Clarence G. Badger Movies

After closing out his Hollywood career, director Clarence Badger retired to Australia, where he briefly returned to work with a brace of home-grown comedies. The last of Badger's directorial endeavors was That Certain Something, completed in 1940 and released in the US by RKO Radio in 1941. Perhaps drawing from real life, the plot deals with an American director who decides to make a film in Australia. He spends the bulk of the story looking for a local leading lady with "that certain something", ultimately finding her in the form of Patsy O'Connell (Megan Edwards). Rather endearingly old-fashioned, That Certain Something benefits from the presence in the cast of several Australian radio favorites. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this action-drama, a railroad worker plys his trade at the straits of Malay. He begins a steamy affair with a spoiled rich girl. His romantic rival tries to break them and keep the railroad from being completed. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this western, three rambunctious young cowboys head for the hills after spending a night painting a town red and terrorizing its residents. During their flight, they find a woman from the East alone at her brother's home. They are preparing to rape her, but they do not count on her ingenuity. Using all her feminine wiles, she pits them against each other. She promises one of them anything he desires if only he will protect her from the others. He pays one fellow off and shoots the other in a duel. The honorable woman acquiesces to his wishes and marries him. He then tries to win her heart. In time he succeeds and the two come to an agreement. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Other Men's Wives, a play by Walter Hackett, was the source for this early-talkie comedy-melodrama. The scene is a sinister French Inn, where a woman is murdered and a valuable necklace is stolen. Among the predatory types searching for the missing gems is philandering noblewoman Angela Worthington (Leila Hyams), who trades identities with a pretty maidservant (Billie Dove) to gain access to the dead woman's boudoir. Taking advantage of her new aristocratic status, the long-suffering maid gives Angela the scathing treatment she deserves -- but there are unforeseen consequences to this masquerade for both women. Almost as much a surprise as the casting of Leila Hyams as a villainess is the good-guy portrayal by veteran screen heavy Sidney Blackmer. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Based on Porter Emerson Browne's 1920 play of the same name, The Bad Man features Walter Huston as the title character, bold Mexican bandido Pancho Lopez. Holding Americans Ruth Pell (Dorothy Revier) and her wealthy husband Morgan (Sidney Blackmer) for ransom, Lopez takes a liking to Ruth and begins plotting Morgan's demise. As things turn out, however, Lopez's inherent decency suddenly and unexpectedly surfaces -- not soon enough, however, to save him from being mowed down by the Texas Rangers. Previously filmed in 1923, The Bad Man was remade in an oriental setting as West of Shanghai (1937), with Boris Karloff assuming the Walter Huston role, albeit transformed into a Chinese war lord. It was filmed again, under its original title, as a 1941 Wallace Beery vehicle. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Paris served as the talkie debut for French music-hall favorite Irene Bordoni, who though never quite attaining screen stardom remained popular on American radio. Bordoni is cast as Vivienne Rolland, a Parisian chorus girl in love with Massachusetts boy Andrew Sabbot (Jason Robards Sr.) Andrew's snobbish mother Cora (Louise Closser Hale) tries to break up the romance, and it is her scenes which give the film what little life it has. British song-and-dance man Jack Buchanan (remember him in 1953's The Band Wagon?) likewise makes his talking-picture bow as Guy Pennell, the leading man in Vivienne's revue. Four reels of this 10-reel epic were originally lensed in two-color Technicolor. Paris was adapted from the Cole Porter Broadway musical of the same name -- inexplicably minus the Porter songs! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The Clara Bow vehicle Three Week Ends was based on a story by Elinor Glyn, the romance novelist who bestowed the "It Girl" title upon the saucer-eyed Bow. Seeing hero James Gordon (Neil Hamilton) driving around in an expensive, custom-built Hispano Suiza automobile, heroine Gladys O'Brien (Bow) naturally assumes that Gordon is rich. What she doesn't know is that Gordon is a low-paid insurance salesman, who was driving his boss' car while running an errand. Meanwhile, millionaire Turner (Harrison Ford) develops a yearning for Gladys and invites her to a weekend party, for purposes of you-know-what. Capriciously hiding the girl's clothes while she takes a swim, Turner is about to move in for the moment of truth when she is rescued by the timely arrival of Gordon, who'd come to the Turner mansion to make a sale. Not surprisingly, Gordon fails to collect his commission, but he does end up with Gladys as his bride. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Contrary to popular belief, Clara Bow was already Paramount's biggest box-office draw when she starred in this delightful rags-to-riches comedy. But It, from the fertile mind of bizarre best-selling author Elinor Glyn, remains perhaps the quintessential Bow picture. Not that the story of a poor shopgirl falling for her rich employer was anything new (by 1927, Bow could play that role in her sleep), but It came complete with one of the best publicity campaigns in Hollywood history. Glyn herself publicly pointed to Bow as the personification of It, "that quality possessed by some which draws all others with its magnetic force." Paramount made sure that Glyn's lofty description of the word sunk in and even convinced the author to explain It in the film to leading man Antonio Moreno (who, according to Glyn, simply oozed It as well). The lightweight comedy behind all this hoopla centered on little Betty Lou Spence, a vivacious salesgirl invited to dinner at the Ritz by foppish wastrel and self-described "old fruit" "Monty" Montgomery (William Austin in one of those roles later personified by Edward Everett Horton). Betty is not paying attention to her dinner companion, however, but is ogling department store heir Cyrus Waltham (Moreno). He notices her too, and takes the salesgirl on a whirlwind tour of Coney Island. But when Betty is mistakenly assumed to be the unmarried mother of an infant (actually her roommate Molly's), stern Cyrus no longer sees her as proper marriage material. Betty, of course, gets her man in the end and Waltham's snooty girlfriend ("other woman" specialist Jacqueline Gadsden) ends up in the drink. Delivering all the vivacious punch expected of a Bow comedy, It takes time out for a couple of rather poignant scenes. With the hindsight that Brooklyn's own Bow was never fully accepted by Hollywood society despite her stardom, it is touching to watch Betty being ostracized at the snobbish Ritz; and Bow is never more affecting than when she realizes that Moreno is offering diamonds and pearls instead of marriage. Priscilla Bonner, as Bow's drab, single-mother roommate, adds a touch of realism to her brief role, enviously observing Betty's frivolity. If It only added to Bow's brilliant success, the film did little for the intelligent Bonner. To the end of her life, Bonner maintained that accepting featured billing in It lost her any chance of true stardom. A very young Gary Cooper, has a bit as a reporter and director Josef Von Sternberg reputedly took over for Clarence Badger during a brief illness. Despite its rather trite Cinderella plot, It magnificently demonstrates why Bow's guileless flapper came to define an entire decade. It is heartbreaking to realize that her decline had already set in, and Bow's very public troubles and eventual career destruction were lurking right around the corner! ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

This two-fisted Richard Dix vehicle casts the muscular star as virile caterpillar-tractor operator Tom Roberts. It is Roberts' mission to deliver a fragile cargo of dynamite, to be denoted for the purposes of redirecting an anticipated flood. The hero's odyssey is fraught with peril as he burrows his way through a torrential downpour, and at times it seems as if both Roberts and his shipment will "go to pieces" at any moment. Upon reaching his destination, Roberts is nearly engulfed when the dam bursts, but when the sturm und drang has subsided, the audience realizes that it takes more than Mother Nature to wipe out Richard Dix. Mary Brian provides romantic interest, while questionable comic relief is in the hands of black performer Oscar Smith. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

One of the most frustrating items in the list of missing Bebe Daniels comedies, Senorita certainly sounds fascinating. When the life and property of Spanish Californian aristocrat Don Hernandez (Josef Swickard) is threatened by land-grabbers, the old man sends for his grandson to help out. What he doesn't know is that his "grandson" is actually a girl, played of course by Daniels. Rather than break Don Hernandez' heart, Senorita Daniels dons male attire and a Fairbanks-like mustache, and in this guise bests principal heavy Ramon Oliveros (William Powell) in a spectacular sword duel. When the "hero" is revealed to be the heroine, she instantly wins the heart of Oliveros' much-nicer cousin Roger (James Hall). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

George Barr McCutcheon's novel had already been filmed a couple of times (and would be filmed several times more after the advent of talkies). To make it a vehicle for Bebe Daniels, writer Monty Brice threw the story out the window and just kept the basic premise. Polly Brewster (Daniels) is working as a film extra when she gets word from Thomas Hancock (Warner Baxter) that she has inherited a million dollars from a rich uncle. The only problem is that she is supposed to invest the whole sum, taking only 30 dollars a week to live on -- about the same amount she is earning as an extra. But then Ned Brewster (Ford Sterling) shows up to inform her that yet another rich uncle wants to give her five million dollars -- providing she spend the first million she received in just 30 days. Polly makes a mad rush to get rid of the sum, and winds up sinking a good portion of it into a film company. Unfortunately, at the end of the 30 days, it turns out that the uncle with the five million has gone bankrupt. Polly is saved from the poorhouse when Mr. Brent, the production company's director (Andre de Beranger), comes up with a hit film. Polly is in the money again, and she and Hancock get married. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide