Mamie van Doren Movies
1950s "sex bomb" Mamie Van Doren could act, but reviewers seldom got any farther than commenting on her torpedo bras and skin-tight capri pants. She made her professional bow as a band singer, acting in stock companies before signing a contract with Universal Pictures in 1953. There would be a few A pictures in her future, notably the Clark Gable-Doris Day comedy Teacher's Pet (1958), but Van Doren's career was mainly devoted to tawdry exploitation programmers and drive-in quickies. She became the resident Marilyn Monroe-type for fast-buck producer Albert Zugsmith in the late 1950s and early 1960s, starring in such films as The Beat Generation (1958), The Big Operator (1959), The Private Lives of Adam and Eve (1960), and her signature film, Sex Kittens Go To College (1960). She also showed up in the "musical j.d." epic Born Reckless (singing five songs) and as a neurotic striptease artist in director Tommy Noonan's tickle-and-tease farce Three Nuts in Search of a Bolt (1964). Disappearing from films in the 1970s, Van Doren continued popping up at important Hollywood social functions and awards presentations, as zaftig and exhibitionist as ever, much to the delight of her ever-growing fan club. In 1987 Mamie Van Doren wrote her memoirs, Playing the Field, in which she claims she slept with practically every male star in the entertainment industry. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide- 1957
Anne Bancroft was several years away from her 1962 Oscar win when she starred in the compact murder mystery The Girl in Black Stockings. The scene is a posh Utah resort hotel, where several beautiful women are mysteriously killed. Suspects include lawyer David Hewson (Lex Barker), his secretary Beth Dixon (Anne Bancroft), nasty hotel owner Edmund Parry (Ron Randell), and Parry's sister (Marie Windsor). Among the victims is Mamie Van Doren. The Girl in Black Stockings was adapted from a short story by Peter Godfrey. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lex Barker, Anne Bancroft, (more)
- 1956
In this western, a lawman tries to mediate between irate farmers and angry ranchers who are trying to decide the fate of a captured killer. The killer was hired by the ranchers who want him freed. The farmers, egged on by a schoolteacher, want to see the gunman swing. Meanwhile the real troublemaker, the town banker, votes for the death penalty. Look carefully and see Clint Eastwood as a ranch hand. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Agar, Mamie van Doren, (more)
- 1955
In this lively musical a chorine hooks a successful businessman and becomes the snob she thinks he expects her to be. This is a problem, because he fell in love with her because she was so earthy and fun. Now that she has become refined and aloof, he is bored. Fortunately, just as he is leaving, the plucky girl sees the error of her ways and marital bliss ensues. Songs include: "Ain't Misbehavin'", "The Dixie Mambo", "I Love That Rickey, Tickey, Tickey", and "A Little Love Can Go a Long Way". ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rory Calhoun, Piper Laurie, (more)
- 1955
This musical is a contemporary version of Aristophanes' ancient play Lysistrata. Instead of Greece, this play is centered in the town of Osawkie, Kansas and centers on the feuds between the men there and those of nearby towns. They are fighting over the possession of a safe filled with important county records. The women, sick of all the fighting, band together, lock themselves in a fortress and refuse to make any form of love with the brutes until they stop. They do, and prairie love blossoms. Songs include: "Lysistrata," "Send Us a Miracle," "My Love Is Yours," "Travellin' Man," "What Good Is a Woman Without a Man?" "There's Gonna Be a Wedding," "The Second Greatest Sex," "How Lonely Can I Get?" ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jeanne Crain, George Nader, (more)
- 1955
One of the earliest examples of the hot rod/juvenile delinquency flick, Running Wild featured William Campbell as a rookie cop infiltrating a gang of teenagers that are stealing cars for Ken Osanger (Keenan Wynn), a nasty type who uses a gas station as a front for his nefarious purposes. Going undercover as a teenage rebel, Ralph Barclay (Campbell) not only saves pretty Leta Novak (Kathleen Case) from being ravaged by Osanger, but wins the love of voluptuous Irma Bean (Mamie van Doren), the former girlfriend of teenage gang leader Scotty Cluett (Jan Merlin). John Saxon, Walter Coy, and teen flick regular Kenny Miller also appeared in this highly exploitative crime drama from Universal directed by character actor Abner Biberman. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- William Campbell, Mamie van Doren, (more)
- 1954
Francis Joins the WACS was the fifth in Universal's comedy series about a talking Army mule and his hapless human companion. Thanks to a bureaucratic snafu, ex-GI Peter Sterling (Donald O'Connor) is called into acitive duty and assigned to a WAC unit, headed by Major Simpson (Lynn Bari). It is Sterling's task to train the women to be camouflage experts, but the ladies resent his presence, assuming that Peter has been sent to discredit their unit. But with the help of Francis, the WACs manage to win the annual War Games, and to flummox misogynistic General Kaye (Chill Wills, who also provides Francis' voice). Julie Adams, then billed as Julia, provides the love interest. ZaSu Pitts also appears in Francois Joins the WACs, recreating the role she'd played in the first Francis installment back in 1949, while other uniformed females include Mamie Van Doren and Allison (Attack of the 50-Foot Woman) Hayes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Donald O'Connor, Julie Adams, (more)
- 1954
Yankee Pasha has the potential for silliness, but is commendably played straight by most of the participants (exceptions being such professional funsters as Hal March and Benny Rubin). Jeff Chandler plays American frontiersman Jason, who springs into action when his sweetheart Roxanna (Rhonda Fleming) is kidnapped by Barbary Pirates. Pursuing the villains all the way to Morocco, Jason gains the confidence of sultan Lee J. Cobb, who helps our hero thwart the megalomanic machinations of Omar-Id-Din (Bart Roberts). Mamie Van Doren is better than usual as a pampered harem girl who develops a crush on the stalwart Jason. Just as Universal's 1953 release Abbott and Costello Goes to Mars was an excuse to show of the charms of that year's crop of Miss Universe contests, so to does Yankee Pasha devote plenty of screen time to the pulchritudinous finalists of the 1954 Miss Universe pageant, including such now-forgotten lovelies as Christiane Martel, Kinuko Ito and Maxine Morgan. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jeff Chandler, Rhonda Fleming, (more)
- 1953
A loose remake of the 1931 Richard Barthelmess vehicle of the same name, The All-American stars Tony Curtis as college football star Nick Bonnell. When his parents are killed in a traffic accident while taking a bus trip to see him play, Nick quits football cold. Later on he accepts a scholarship at a small college, but still refuses to resume his gridiron activities--at least for a while. Never the life of the party to begin with, Nick runs afoul of his snooty fellow students and is kicked out of school. Somehow or other, however, he manages to show up during the crucial fourth quarter of the Big Game. Lori Nelson plays requisite heroine Sharon Wallace, who helps draw the taciturn Nick out of his shell, while Mamie Van Doren does what Mamie Van Doren usually does. While the football sequences are exciting, the film is a bit hard to take at times, especially when the 20-plus college freshman Nick is advised by his professors to grin and bear it when he's hazed by the much-younger upper classmen. At the time The All-American was released, much was made of the fact that producer Aaron Rosenberg and director Jess Hibbs had both been USC All-American footballers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tony Curtis, Lori Nelson, (more)
- 1953
Forbidden bears traces of several earlier film noirs, with Tony Curtis filling the shoes vacated by the likes of Alan Ladd, Dick Powell and Robert Mitchum. Curtis acquits himself very nicely as a small-time hood sent to Macao by gangster Lyle Bettger to locate Joanne Dru, the widow of another gangster. It will not spoil the film to reveal here that Curtis and Dru fall in love as he escorts her back. Nor is there any surprise in the revelation that hero and heroine decide to dodge Bettger once they learn that they've both been set up for extermination. Forbidden was directed by Rudolph Mate, a former cinematographer who could probably find long, looming shadows in the Sahara Desert at high noon. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tony Curtis, Joanne Dru, (more)
- 1951
His Kind of Woman directed by veteran John Farrow, is a convoluted mystery thriller which tries unsuccessfully to combine slapstick comedy with excessive violence, resulting in a film that depends more on stereotypes than on plot development. Nick (Raymond Burr), is a deported gang boss who needs to get back to the United States to run his operation. Dan Miller (Robert Mitchum) is a hard-up guy, who is persuaded, both by a series of beatings and a substantial sum of money, to sell his identity to Nick. Lenore (Jane Russell) a singer, poses as a heiress, trying to marry a millionaire. They all meet up in a resort in Mexico where Nick intends to have plastic surgery to alter his looks. There, a number of double-crosses, shootings, and chases all culminate in an exciting confrontation aboard ship. His Kind of Woman, a Howard Hughes production designed to be a showcase for Jane Russell, is entertaining when viewed as a comedy. As a serious film-noir thriller, it lacks suspense and depth. However, the film has its moments, and Robert Mitchum is in his element as the loner anti-hero. ~ Linda Rasmussen, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Mitchum, Jane Russell, (more)
