John Sutton Movies

In this espionage thriller, an agent on his way back to London from Baghdad must deliver an important coded message to an operative. Though ordinarily a routine assignment, the agent finds his life jeopardized when word that he has a photographic memory leaks out. Suddenly he finds himself pursued by enemy agents from all over. Later his boss asks the agent and his lover to allow themselves to be captured so the British agents can move in and capture the enemy spies. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Albert escapes from South American fishermen who saved her from drowning and subsequently wish to throw her back in because the fish are few. An Amazon jungle adventure proves exciting and Albert falls in love with Sutton. ~ Rovi

In the late nineteenth century, Inspector Gannon (Robert Ryan) is a member of the Northwest Mounted Police (forerunners of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police) sent to give a message to the leaders of the Sioux Indian nation. Chased by the U.S. cavalry, the Indians have entered Canada in the wake of the Custer massacre at Little Bighorn. Gannon and his crew assure the Indians there will be no trouble as long as they remain peaceful. American ranchers stage a raid across the border under the guise of rescuing a caucasian woman and kill many Indians. This leads to an inevitable uprising that Gannon must control. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

In the third episode of Walt Disney's eight-part miniseries The Swamp Fox, Revolutionary War hero Francis Marion (Leslie Nielsen) must pretend to despise his sweetheart, Mary Videaux (Barbara Eiler), lest anyone suspects Mary is one of Francis' most valuable allies against the Redcoats. Despite this charade, Redcoat leader Col. Tarleton (John Sutton) smells a rat. Meanwhile, Marion's nephew, Gabe (Tim Considine), hopes to impress his girlfriend, Melanie (Sherry Jackson), and dons his new Continental Army uniform and rides off to visit her -- whereupon he is captured by British officer Col. Townes (Henry Daniell). "Tory Vengeance" originally aired as part of the Walt Disney Presents anthology. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In the fifth episode of Walt Disney's eight-part miniseries The Swamp Fox, the guerilla forces under the leadership of Francis Marion (Leslie Nielsen) have succeeded in capturing British officer Col. Townes (Henry Daniell). Unfortunately, Marion's longtime enemy Col. Tarleton (John Sutton) has, at the same time, seized the home of Marion's brother Gabriel (John Sutton). As Marion prepares to escort Towne and his wife to Continental Headquarters, Tarleton lays a carefully planned trap for the elusive "Swamp Fox", using Redcoats disguised as American patriots. "Redcoat Strategy" originally aired as part of the Walt Disney Presents anthology. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This sequel to Kurt Neumann's The Fly (1958) is peculiar, to say the least. Producer/director Neumann had passed away during the summer of 1958, and the studio needed a sequel. The resulting film, Return of the Fly, was directed by Edward L. Bernds, a filmmaker (and former sound man at Columbia Pictures) most closely associated with the Three Stooges, but who had lately moved successfully into popular science fiction, with movies such as World Without End, Space Master X-7, and Queen of Outer Space to his credit -- not that this last, in particular, seemed to qualify him for anything but tongue-in-cheek satire. Curse of the Fly was shot in CinemaScope but in black-and-white, an unusual combination that is usually associated with artier movies, as a compromise for discriminating directors who can't avoid the widescreen format but want to present something serious; in this particular case, however, it was purely a budgetary decision. Vincent Price is the nominal star as Francois Delambre, the brother of Andre Delambre, who died as a result of his experiments with a matter transmitting device in The Fly. It is now a dozen years later, and Andre's son, Philippe (Brett Halsey), has just laid his mother to rest, having witnessed the final years of her life blighted by the memory of the horror of Andre's death. He convinces Francois to tell him what happened and of the device that destroyed his parents' happy life together. Philippe vows to perfect the matter transmitter, so that all of the heartache and sacrifice by his parents will not have been in vain. He employs as his assistant a scientist friend, Alan Hinds (David Frankham), who, unbeknownst to him, has shady business connections and a dark secret in his own past. Alan conspires to steal the secret of the matter transmitter, but first he must dispose of a detective who has come to arrest him for an earlier crime, and then eliminate Philippe, who doesn't know what Alan has done, only that he's hiding something. Thus, the same disaster that befell Philippe's father now occurs again, to him -- his body parts are transposed with those of a house-fly. The human-sized fly, even nastier looking than the monster in the original film, goes on a rampage, trying to catch Alan and get revenge for what has happened to him, using what faculties he has. Meanwhile, Francois gets help from the surviving detective on his brother's case, who knows the truth, and the two try to trap the monster alive and also find the fly-sized creature with Philippe's head and features, so they can try and unscramble the atoms of both. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

One of producer Walt Disney's more blatant efforts to duplicate the success of his early TV miniseries Davy Crockett, the eight-part Swamp Fox featured another flamboyant frontiersman hero who wore coonskin-style headgear and whose adventures were introduced with a catchy, memorable theme song. Based on a book by Dr. Robert D. Bass, The Swamp Fox stars Leslie Nielsen as real-life American patriot Francis Marion, a wealthy landowner who during the Revolutionary War led a hardy band of guerilla fighters against the Redcoats and pro-British tories in his native South Carolina. The villain of the piece (at least in the first few episodes) was another actual historical figure, the ruthless Banastre Tarleton (John Sutton), an officer in the British Green Dragoons (Marion and Tarleton later served as the models for the hero and villain, respectively, of the 1999 Mel Gibson film Patriot). In the first episode, Marion is prevailed upon by his friends and neighbors to help free South Carolina from the grip of British rule. His task is made difficult by the fact that his sweetheart, Mary Videaux (Joy Page), is from a pro-Tory family. "The Birth of the Swamp Fox" originally aired as part of the Walt Disney Presents anthology. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Gregory Peck stars as the great American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald in this film based on a memoir by Sheilah Graham, who was Fitzgerald's paramour during his final days. Graham (played by Deborah Kerr) was a gossip columnist and aspiring novelist who met Fitzgerald during his latter days as a Hollywood screenwriter. Deep in debt thanks to his wife's stay in a mental hospital and his daughter's private school tuition, Fitzgerald took a job writing film scripts to pay the bills, as he attempted to complete another novel that would re-establish his position as one of the important American authors of his century. Graham became Fitzgerald's aid and inspiration as he tried to steer himself away from alcohol and focus on his work, but the author was no longer as strong or stable as he once was. While Graham and Fitzgerald were in love, they often fought, and their efforts came to naught when he died of heart failure before completing The Last Tycoon, with Graham at his side. Eddie Albert co-stars as Carter, a character based on Fitzgerald's close friend Robert Benchley. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A contemptuous and self-serving immigrant, Clementi Sabourin (George Sanders) pulls himself up by his bootstraps by instrumenting a series of cons and seductions which bilk several very wealthy persons out of most of their money. Most of the action is related in a series of flashbacks after Sabourin's body is found dead in a Park Avenue apartment. Death of a Scoundrel is a fictionalized adaptation of the life and mysterious death of Serge Rubenstein. ~ John Bush, Rovi

In the year 1783, as the British surrender to the colonists, Dr. Carlos Morales (Fernando Lamas) is one of many new Americans to rejoice in the victory. But his joy is muted by the impending death of General Victor Darby (Lester Matthews), his benefactor, who raised and educated Morales as though he were his own son. On his deathbed, the general insists that Carlos take over the running of Sangaree, his plantation outside of Savannah. It is a wish that Carlos heartily wishes to avoid carrying out, in part because he can't wholly forget the fact that Sangaree was where his own father toiled as an indentured servant and where aristocratic neighbors still regard him, medical degree or not, as nothing more than an upstart bond-slave; and also because the geeeral's dying wish will put Carlos on a collision course with Nancy Darby (Arlene Dahl), the general's headstrong, British-raised daughter, who expects to control the plantation herself. And sure enough, Nancy and her fiance Harvey Bristol (John Sutton), the son of the wealthy, deeply prejudiced Dr. Bristol (Francis L. Sullivan), do their best to undermine Carlos, challenging her father's will in court and humiliating and belittling him in public at every turn. Carlos prevails, through a mixture of courage, boldness, and good sense, even winning Nancy over, at least in part, but he soon discovers that securing control of Sangaree is only a small battle in the larger war he faces against greed, prejudice and ignorance -- there are pirates to contend with, and the lurking threat of plague, the latter complicated by Dr. Bristol's unaccountabl refusal to allow the inspection of his warehouses. And just as urgent as those larger problems are the lingering vengefulness of Harvey Bristol, who is prepared to kill Carlos by any means at his disposal, and the mysterious machinations of his best friend's wife Martha (Patricia Medina),like Carlos the descendant of a bond-slave; and the enigmatic Frenchman Pagnol (Charles Korvin), who seems to have an agenda of his own that includes piracy. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

This above-average Louis Hayward swashbuckler was sumptuously produced by Columbia's resident western specialist Harry Joe Brown. Adapted from Rafael Sabatini's Captain Blood Returns, the film stars Hayward as physician-turned-buccaneer Peter Blood. Now respectably retired in the West Indies, Blood is shaken out of his complacency when he is accused of returning to piracy. Given a chance to clear his name, Blood reassembles his old crew to track down the villain who's pilfered his good name. The excellent cast includes John Sutton, George Givot, Ted de Corsia, and, in larger roles than usual, Charles Irwin and Rex Evans. And what would a Columbia pirate picture be without leading lady Patricia Medina? ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This Sam Katzman costume quickie stars Sterling Hayden as 17th-century privateer Kit Gerardo, and (inevitably in a buccaneer meller of this sort) Rhonda Fleming as a gorgeous female pirate named Rouge. When Rouge's vessel is besieged by the minions of evil Caribbean governor Luis del Toro (John Sutton), Gerardo comes to her rescue. As the film unfolds, it turns out that practically no one is who they seem to be--especially the mysterious Rouge. Producer Katzman cannily fleshes out the film with miles of stock footage from earlier pirate epics. Apparently contemptuous of his role, Sterling Hayden delivers an uncharacteristically awful performance, but Rhonda Fleming makes the whole enterprise worthwhile. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi