly owned is missing. The Naked City is actually about six days in the life of New York City that coincide with the murder and the subsequent investigation by Lt. Dan Muldoon (Barry Fitzgerald) and Detective James Halloran (Don Taylor). The account of their work, and the workings of the New York City police department, is interspersed with brief vignettes about the life of the city around them, and, especially, the reaction of residents to the murder and the newspaper reports of the progress of the case. Muldoon and Halloran first must determine why she was killed, which may (or may not) have to do with how a woman with a minimal income came by the jewelry -- was it a love affair gone bad (and if so, with whom?), or something more complex and sinister? Retracing the final 18 months of the victim's life, their investigation reaches out to a mysterious "Philip Henderson" with whom she was supposedly linked romantically, and to Frank Niles (Howard Duff), who's a little too fast-and-loose with the truth when he doesn't have to be to make Muldoon comfortable; to make things more complicated, Muldoon determines that there were at least two men involved with the actual commission of the murder. The victim turns out to have led a wild life, filled with men and parties, and was tied up with several sordid figures. Their investigation carries them into the highest and lowest ends of New York's social strata to find the killer, and it turns out there are a lot of interlocking reasons why at least three men might've wanted her dead. In the process, we get glimpses of the private lives of the detectives, which was something new in movies at this time; in the midst of all of this activity, the writers set up a fascinating contrast, in adjacent scenes, between Halloran, his wife, and their young son looking toward the future, with the parents of the dead woman, looking back with bitter regret and recriminations -- no movie ever presented in more subtle fashion the contrast between the zeitgeist of the 1930s and that of the postwar era. The final chase on the Williamsburg Bridge is one of the classic pieces of suspense cinema, as the armed and desperate killer races up the walkway past children playing and adults strolling, while detectives close in on foot from behind and patrol cars come up from ahead, with crowded subways rolling past, and then into the superstructure of the bridge for a stand-off and shootout. Sharp-eyed viewers will spot future character leads Paul Ford, James Gregory, John Marley, Kathleen Freeman, and Arthur O'Connell as well as familiar faces Tom Pedi, John Randolph, Molly Picon, and Walter Burke in the supporting cast. Cinematographer William Daniels and editor Paul Weatherwax won Oscars for their work, but awards might just as easily have been presented to director Jules Dassin, writers Albert Maltz and Malvin Wald, composers Miklos Rozsa and Frank Skinner, and, most notably, to producer/narrator Mark Hellinger, who intoned the closing monologue, which opens with one of the most famous tag lines in movie history: "There are eight million stories in the Naked City." ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Irving Pichel's They Won't Believe Me is the flashback unfolding of Larry Ballentine's (Robert Young) witness-stand testimony in his trial for the murder of girlfriend Verna Carlson (Susan Hayward). Larry is the first to admit he's a parasitic heel, cheating on his rich wife Gretta (Rita Johnson) first with magazine writer Janice Bell (Jane Greer) and then with Verna. Though aware of Larry's affairs, Gretta cannot manage to leave him; rather, she uses her money to keep him in tow. She foils his attempt to run off with Janice by buying him a partnership in a brokerage firm. When she discovers his plan to flee with Verna, she sells her interest, leaving Larry unemployed and penniless. The lovers run off nonetheless, but Verna is killed when a truck crashes into their car. When the authorities assume the charred victim is his wife, Larry gets a sinister idea. He returns home to kill Gretta, but she is already dead, so all he has to do is hide the body. Unfortunately for him, the police come looking for the missing Verna, who they suspect was blackmailing him. They find Gretta's unrecognizable corpse, think it's Verna's, and arrest Larry. The flashback structure of this suspenseful film noir effectively creates a foreboding tension that mounts to a powerful final scene. ~ Steve Press, All Movie Guide

William Powell plays a cynical con man who graduates from penny-ante operations to a big-time charity racket. The scam involves collecting money on behalf of St. Dismas, bringing Powell in close contact with several men of the cloth. As the racket rolls on, Powell is touched by the sincerity of the religious men and the plights of the charity's rightful recipients. He has a change of heart, confessing his original criminal intentions but seeing to it that the money goes to the right people. Hoodlum Saint was typical of the facile religiosity often found in MGM pictures of the period. The film is best remembered as the first non-aquatic performance of MGM swimming star Esther Williams. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Danny Kaye's The Kid From Brooklyn is a virtual scene-for-scene remake of Harold Lloyd's The Milky Way (1936), with music and Technicolor added to the proceedings. Kaye is cast as timid milkman Burleigh Sullivan, who through a fluke knocks out prizefighting champion Speed McFarlane (Steve Cochran). Sensing a swell publicity angle, McFarlane's manager Gabby Sloan (Walter Abel) promotes Burleigh as the next middleweight champ-and to insure this victory, Gabby fixes several pre-title bouts. Unaware that his fighting prowess is a sham, Burleigh develops a swelled head, which alienates him from everyone he cares about, including his sweetheart Polly Pringle (Virginia Mayo). The truth comes out during the climactic title fight, but a chastened Burleigh emerges victorious thanks to a series of incredible plot twists. The strong supporting cast includes Vera-Ellen as Burleigh's sister Susie, Eve Arden as Gabby's wisecracking girl friday Ann Westley, and, repeating his role from Milky Way, Lionel Stander as Speed's lamebrained trainer Spider Schultz. Danny Kaye does his best to play Burleigh Sullivan rather than Danny Kaye, though his efforts are undermined by the interpolated "specialty" number "Pavlova," which just plain doesn't belong in this picture. Like The Milky Way, The Kid From Brooklyn was adapted from the Broadway play by Lynn Root. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide