Paul Blake Movies
- 1952
Most of this hectic British comedy takes place in an ancient Scottish castle. The British National Coal Board, following a real-life policy established in the 1940s, wants to annex the castle as a group home for the local miners and their families. Wealthy, much-married American Mrs. Clodfelter Dunne (Barbara Kelly) wants to claim the castle--and its owner, the Earl of Locharne (David Tomlinson)--for herself. Meanwhile, eccentric boarder Miss Nicholson (Margaret Rutherford) is possessed with the notion that the Earl is actually the rightful King of Scotland. The film's deus-ex-machina is a beautiful ghost, played by Patricia Dainton. With all this going on, it is easy to ignore the antiseptic romantic subplot involving Tomlinson and Helen Cherry. Castles in the Air was based on the popular stage play by Alan Melville. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- David Tomlinson, Helen Cherry, (more)
- 1949
In this drama, a young Englishman wants to become a surgeon, but after medical school, his father dies, leaving him the responsibility of supporting his mother and paying for his brother's education. He becomes a partner in a small practice and watches the woman he wanted to marry go off with his brother. The brother is killed in WWI, after which his illegitimate son is born. The doctor marries the woman, but she dies in childbirth, leaving him to raise his brother's child. Eventually, he finds a new wife. ~ Steve Huey, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Hilda Bayley, Beatrice Campbell, (more)
- 1948
This sci-fi adventure was originally aimed at younger audiences. It tells the story of a young woman who falls from a horse frightened by a gunshot and is assisted by two clever brothers who begin investigating and discover that the girl's father is being chased by crooks after his innovative ray gun. Later the girl and her father are kidnapped and stashed in a secret subterranean hideout. To save her, the brothers get help from a G-man and together they see that justice is done. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1947
In this melodrama, a fisherman begins studying to be a doctor. Although he isn't finished with medical school, he begins treating his landlady's daughter who is believed to have a terminal illness. He seems to cure her, and the case draws a lot of attention, some of it negative because he was unlicensed when he treated her. He still does not have a degree when he marries the daughter and begins practicing osteopathy. He soon finds success and happiness until he begins having an affair. Later he jilts his mistress and she kills herself. During the autopsy he is appalled to learn that it was actually his misdiagnosis of her illness and the resulting medical treatment that caused her to die. The distraught osteopath then takes off and does not return until his wife, whose disease has come back, begs him to help her once again. He succeeds and their happiness resumes. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Beatty, Carol Raye, (more)
- 1946
Though its title suggests that Gaiety George is yet another vehicle for British comedian George Formby, the film is in fact a biopic. Richard Greene plays Irish theatrical impresario George Howard, whose elaborately staged musical entertainments were highlights of the early 20th century. Wounded during World War I, Howard returns to London and virtually forgotten, compelling him to mount a spectacular comeback. Surprisingly, the weakest element is not its banal plotline but the musical numbers, which are staged with little of the "feel" or energy of the period. Released in the US as Showtime in 1948. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Greene, Ann Todd, (more)
- 1944
Like the better-known (and more popular) A Canterbury Tale, Welcome Mr. Washington is a sometimes amusing, sometimes poignant dramatization of what happened when American troops "invaded" England during WW II. Dismissed as "overpaid, oversexed and over here," the Yanks face some hostility while trying to adjust to British manners and mores. But when a farming community finds itself dangerously short-handed at harvest time, the American GIs pitch in and help their British brethren in true "hands across the sea" fashion. Real-life American army lieutenant Donald Stewart is cast as the nominal romantic lead, his lack of professional polish all the more obvious in his scenes with the talented Barbara Mullen. The film is stolen by Peggy Cummins as a precocious teenager, some three years before Cummins was brought to Hollywood to star in Forever Amber (which, as it turned out, she didn't). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Barbara Mullen, Donald Stewart, (more)
- 1938
In this comedy, a dart-playing clerk catches a jewel thief. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1938
In this comedy a young woman weasels out of a vacation with her parents and away from the young man they want her to date by conning a scientist to pose as a doctor and tell them she is terribly ill. The daughter and her "physician" end up traversing the country in their attempts to avoid her family and the suitor who disgusts her. Along the way, the two fall in love. Marital bliss ensues. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1937
In this comedy, an unemployed ex-con searches for the gang that falsely fingered him for counterfeiting. He attends a charity auction and ends up getting sold as a butler for five pounds. Upon examination, he realizes that the five-pound note is bogus. This leads him to confront the father of the woman that hired him. He accuses him of framing him. Rather than go to prison, the semi-honorable father commits suicide. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1937
In this musical, an enigmatic masked woman catches the roving eye of a wily playboy gambler at a masquerade ball. If he knew that she was using her wiles as bait and was planning to reform him of his gambling womanizing ways after catching him, he may have head for different waters. Fortunately for her, he doesn't figure this out until she has reeled him in and effectively ended his days of frying other fish. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michael Bartlett, June Knight, (more)
- 1937
A young woman, desiring to be wealthy, attempts to smuggle French jewels into America. When her boat docks, she is immediately caught by a US customs agent who convinces her to return the jewels to France. If she does that, he will not arrest her. Unfortunately, before she can get back she is accosted by three different groups of criminals who are all after the gems. One of the groups is headed by Pola, a Chicago gangster. He gets murdered. The film climaxes with a prolonged shoot-out aboard the ship. Justice prevails. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1937
Like Rick's Café Americain, the Café Colette is a rendezvous for virtually every spy in Europe. Greta Nissen stars as Russian princess Vanda Muroff, whose seductive powers are so overwhelming that one otherwise intelligent secret agent after another is willing to sacrifice all their top secrets to her on a moment's notice. Only Ryan (Paul Cavanaugh), an outwardly dissolute playboy, is able to resist Vanda's charms. It turns out that Ryan is actually a spy himself -- and one of the best in the business, at that! In the true Hitchcock tradition, the "secret papers" in Café Colette aren't nearly as important as the trials and tribulations undergone by the characters to get their hands on them. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Paul Cavanagh, Greta Nissen, (more)
- 1937
In this crime drama, a chorine flees to Birmingham after she is falsely accused of a murder. Thinking she has finally found peace, she begins to relax and even falls in love with an architect. Things go well until the partner of the producer she is accused of killing finds her. She is finally vindicated after she is able to prove her innocence. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1936
In this drama, a man is tried for participating in a fraud and ends up sentenced to serve a dozen years in prison. His does his time and then tries to return to his family. Unfortunately they are horribly ashamed of him and introduce him as their "Uncle Charles from South America." Later when his own son is framed by the crook who framed him, "Uncle Charles" goes to prison in his stead. There, away from snobbishness and social classes, he finds true happiness. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1936
A butler (Claude Dampier) searches for missing heir (Billy Milton) who claims his inheritance and wins the love of a woman June Clyde. ~ All Movie Guide
- 1936
Blackmail is the basis of this crime drama based on a novel by Edgar Wallace. The trouble begins when the leader of a ring of blackmailers becomes an amateur sleuth to outfox Scotland Yard. He spends a lot of time in the Yard getting to know the higher ups. When not schmoozing with the cops, the crook is plotting blackmail schemes. Despite their efforts the Yard has many problems figuring out the leader of the ring. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Hugh Wakefield, Alfred Drayton, (more)
- 1935
Adapted from a play by Ernest Denny, this was one of director Michael Powell's "quota quickies" that lived up to the name, being filmed in a scant thirteen nights. (The stars were appearing in West End plays and couldn't film during the day, a not-uncommon practice at the time.) The lazybones of the title is Sir Reginald Ford, a baronet who has made indolence into an art form and sees no reason to change his ways -- until discovering that his means of support has dried up. With no recourse but to make an appropriate marriage, Ford pursues Kitty McCarthy, an American heiress, with considerable success. Just as things seem to be going along smoothly, Ford discovers that Kitty has lost her fortune. In the midst of all this, Ford discovers he has fallen in love with Kitty, not her money; further complications ensue as Kitty's conniving cousin Mike comes on the scene and tries to involve her in a wicked scheme. Shaking off his accustomed lethargy, Ford springs into high gear and rids Kitty of her cousin, while at the same time coming up with a clever business proposition that enables him to care for his new wife in the style to which they both have long been accustomed. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
- 1935
The chaos in this comedy culminates in compromise when two chorines and their neer-do-well boyfriends attempt blackmail their uncle into putting up with their antics by threatening to expose some of his own improper antics when he was an admiral. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
