Diane Brewster Movies

There may be blood in the streets when the chief of staff of the "Second Force", a paramilitary vigilante group ostensibly set up to fight crime, is murdered. Despite his distaste for the group's racist rantings, Ironside dedicates himself to solving the man's murder before the vigilantes begin exacting vengeance against their supposed enemies. In the course of events, the Chief uncovers the group's true motives--and they are not pure in any way, shape or form. TV talk show host Les Crane appears as himself. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Diane Brewster, best remembered as schoolteacher "Miss Canfield" on Leave It to Beaver, makes her final acting appearance in this episode as Bill's former hometown sweetheart Freddie. Arriving from Terre Haute to pay Bill (Brian Keith) a visit, Freddie becomes enchanted by youngsters Buffy (Anissa Jones), Jody (Johnnie Whitaker) and Cissy (Kathy Garver)--which unfortunately serves only to remind her that she and her husband have never had any children of their own. The subsequent crisis arising from this situaiton is solved in a manner that is both touching and credible (qualities often missing from TV sitcoms of the mid-1960s). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

After discovering that her lover Paul Clements (Ed Nelson) is married, Ruth Norton (Pamela Tiffin) angrily jumps into her car and speeds away--striking down a pedestrian in the process. The victim turns out to be fugitive from justice Richard Kimble (David Janssen), whom the distraught Ruth takes to her home to recover from his injuries. In his delirium, Kimble recalls the events leading up to the murder of his wife Helen (Diane Brewster) by the elusive One-Armed Man (Bill Raisch)--and also unwittingly reveals that he had plenty of motive to commit the murder himself. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This undistinguished murder muddle by director Michael Curtis involves an artist and his alcoholic psychologically disturbed wife -- who disappears one day. John Hamilton (Alan Ladd) has retreated to the New England countryside to pursue a potential career as an artist, but his wife Linda (Carolyn Jones) wants to go back to New York. She is observed as being both drunk and a little strange, while John is clearly the anchor in the relationship. When Linda disappears, John is immediately suspected of doing away with his troublesome wife, and so a net of suspicion and circumstantial evidence closes in ever-tightening circles around him. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Something of an urbanized, upscale version of Peyton Place, Vincent Sherman's
The Young Philadelphians is a glossy adaptation of Richard Powell's bestselling novel
The Philadelphians that revels in melodrama. The film opens strongly, with a lengthy 1924 prologue. Socialite Kate Lawrence (Diane Brewster) jilts impoverished lover Mike Flannagan (Brian Keith) in favor of wealthy William Lawrence (Adam West). On their wedding night, William drunkenly announces that he's impotent and commits suicide (this scene should fascinate Batman fans). Returning to Mike, Kate has a child by him, Tony. The boy grows up amid an atmosphere of dire poverty, which imparts him with a relentless drive for success. Flash forward to 1952: the out-of-wedlock kid, Tony, has grown up (now played by Paul Newman) and still doesn't know that he was an illegitimate child. Tony attends Princeton Law School, and falls in love with rich girl Joan Dickinson (Barbara Rush). Via the doings of Joan's father, wealthy Gilbert Dickinson (John Williams), Tony ends up taking a cushy job in a law office, at the expense of the relationship. The heartbroken Joan marries Carter Henley (Fred Eisley) on the rebound, who is conveniently killed in Korea. Tony then begins spending a prodigious amount of time with Carol Wharton (Alexis Smith), wife of attorney John Wharton (Otto Kruger), so that she will persuade John to find Tony a better job. Soon it's Tony's turn to fight in Korea; when he returns, the opportunity arises for Tony to redeem himself for his past misdeeds. Watch for Richard "Mel Cooley" Deacon in a bit as a hostile witness. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the psychological WW2 drama Torpedo Run, Glenn Ford plays submarine commander Barney Doyle, who is obsessed with sinking a particular Japanese aircraft carrier. Several months earlier, the carrier had escaped destruction by shielding itself with a POW transport ship, which was sunk by Doyle's torpedoes. The sunken transport had been carrying Doyle's wife and daughter, captured in the Philippines. This tragically unavoidable incident has transformed Doyle into a modern Ahab, mercilessly driving the men under him towards the single goal of blowing the hated enemy aircraft carrier out of the seas. Finally, Doyle achieves his goal, and all is forgiven between himself and his crew, especially his second-in-command Archer Sloan ($Ernest Borgnine). Unfortunately, Doyle's sub was irreparably damaged in the attack, making it necessary for him to attempt an escape. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Bret (James Garner) is among the participants when the lovely but larcenous Samantha Crawford (Diane Brewster) organizes a big, no-limit poker game. Before long, Bret is being accused of cheating, and of masterminded a robbery in which the players are cleaned out. Naturally, Samantha has vanished, forcing Bret to venture into Indian territory to bring her back and clear his name. One of the minor pleasures of this episode is the verbal give-and-take between Bret and Samantha, including several pointed comments about marriage. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Created by Roy Huggins and debuting September 22, 1957 on ABC, the weekly, hour-long Maverick started out as a relatively straightforward western series with a slight twist: The main characters were professional gamblers rather than lawmen or gunslingers. James Garner and Jack Kelly starred respectively as Bret and Bart, the Maverick brothers, who traveled throughout the west in search of poker games and other such lucrative pursuits. Though both of the Mavericks were fairly adept at fisticuffs, they tended to avoid violence and confrontation (a good thing too, since neither brother could by any stretch of the imagination be described as a "fast gun"), preferring to use their wits and the words to wriggle out of jams--and, conversely, to win over the pretty girls they met along the way. Originally, the episodes were evenly divided between the two brothers, with Bret or Bart alternately handling the plotlines, sometimes teaming up when the going got rough. By the end of the first season, however, James Garner had emerged as the more popular of the two stars--and as a bonus, Garner was possessed of a deft comic touch that such scriptwriters as Marion Hargrove and such directors as Douglas Heyes were quick to capitalize upon. As a result, the stories became more humorous and satirical in nature, with star, writers and directors unafraid to emphasize the more cowardly and larcenous aspects of Bret Maverick's character. One of the series' most endearing motifs was Bret's habit of relying upon the pearls of wisdom passed down to him by his grey-haired "Pappy"--who, when he finally appeared on camera, was portrayed by a heavily made up James Garner. By season three, the pattern of Maverick was fairly well set, with Jack Kelly handling the more serious and action-oriented episodes (which became fewer and farther between) and Garner doing the funny stuff. In keeping with the tongue-in-cheek nature of the series, the writers had a field day spoofing such rival western shows as Gunsmoke and Bonanza, and even such non-westerns as Dragnet. In addition, there were the occasional westernized adaptations of "the classics", notably Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet and Richard Brinsley Sheridan's The Rivals. After James Garner left the series over a contract dispute in 1960, Maverick's home studio Warner Bros. tried out a brace of potential replacements. During season four, future "James Bond" Roger Moore was introduced as Bret and Bart's British cousin Beau Maverick; and later that same season, Robert Colbert showed up as the hitherto unrevealed third Maverick brother, Brent. But by the time the series entered its fifth and final season, the only Maverick on screen was old reliable Bart, who starred in the handful of episodes that were filmed to fill out what had essentially become a portfolio of reruns from the James Garner days. The final episode of Maverick was telecast on July 8, 1962; however, the property would be revived on TV in 1979 as Young Maverick, with Charles Frank playing cousin Ben Maverick, and in 1981 as Bret Maverick, with James Garner reviving his original role. And in 1994, Garner shared billing with Mel Gibson and Jodie Foster in a delightful theatrical-feature version of Maverick, which nostalgically showcased a number of familiar western actors in cameo roles. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Producer Howard W. Koch's impoverished Bel-Air company lensed this quasi-horror film somewhere in California's Death Valley. Affecting a none-too-convincing British accent Mark Dana stars as Captain Storm, heading a colonial escort to a lonely archeological dig in Egypt in 1902. Along the way, the party, which includes the American wife (Diane Brewster) of the chief archeologist (George N. Neise), encounters a mysterious girl, Simira (Ziva Shapir aka Ziva Rodann, "Miss Israel of 1957), who warns them not to mess with the dead. They do anyway, of course, drawing the ire of the Gods. One by one, the scientists are decimated by Simira's brother Numar (Alvaro Guillot), who is the reincarnation of the tomb keeper and grows older by the minute. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Though Richard Eyer and Philip Abbott get top billing, the real star of The Invisible Boy is Robby the Robot of Forbidden Planet fame. Based on a short story by Edmund Cooper (which, incidentally, contained no robots!), the film finds electronics genius Dr. Merrinoe (Abbott) developing a huge talking computer. While Merrinoe is the master of his laboratory, he has trouble controlling his rambunctious son Timmie (Eyer). When the doctor takes Timmie to the lab with him, hoping to impress his son with the importance of his work, Timmie is interested only in reassembling a robot left behind by Merrinoe's predecessor. Though the robot has been programmed not to bring harm to human beings, the poor clunking creature falls under the spell of Merrinoe's "super computer," which has developed a demonic mind of its own. The computer arranges to launch a rocket, with the robot at the controls, that will enable it to control the earth's orbit. But Timmie, who has stowed away on board the rocket, is able to bring the robot to its "senses" and save the day. Impressive on a technical level, The Invisible Boy is relentlessly silly storywise, which of course adds to the enjoyment. Best line: "Timmie, if you don't bring that rocketship back this instant, you'll get the spanking of your life!" ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Shortly before signing on for TV's The Rifleman, Johnny Crawford played the juvenile lead in Courage of Black Beauty. Feeling alienated from his rancher father John Bryant,Crawford invests all his affections in his pet foal. Through his love for the horse--who of course grows up to become Black Beauty--Crawford learns to better appreciate his own lot in life. For a while, it looks as though the horse will be destroyed, but when this doesn't happen, Crawford draws even closer to his dad. No screen credit is afforded Anna Sewell, author of the original Black Beauty. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Joel McCrea stars in this leisurely paced Western from Allied Artists (formerly Monogram) originally released in Cinemascope. Having lost his wife in childbirth en route to California, Dr. John Brighton (McCrea) builds a new home for himself and his baby daughter in an Oklahoma backwater town, lodging with kindhearted Mrs. Fitzgerald (Esther Dale). As the town grows up around him, Brighton becomes a well-respected local medico, championing the rights of the area's Indian population when nasty rancher Cass Dobie attempts to buy them out cheap. Unbeknownst to the townspeople, Dobie has discovered oil on the land belonging to Charlie Smith (Michael Pate), whose beautiful daughter, Maria (Gloria Talbott), is working as little Louise Brighton's (Laurie Mitchell) nursemaid. When Charlie is forced to kill Cass' brother, Mel (Douglas Dick), in self-defense, Cass vows revenge. Aided by female rancher Anne Barnes (Barbara Hale), Brighton learns about the discovery of oil and there is a final confrontation on main street. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide