Francis L. Sullivan Movies

Phil Karlson, well-regarded by film buffs for his tough, no-nonsense crime dramas, directed this adventure story shot partially on location in the Caribbean. Mike Cormack (John Payne) was once a District Attorney, until his fiancée, Janet Martin (Mary Murphy), left him to marry another man. Depressed, Mike began drinking heavily, and eventually his alcoholism cost him his job. Trying to pull himself back up after hitting bottom, Mike gets a job as a bouncer at a casino in Las Vegas. Barzland (Francis L. Sullivan), a handicapped criminal, approaches Mike with an unusual offer. Barzland will pay Mike $5,000 if he can locate a ruby that went missing following the disappearance of a plane in the West Indies. Mike discovers that the reason he was picked for this job is that the pilot of the plane, Eduardo (Paul Picerni), is the man Janet chose to marry, and Barzland and his men believe that she might have clues as to the ruby's whereabouts that Mike could uncover. However, when Mike arrives to meet with Janet, he discovers that Eduardo is now in jail, and Janet begins to snare Mike in a web of lies and deceit. Hell's Island was rereleased in 1962 under the title South Sea Fury. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

During a 1980 interview, writer-director Douglas Heyes mentioned that he preferred to forget his first big-screen writing assignment, Drums of Tahiti. Though lensed in 3D, the film's action content is minimal: the character spend most of their time talking over their various problems. Set in the South Seas in the late 19th century, the story concerns gun smuggler Mike Macklin (Dennis O'Keefe). To divert the authorities' attentions from his activities, Macklin hides behind the reputation of his trophy wife Wanda (Patricia Medina). Meanwhile, police inspector Pierre Duvois (Francis L. Sullivan) bides his time, waiting for Macklin to tip his hand. One of the film's isolated highlights is an energetic native dance by the curvaceous Sylvia Lewis. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Filmed in 3-D, Sangaree is a satisfactory swashbuckler adapted from a novel by Frank G. Slaughter. Fernando Lamas portrays the son of an 18th century slave whose fortunes take a radical turn when he inherits a huge cotton plantation in the American colonies. Arlene Dahl (later Mrs. Fernando Lamas) is the haughty aristocrat whom the rough-hewn Lamas tames, while Francis L. Sullivan is a pirate chieftain who plans to sack Lamas' property. Best unintentional laugh: Two different villains, in two separate scenes, say "I've waited this long...I can wait a little longer." Sangaree enjoyed its widest distribution when released "flat," thereby rendering pointless the various 3-D stunt effects. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Caribbean was another box-office winner from Paramount's "two dollar bills," producers William H. Pine and William Thomas. Set in the 18th century, the film stars John Payne as adventurer Dick Lindsay, hired by pirate leader Charles Barclay (Sir Cedric Hardwicke) to pose as the long-lost nephew of wealthy slave-trader Andrew McAllister (Francis L. Sullivan). It's all part of Barclay's revenge scheme against McAllister, his bitterest enemy for the past 20 years. Through a series of exciting (if slightly incredible) plot twists, Lindsay manages to foment a slave revolt against McAllister and to settle the hash of Barclay. As the exotic leading lady, Arlene Dahl looks terrific in Technicolor. In one priceless moment, both Cedric Hardwicke and Francis L. Sullivan intone "I've waited this long, I can wait a little longer" within a few moments of each other--and the word-for-word repetition is not intended to be funny! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Bob Hope is up to his famous nose in danger in this espionage comedy. Second-rate burlesque comic Peanuts White (Hope) is approached by federal agents who think that he's international spy Eric Augustine, to whom Peanuts bears a striking resemblance. When they realize that Peanuts and Eric are two different people, the FBI persuades him to travel to Africa posing as Eric and fetch a batch of microfilm that could prove vital to national security. With reluctance, Peanuts flies to Tangiers and arranges a rendezvous with Lily Dalbray (Hedy Lamarr), Eric's beautiful girlfriend and an agent of shifting alliances herself. However, Lily's superior Karl Brubaker (Francis L. Sullivan) wants the microfilm, and he will stop at nothing to get it. As Peanuts tries to rescue the microfilm, make time with Lily, and avoid Karl, things become even more confused when Eric escapes from hiding and re-enters the picture. Both Bob Hope and Hedy Lamarr contribute songs to the soundtrack, though unlike Bob, Hedy's vocals were dubbed in by a studio vocalist. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Reverent to the point of tedium, Christopher Columbus stars Fredric March in the title role, and he's welcome to it. March's wife Florence Eldredge co-stars as Queen Isabella, who finances Columbus' expedition to find a westward route to India. After several reels devoted to table-top miniatures impersonating the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria (punctuated by rumbles of mutiny--no, not "rumble rumble, mutiny mutiny") Columbus reaches the New World. Though obviously filmed on an extravagant budget (Technicolor was still a rare commodity in 1949), the British Christopher Columbus has less going for it than the 1939 Porky Pig cartoon Christopher Columbus Jr.. Filmgoers stayed away in droves, as they would when the movie industry "rediscovered" Columbus for a brace of disastrous multimillion-dollar films in 1992. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

One of the more palatable of Hollywood's anti-communist tracts of the late 1940s-early 1950s was MGM's The Red Danube. Janet Leigh plays Maria Buhlen, an Eastern Bloc ballerina who seeks political asylum in the British-occupied zone of Vienna. Maria's plight turns into a political tug-of-war involving a British colonel (Walter Pidgeon) and a Soviet colonel (Louis Calhern). Their ideological hagglings spill over into spiritualism, as represented by Mother Superior Ethel Barrymore, and romance, as personified by Maria's ardent suitor Major John McPhimister (Peter Lawford). Like earlier anti-Red cinematic exercises, The Red Danube failed to connect at the box office. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Cinematographer Ronald Neame made his directorial debut with the 1947 murder melodrama Take My Life. When a Covent Garden violinist is found murdered, her ex-lover, show business manager Nicholas Talbot (Hugh Williams) finds himself under suspicion. The only person who believes that Talbot is innocent is his wife, opera diva Phillipa Shelley (Greta Gynt). Unable to convince the authorities, Phillipa plays detective herself, utilizing a snatch of a newly written song as her main clue to the true killer's identity. If the mysterious murderer isn't all that mysterious to the audience, it is only because the actor in question had played too many similar roles in the past. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The second of director David Lean's adaptations of a Charles Dickens novel (Great Expectations (1946) was the first), Oliver Twist expertly boils down an enormous novel to a little less than two hours' screen time. The film begins with baby Oliver left on the doorstep of an orphanage/workhouse by his unwed mother. Proving a difficult charge to the wicked orphanage official, Oliver (John Howard Davies) is sold into a job as an undertaker's apprentice. He runs away and joins a gang of larcenous street urchins, led by master pickpocket Fagin (Alec Guinness). Oliver is rescued from this life by the kindly Mr. Brownlow (Henry Stephenson); but, with the complicity of evil Bill Sikes (Robert Newton), Fagin abducts Oliver. Sikes' girl friend Nancy (Kay Walsh) restores Oliver to Brownlow, leading to tragic consequences before an ultimately happy ending. Oliver Twist was filmed in England in 1948, but its American release was held up for three years due to the allegedly anti-Semitic portrayal of the duplicitous Fagin. Even in its currently censored form, Oliver Twist is one the best-ever film versions of a Dickens novel. It served as a blueprint for Oliver! (1968), the Oscar-winning musical version. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Immediately grabbing the audience's attention with a heart-stopping opening scene in a dark graveyard, acclaimed British director David Lean realizes the cinematic potential of Charles Dickens' classic 1861 novel, and the result is considered by many to be one of the finest literary adaptations ever made as well as one of the greatest British films of all time. Crystallized into a tight 118-minute running time by Lean, Ronald Neame, and a corps of uncredited contributors, this is the story of young Pip, a lad of humble means whose training as a gentleman is bankrolled by a mysterious benefactor. Along the way, Pip falls in love with the fickle Estella, befriends the cheerfully insouciant Herbert Pocket, has memorable encounters with the escaped convict Magwitch and the lunatic dowager Miss Havisham, and almost (but not quite) forgets his modest origins as the foster son of kindhearted blacksmith Joe Gargery. The role of Pip is evenly divided between Anthony Wager as a child and John Mills as an adult; Alec Guinness makes his starring film debut as the jaunty Pocket; Jean Simmons and Valerie Hobson are costarred as the younger and older Estella; and Martita Hunt is unforgettable as the mad Miss Havisham ("It's a fine cake! A wedding cake! MINE!") Remade several times, Great Expectations resurfaced in 1989 as a TV miniseries, with Jean Simmons, originally the young Estella, tearing a passion to tatters as Miss Havisham; and in 1998 it was remade again, in a contemporary version, with Ethan Hawke, Gwyneth Paltrow, Robert DeNiro, and Anne Bancroft in the Miss Havisham role. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

George Bernard Shaw adapted his own play for the screen in this blithe film version of the romance between Caesar (Claude Rains) and Cleopatra (Vivien Leigh). Shaw's Caesar and Cleopatra are merely Henry Higgins and Eliza Doolittle cast back into ancient times with Caesar doting with admiration and burgeoning love upon Cleopatra and expostulating, "You have been growing up since the Sphinx introduced us the other night." The story is a simple one concerning Caesar instructing Cleopatra on how to act like a queen. But Cleopatra is left cold by Caesar and his blatherings. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

In this comedy, a young playboy and a petty thief both simultaneously attempt to impersonate an non-existent butler. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide