Charlotte Wynters Movies

In this teenage exploitation drama, a young woman secretly marries. The trouble begins after her husband is killed while drag racing. She bears his child, but she cannot prove that she was married. Caring nothing for the child, she spends her time hitting on a jazz trumpeter who takes her to Las Vegas. Soon she figures out that he is not interested in marriage. She takes off and marries a DJ. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A Woman of Distinction serves as a tailor-made vehicle for Rosalind Russell. The star is cast as Susan Middlecott, a highly respected college dean. As can be expected, Susan is too busy for romance -- at least until handsome professor Alec Stevenson (Ray Milland) enters the picture. At first, the dean and the prof are thrown together by the overzealous machinations of a press agent, and they're none too pleased about it. No matter how hard they try to keep their distance from each other, Susan and Alec constantly find themselves in embarrassing situations in full view of the public. It takes the behind-the-scenes maneuvers of Susan's puckish papa (Edmund Gwenn) to straighten things out. Appearing in unbilled cameos are Lucille Ball as herself, and Ball's future TV cohort Gale Gordon as a railroad ticket agent. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The ever-reliable Richard Arlen tops the cast of Republic's The Phantom Speaks. Arlen plays a reporter investigating a series of baffling crimes. It would seem that notorious criminal Tom Powers is the culprit...except that Powers has been executed. The audience learns early on that Powers has returned to earth and taken over the body of kindly scientist Stanley Ridges, but Arlen doesn't catch on to this until the film is nearly over. Ridges had earlier played a similar split-personality medico in Universal's Black Friday (1945). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Barton MacLane dominates the proceedings in the PRC quickie Man of Courage. Taking a break from his usual gangster and convict roles, MacLane plays a crusading district attorney. His number one target is mob boss Lyle Talbot, who enjoys the protection of several crooked politicos. With perserverance, MacLane collars his quarry and brings him to trial. MacLane also cowrote the script, so he has only himself to blame for lines like "I remember when I used to plow on the farm...BOY! Did I love ta PLOW!" Newpaper columnist Erskine Johnson appears as "himself" in Man of Courage. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

As PRC pictures go, the modest Harvest Melody is practically a spectacular. Rosemary Lane plays former film star Gilda Parker, who hopes to regain her popularity with a carefully staged publicity stunt. Aiming for the "rural" trade, Gilda goes to work on a farm at harvest time. At the behest of Gilda's fast-talking agent Chuck (Sheldon Leonard), several other show-bizzers begin pitching hay alongside our heroine. A little more altruistic than Gilda is farmer's son Tommy (Johnny Downs), who turns down a chance at a movie contract to devote his energies to the establishment of a patriotic National Farm Labor Club. But he doesn't turn down Gilda, allowing the film to end happily. Outside of its better-than-average cast, the most impressive aspect of Harvest Melody is the glittering new PRC logo at the beginning of the film. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Half Way to Shanghai is Burma, according to this Universal B-grade actioner. The film takes place almost in its entirety on a train bound from Lashio to Rangoon in the days just prior to the Japanese invasion. Passenger Alexander Barton (Kent Taylor) becomes the reluctant hero of the piece when he comes into possession of a map showing Chinese defense sites. When he's not trying to elude Nazi agents Zerta (George Zucco) and Van Simet (Lionel Royce), Barton is dealing as best he can with the film's two heroines, Vicki Nelson (Irene Hervey) and Caroline Wrallins (Charlotte Wynters). Half Way to Shanghai bears traces of the earlier Universal suspenser Bombay Clipper, which took place on a cramped passenger plane. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Olive Higgins Prouty's popular novel was transformed into nearly two hours of high-grade soap opera by several masters of the trade: Warner Bros., Bette Davis, Paul Henreid, director Irving Rapper, and screenwriter Casey Robinson. Davis plays repressed Charlotte Vale, dying on the vine thanks to her domineering mother (Gladys Cooper). All-knowing psychiatrist Dr. Jaquith (Claude Rains) urges Charlotte to make several radical changes in her life, quoting Walt Whitman: "Now voyager sail thou forth to seek and find." Slowly, Charlotte emerges from her cocoon of tight hairdos and severe clothing to blossom into a gorgeous fashion plate. While on a long ocean voyage, she falls in love with Jerry Durrance (Henreid), who is trapped in a loveless marriage. After kicking over the last of her traces at home, Charlotte selflessly becomes a surrogate mother to Jerry's emotionally disturbed daughter (a curiously uncredited Janis Wilson), who is on the verge of becoming the hysterical wallflower that Charlotte once was. An interim romance with another man (John Loder) fails to drive Jerry from Charlotte's mind. The film ends ambiguously; Jerry is still married, without much chance of being divorced from his troublesome wife, but the newly self-confident Charlotte is willing to wait forever if need be. "Don't ask for the moon," murmurs Charlotte as Max Steiner's romantic music reaches a crescendo, "we have the stars." In addition to this famous line, Now, Voyager also features the legendary "two cigarettes" bit, in which Jerry places two symbolic cigarettes between his lips, lights them both, and hands one to Charlotte. The routine would be endlessly lampooned in subsequent films, once by Henreid himself in the satirical sword-and-sandal epic Siren of Baghdad (1953). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this episode of the popular medical series, Kildare finds himself involved in a dispute between to competing hospitals. The trouble begins when an intern rushes a beautiful girl to Kildare's hospital. She has a shard of glass imbedded in her heart. The girl survives the surgery, and the intern is promptly fired for bringing her to the wrong hospital. Meanwhile the girl falls for Kildare, but he is still grieving over his late fiance who died during "Dr. Kildare's Wedding Day." ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In a manner of speaking, Humphrey Bogart had George Raft to thank for his ascendancy to stardom: after all, if Raft hadn't turned down both High Sierra and The Maltese Falcon, Bogart might have continued playing second-billed gangsters to the end of his days. Adapted from W. R. Burnett's novel by Burnett and John Huston, High Sierra opens with gangster Roy Earle (Bogart) being paroled after a lengthy prison term. Though he enjoys the fresh air and sunshine of the outside world, Earle has no intention of giving up his criminal ways. In fact, his parole has been arranged by Big Mac (Donald MacBride), so that Earle can mastermind a big-time heist at a fancy California resort hotel. After a few unkind words with a crooked cop, Kranmer (Barton MacLane), in Big Mac's employ, Earle heads toward a fishing resort, where he is to commiserate with his inexperienced, hot-headed cohorts Babe (Alan Curtis) and Red (Arthur Kennedy). En route, he befriends a farm family, heading to LA in search of work. He falls in love with the family's club-footed daughter Velma (Joan Leslie)--though she never really gives him any encouragement--and makes a silent promise to finance an operation on her foot once he's gotten his share of the loot. At the mountain cabin rendezvous, Earle meets Marie (Ida Lupino), Babe's tough-but-vulnerable girlfriend. He angrily orders her to scram, but she stubbornly remains. Earle also finds himself the owner of a "jinxed" dog, whose previous masters have all met with early demises (a none-too-subtle foretaste of things to come). Marie is strongly attracted to Earle, but he refuses to have anything to do with her, reserving his affections for Velma. He arranges an operation for the girl with mob doctor Banton (Henry Hull), never suspecting that the self-serving Velma is planning all along to marry someone else. The robbery goes off without a hitch, save for the fact that "inside man" Mendoza (Cornel Wilde) panics and nearly gives the game away. While escaping, Babe and Red are killed in a car accident, but Earle and Marie escape. Having been disillusioned by Velma's indifference and by the fact that the untrustworthy Kranmer has taken over the late Big Mac's operation, Earle at last realizes that the only person he can truly depend upon is the faithful Marie. With the police hot on his trail, Earle tells Marie to look after herself, then heads alone into the High Sierras--where, in Greek Tragedy fashion, he "busts out" of life. As in Petrified Forest, Humphrey Bogart plays a burnt-out anachronism from an earlier era in crime in High Sierra; in the latter film, however, Bogart has an innate nobility that allows the audience to empathize with him throughout. It is nothing short of amazing that, despite his superb performance in this 1940 film, he still had to wait until The Maltese Falcon for top billing in an "A picture." High Sierra was remade in 1949 as Colorado Territory and in 1955 as I Died a Thousand Times. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Rosalind Russell stars as a no-nonsense judge who dabbles in sculpting in her spare time. Walter Pidgeon costars as a reporter assigned to discredit Rosalind after she rules against his boss (Edward Arnold) in a divorce case. Pidgeon plans to frame the judge in a compromising situation, then blackmail her into reducing the alimony. He succeeds in humiliating Rosalind, but regrets his actions when he realizes he's fallen in love with her. All ends happily in this glossy derivative of MGM's earlier Libelled Lady (36). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Number ten in MGM's heart-warming (and immensely profitable) "Andy Hardy" series was the 1941 entry Life Begins for Andy Hardy. Upon his graduation from high school, Andy (Mickey Rooney) decides to seek his fortune in New York City without benefit of a college education, much to the consternation of his father Judge Hardy (Lewis Stone). Moving to the Big Apple, Andy lands a job in a stockbroker's office, where he falls in love (at least he thinks it's love) with fickle telephone operator Jennitt Hicks (Patricia Dane). Alas, Andy is unable to cope with life in the fast lane, but it takes the combined efforts of his father and his hometown sweetie Betsy Booth (Judy Garland) to convince him of this fact. For reasons that defy logic, each of Judy Garland's four songs in Life Begins for Andy Hardy were cut from the final release print. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Parole Fixer is another entry in Paramount's unofficial "J. Edgar Hoover" series, purportedly based on an actual case in the files of the FBI. The plot revolves around the activities of crooked attorney Paul McGrath, who secures paroles for big-time criminals by pulling a number of political strings. Feeling particularly expansive, McGrath masterminds the kidnapping of socialite Virginia Dale, using ex-con chauffeur Robert Paige as an "inside man". When another of McGrath's stooges, Anthony Quinn, bumps off FBI agent Jack Carson (established as a happy family man in the early scenes, thereby signing his own death warrant!), Carson's partner William Henry vows to bring the whole rotten bunch of crooks to justice. Directed with split-second timing by Robert Florey, Parole Fixer is a masterpiece of its kind. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Though the peak productivity of Monogram's "rural romance" films was the mid-1930s, the studio continued to put together films like Tomboy well into the early 1940s. Marcia Mae Jones plays the title character, a rambunctious city girl named Pat. Sent to the country to temper her hoydenish behavior, Pat falls in love with farm boy Steve (Jackie Moran), who lives under the thumb of his tyrannical Uncle Matt (Grant Withers). The couple's budding romance is helped along by Kelly (Grant Withers), Pat's ne'er-do-well father. The film's best performance is delivered by Clara Blandick, the immortal "Auntie Em" in The Wizard of Oz. Tomboy was directed by Robert McGowan, formerly the guiding light of Hal Roach's "Our Gang" films. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide