Howard Wilson Movies

If John Ford is the greatest Western director, The Searchers is arguably his greatest film, at once a grand outdoor spectacle like such Ford classics as She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949) and Rio Grande (1950) and a film about one man's troubling moral codes, a big-screen adventure of the 1950s that anticipated the complex themes and characters that would dominate the 1970s. John Wayne plays Ethan Edwards, a former Confederate soldier who returns to his brother Aaron's frontier cabin three years after the end of the Civil War. Ethan still has his rebel uniform and weapons, a large stash of Yankee gold, and no explanations as to where he's been since Lee's surrender. A loner not comfortable in the bosom of his family, Ethan also harbors a bitter hatred of Indians (though he knows their lore and language well) and trusts no one but himself. Ethan and Martin Pawley (Jeffrey Hunter), Aaron's adopted son, join a makeshift band of Texas Rangers fending off an assault by renegade Comanches. Before they can run off the Indians, several homes are attacked, and Ethan returns to discover his brother and sister-in-law dead and their two daughters kidnapped. While they soon learn that one of the girls is dead, the other, Debbie, is still alive, and with obsessive determination, Ethan and Martin spend the next five years in a relentless search for Debbie -- and for Scar (Henry Brandon), the fearsome Comanche chief who abducted her. But while Martin wants to save his sister and bring her home, Ethan seems primarily motivated by his hatred of the Comanches; it's hard to say if he wants to rescue Debbie or murder the girl who has lived with Indians too long to be considered "white." John Wayne gives perhaps his finest performance in a role that predated screen antiheroes of the 1970s; by the film's conclusion, his single-minded obsession seems less like heroism and more like madness. Wayne bravely refuses to soft-pedal Ethan's ugly side, and the result is a remarkable portrait of a man incapable of answering to anyone but himself, who ultimately has more in common with his despised Indians than with his more "civilized" brethren. Natalie Wood is striking in her brief role as the 16-year-old Debbie, lost between two worlds, and Winton C. Hoch's Technicolor photography captures Monument Valley's savage beauty with subtle grace. The Searchers paved the way for such revisionist Westerns as The Wild Bunch (1969) and McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971), and its influence on movies from Taxi Driver (1976) to Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and Star Wars (1977) testifies to its lasting importance. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Private Hell 36 was one of the last feature-length efforts by Filmmakers, a company created by producer Collier Young and his then-wife Ida Lupino. Young and Lupino also wrote the script for this grim crime melodrama, wherein two detectives Cal Bruner (Steve Cochran) and Jack Farnham (Howard Duff Lupino's future husband) are assigned to track down $300,000 stolen in a bloody hold-up. The two cops manage to locate $80,000 of the booty, whereupon Bruner, not the most ethical of men, suggests that he and Farnham split the money 50-50 and keep their mouths shut. When Farnham decides to turn honest and hand the money over to his superiors, Bruner responds with the business end of his revolver. The very small cast is rounded out by Dean Jagger as the detectives' boss and Dorothy Malone as Duff's understandably worried wife. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The Atomic Kid strives mightily to wring laughs from the otherwise humorless topic of atomic radiation. Mickey Rooney (who also produced the film) and Robert Strauss play a couple of brainless prospectors who stumble upon a A-bomb testing site. Led to believe that the area is rich with uranium, Strauss goes off to stake a claim, while Rooney relaxes in a "test" house. Before long, a bomb is dropped, a mushroom cloud sprouts in the desert. . .and Rooney emerges from the rubble unharmed. Later on, however, our hero discovers that he's so full of radiation that he glows in the dark, which makes him both dangerous and world-famous. The plot then veers into Cold War territory as Rooney routs a nest of Soviet spies, led by Robert Emmet Keane. The leading lady of the proceedings is Elaine Davis, Mickey Rooney's then-wife (her marital status, transitory though it may have been, was emphasized in the film's opening credits) Believe it or not, this monumentally unfunny comedy was based on a story by Blake Edwards. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

All of his life, Danny Hawkins (Dane Clark) has been taunted and mistreated by most of the people around him, enduring innumerable beatings and other humiliations as a boy because his father was a murderer who died on the gallows. He finds it not much better as an adult, living with his aunt in the small Virginia town of Woodville -- especially when he is contending for the attentions of young schoolteacher Gilly Johnson (Gail Russell) with his boyhood tormentor Jerry Sykes (Lloyd Bridges), whose bullying and arrogance are made worse (and more galling) by the fact that he's the son of the town banker (and its richest man). Sykes picks a fight with Danny and loses for the first time, but he dies in the process. Knowing how the town thinks of him because of his father, Danny tries to hide the body. But for all of his bitterness over how he's been treated, he can't truly escape the feelings of guilt over what he's done -- nor can he escape his fear of what people will probably think. For a time, his new romance with Gilly distracts him, but he's unable to put it out of his mind for long, especially when he's forced to join his good friend Mose (Rex Ingram) on a raccoon hunt that takes them right to the pond where the body is hidden. Soon the sheriff (Allyn Joslyn) is investigating, and he can't help but confer with the one man in town whose judgment he respects nearly as much as his own -- Danny. And when Danny's deaf-mute friend, Billy (Harry Morgan), unknowingly uncovers a key piece of evidence, Danny is pushed almost to the breaking point. He's driven by his own instincts to run away, and invite almost certain capture or death, but Gilly and the sheriff see this as a chance for Danny not only to free himself of the torment over what he's done but from the past that has haunted him and blighted his life -- if only they can reach him and make him understand. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

It's hard to go wrong with such stars as Bob Hope, Burns & Allen, Martha Raye and Edward Everett Horton, and College Swing doesn't-go wrong, that is. The film begins in 1738, when a pact is drawn up between the Alden family and a highly respected Colonial college: If any female member of the family can pass her college exams within a 200-year period, ownership of the institution will be turned over to her. Comes 1938, and the last of the Alden girls, giddy Gracie Alden (Gracie Allen, of course) hires glib-tongued tutor Bud Brady (Bob Hope) to help her pass her exams. She also tries to win over no-nonsense professor Hubert Dash (Edward Everett Horton), who has no intention of handing his college over to a blithering idiot like Gracie. Once she has inherited the place, however, Gracie turns it into a jumpin'-jivin' joint, complete with jitterbugging students, swing bands and remote radio broadcasts. Though George Burns' role is nearly nonexistent, he does get to indulge in his patented cross-talk with Allen. Others contributing to the fun are Ben Blue, Jerry Colonna, Betty Grable, and Grable's then-husband Jackie Coogan. Highlights include Allen's spirited Irish jig and her endearing song duet with Edward Everett Horton. College Swing is the sort of high-powered, all-star entertainment that is virtually impossible to reproduce today. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In his first starring role (after being second-billed to Claudette Colbert in The Gilded Lily), Fred MacMurray plays officer Ross Martin of the Michigan State Police. After completing his training, Martin is pitted against dignified Professor Anthony (Sir Guy Standing), who uses his academic status as a cover for his bank-robbery activities. Keeping himself abreast of police maneuvers by listening to car radios and unobtrusively hanging around headquarters, Anthony ultimately uses his technological know-how to paralyze the police communications systems. But with the cooperation of the Massachusetts police department, whose radios are in full working order, rookie Martin and rustic sheriff Pete Arnot (Frank Craven) combine forces for a final assault upon Anthony's hideout. Its sometimes illogical plot twists notwithstanding, the screenplay is based on a series of factual articles, first published in Saturday Evening Post. Also given a career boost in Car 99 is another new Paramount contractee, Ann Sheridan. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Randolph Scott stars in this adequate Zane Grey adaptation. Lawman Larry Sutton (Scott) is assigned to solve a series of murders occurring at a radium mine. Among the suspects is mine owner Mrs. Borg, played by legendary Broadway star Leslie Carter in a rare film appearance. The key to the mystery would seem to be a sinister Chinese gent named Ling Yat (Willie Fung), but he proves to be one of many red herrings. Hoping to beat Sutton to the solution is local sheriff Tex Murdock, played by veteran vaudevillian Chic Sale. With so much high-powered talent, it's small wonder that many reviewers failed to mention the ingenue, a young actress named Anne Sheridan. A remake of the 1922 film Golden Dreams (the original title of the Zane Grey novel), Rocky Mountain Mystery was reissued as Vanishing Pioneer. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Previously filmed in 1929, Philip MacDonald's novel Patrol was lensed by director John Ford as The Lost Patrol in 1934. Sergeant Victor McLaglen is in charge of a World War I-era British cavalry regiment, stranded somewhere in the Mesopotamian desert. McLaglen hasn't asked for the responsibility: the commanding officer has been killed by an Arab sniper, leaving McLaglen to take over. One by one, McLaglen's men are picked off as they desperately fend off the enemy, waiting for reinforcements to arrive. The most spectacular death scene goes to Boris Karloff, playing a religious zealot who goes insane and begins marching towards the Arabs while bearing a makeshift cross. Max Steiner's relentless musical theme for The Lost Patrol would later be adapted into his score for Warner Bros' Casablanca. Lost Patrol would itself be adapted as the 1939 western Bad Lands. Originally running 74 minutes, Lost Patrol is now generally available only in its 69-minute reissue form. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Ace of Aces was based on Bird of Prey by John Monk Saunders, an acknowledged master of aviation epics. Richard Dix stars as Rex Thorne, a pacifistic sculptor who registers as a conscientious objector when WWI breaks out. Thorne's unwillingness to fight in a war he believes to be unnecessary is misread as cowardice by his socialite sweetheart Nancy Adams (Elizabeth Allen). In "four feathers" fashion, Thorne signs up with the air corps to prove his courage. Before long, he has established a reputation as a reckless, ruthless flying ace, with little concern for anyone's safety, including his own. This fails to satisfy Nancy -- now also serving her country as a Red Cross nurse -- who feels that Thorne has become too bloodthirsty for his own good (What does this woman want?) The supporting cast includes radio singer Art Jarrett and James Cagney's look-alike brother Bill. Some of the aerial scenes in Ace of Aces were "borrowed" from Howard Hughes's Hell's Angels. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi