Al Bridge Movies

Absent from films since 1938 (except as producer of a brace of RKO Radio features), silent-screen comedy favorite Harold Lloyd returned before the cameras in The Sin of Harold Diddlebock. The project began as a labor of love between Lloyd and the brilliant, innovative producer/writer/director Preston Sturges. Though these two comedy geniuses eventually had a stylistic falling out, resulting in an uneven, spasmodically dreary film, on the whole Harold Diddlebock is well worth having. Sturges cleverly opens the picture with the final reel of Lloyd's silent classic The Freshman(1925), in which the drudge of the college football team makes good and scores the winning touchdown. The story proper begins in the locker room, where football hero Harold Diddlebock (Lloyd, looking three decades younger than his 53 years) is impulsively offered a job by banker J.E. Wagglebury (Raymond Walburn). Taking his place at his new desk and festooning his walls with inspirational homilies, Harold starts to work, supremely confident that he's poised on the brink of bigger things. Twenty-three years pass: In 1946, a weary, stoop-shouldered Harold is still at the same desk at the same job, his dreams of success but a dim memory. Summarily fired by the pompous Wagglebury ("You have not only ceased to go forward, you have gone backward"), Harold collects his final paycheck, cleans out his desk, and bids farewell to office girl Miss Otis (Frances Ramsden), all of whose older sisters had previously been Harold's sweethearts. Wandering aimlessly on the street with his severance pay in hand, Harold is spotted by a dessicated street hustler named Wormy (Jimmy Conlin), who inveigles the newly fired clerk to join him at a nearby bar. Informed that Harold has never taken a drink in his life, the bartender (Edgar Kennedy) lights up and declares, "Sir, you rouse the artist in me!" With great ceremonial flourish, the bartender concocts a potent beverage called the Diddlebock. Harold takes one sip of the brew, lets out a yell, and immediately loses all the inhibitions that have kept him from advancing himself in the past two decades. With Wormy in tow, Harold goes on a wild spending and carousing spree, totally losing track of an entire day-and-a-half.

At the end of his revelry, the hung-over Harold is awakened by his sister (Margaret Hamilton), who informs him that he's bought a garish new wardrobe, a ten-gallon hat, and goodness knows what else. He soon finds out what else when he ventures into the street and is informed that he's bought a horse-drawn cab (with driver!) -- and a circus, complete with hungry lions. Quickly formulating a plan to get rid of the circus at a substantial profit, Harold decides to elicit bids from the town's various bankers, bringing Jackie the Lion along with him so that the bank guards won't stop him at the door. All of this leads to a wild recreation of Lloyd's skyscraper-teetering gags from his silent days, a noisy episode at the local jail, and a romantic tête-à-tête with Miss Otis, who reveals at the very end how Harold really spent his "missing" Wednesday! Though it tested well upon its first release, Sin of Harold Diddlebock was abruptly withdrawn from circulation by its co-producer Howard R. Hughes, who spent four years reediting and sometimes reshooting the film before finally releasing it through RKO as Mad Wednesday. Both this version and the original Sin of Harold Diddlebock still exist; while the earlier version is undeniably richer in comic invention and characterization, the shortened Mad Wednesday works better in front of an audience. Neither version completely fulfills the potential of its premise, however. Though not to be missed, this final Harold Lloyd vehicle pales in comparison with his vintage silent comedies. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The moodily evocative docudrama T-Men stars Dennis O'Keefe as Dennis O'Brien, a treasury agent determined to bring a counterfeiting ring to justice. O'Brien and his partner Tony Genaro (Alfred Ryder) go undercover to gain the confidence of the ruthless Detroit mob responsible for the phony money. The plot, compelling though it is, takes second place to the film's stylish set pieces, superbly directed by Anthony Mann and brilliantly photographed by John Alton. Among the film's most famous moments is the scene in which two-bit hood Wallace Ford is bumped off in a steam bath by sadistic hood Charles McGraw, not to mention the harrowing vignette wherein O'Keefe, posing as a crook, must stand by silently as his partner Ryder is murdered. One of the finest examples of the film noir form, T-Men proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that a film didn't need to have a lush budget, brilliant Technicolor and Clark Gable to score a hit with postwar moviegoers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A semi-sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan, Columbia's Down to Earth is a camp- and kitsch-lover's delight. More beautiful than ever, Rita Hayworth stars as Terpsichore, the Goddess of Dance. From her perch Up Above, Terpsichore discovers that Broadway producer Danny Miller (Larry Parks) intends to put together a musical satire, lampooning herself and her fellow Greek Gods. Eliciting the aid of Heavenly emissary Mr. Jordan (Roland Culver, taking over from the earlier film's Claude Rains), Terpsichore descends to Earth in human form, landing a role in Miller's play. Through her bewitching influence, Miller agrees to abandon his plans for a satire, transforming his production into a portentiously serious "work of art"-which lays a large and noxious egg with the opening-night crowd. Somehow, our ethereal heroine manages to set things right, but there's still one nagging problem: Will she, a goddess, ever be permitted to fall in love with a mere mortal like Miller? Repeating their Here Comes Mr. Jordan roles, James Gleason and Edward Everett Horton appear respectively as the eternally flustered Max Corkle (formerly a fight promoter, now a theatrical agent) and the pompous, rule-bound Heavenly messenger #7013. Silly but immensely entertaining, Down to Earth was remade as the sillier but decidedly less entertaining Xanadu in 1980. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A dude ranch, unemployed cowhands, modern-day bank robbers, and music are the main ingredients in this, Gene Autry's swan song for Republic Pictures, lovingly restored by UCLA and Gene Autry Entertainment in 2001. Swindled out of their savings, Gene and the Cass County Boys mistakenly get mixed up in a bank robbery. The local police chief (James Flavin) let them go, however, hoping the hicks will lead him to the stolen 100,000 dollars. And so they do, right to a dude ranch in the none-too-quiet town of Serenity. With Sterling Holloway supplying the comic relief as a vacationing hypochondriac, Gene Autry and the Cass County Boys perform Autry's own "The Merry-Go-Roundup" and "Good Old-Fashioned Hoedown"; "Goin' Back to Texas" by Carson J. Robison; and "You're the Moment of a Lifetime" by Sergio de Karlo and Kay Charles (in both Spanish and English). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

A kind-hearted Native American adopts a homeless, orphaned Chinese boy who has only a horse to his name. This touching melodrama chronicles the years they spend together. The boy's new parents mate his horse with their mare and the resulting filly proves to be fast. They nearly lose the filly, but manage to get her out of the clutches of a dishonest horse manager. They then breed her. On the day she foals, they find oil upon the land and they name the colt "Black Gold." Together father and adopted son raise the horse with the hope of entering it in the Kentucky Derby. Unfortunately, by this time, the father is an old man and just before he dies, he makes the boy promise to run the horse in the Big Race. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A loose remake of 1941's The Gay Falcon, The Falcon's Alibi is one of the better entries in RKO's "Falcon" series, and one of the few that can stand on its own merits as a "film noir." This time, amateur detective Tom Lawrence (Tom Conway), aka the Falcon, is hired by a wealthy woman's secretary to protect the lady's precious jewels. Nevertheless, the thief still manages to get away with them, which puts Lawrence hot on his trail. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This gentle, tuneful western is one of cowboy crooner Roy Rogers' best and most successful films; it is also his personal favorite. The fanciful tale tells how Rogers obtained his magnificent horse Trigger and begins with horse trader Rogers as he prepares to breed his best mare with his best friend's glorious Palomino stallion. Trouble comes in the form of a villainous gambler who has similar plans for his own mare. He attempts to rustle the stud, but the attempt fails, the stallion escapes and breeds with Roger's mare. Angrily, the gambler shows up and shoots the beautiful horse, leaving Rogers to shoulder the blame. Fortunately, Roy and his impregnated mare flee. Later she gives birth to Trigger who helps Rogers get revenge after he grows up. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

This is director Frank Capra's classic bittersweet comedy/drama about George Bailey (James Stewart), the eternally-in-debt guiding force of a bank in the typical American small town of Bedford Falls. As the film opens, it's Christmas Eve, 1946, and George, who has long considered himself a failure, faces financial ruin and arrest and is seriously contemplating suicide. High above Bedford Falls, two celestial voices discuss Bailey's dilemma and decide to send down eternally bumbling angel Clarence Oddbody (Henry Travers), who after 200 years has yet to earn his wings, to help George out. But first, Clarence is given a crash course on George's life, and the multitude of selfless acts he has performed: rescuing his younger brother from drowning, losing the hearing in his left ear in the process; enduring a beating rather than allow a grieving druggist (H.B. Warner) to deliver poison by mistake to an ailing child; foregoing college and a long-planned trip to Europe to keep the Bailey Building and Loan from letting its Depression-era customers down; and, most important, preventing town despot Potter (Lionel Barrymore) from taking over Bedford Mills and reducing its inhabitants to penury. Along the way, George has married his childhood sweetheart Mary (Donna Reed), who has stuck by him through thick and thin. But even the love of Mary and his children are insufficient when George, faced with an $8000 shortage in his books, becomes a likely candidate for prison thanks to the vengeful Potter. Bitterly, George declares that he wishes that he had never been born, and Clarence, hoping to teach George a lesson, shows him how different life would have been had he in fact never been born. After a nightmarish odyssey through a George Bailey-less Bedford Falls (now a glorified slum called Potterville), wherein none of his friends or family recognize him, George is made to realize how many lives he has touched, and helped, through his existence; and, just as Clarence had planned, George awakens to the fact that, despite all its deprivations, he has truly had a wonderful life. Capra's first production through his newly-formed Liberty Films, It's a Wonderful Life lost money in its original run, when it was percieved as a fairly downbeat view of small-town life. Only after it lapsed into the public domain in 1973 and became a Christmastime TV perennial did it don the mantle of a holiday classic. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Sidney Toler seems listless and barely awake throughout the intrigues of the Monogram "Charlie Chan" opus Shadows over Chinatown. This time out, Charlie Chan (Sidney Toler) and his erstwhile assistants, son Jimmy (Victor Sen Yung) and chauffeur Birmingham (Mantan Moreland), investigate a clever insurance scam. The crooks are using a series of brutal "torso murders" to rip off an insurance company by claiming that the long-missing Mary Conover (Tanis Chandler) is a victim of the unknown murderer. Actually, Mary is in hiding from the insurance hucksters themselves, forcing Chan to race against time (if "race" is the correct word) to save the girl from certain doom. Perennial movie drunk Jack Norton has all the film's best lines as a garrulous boozer who isn't quite what he seems. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The first "Road" picture in three years (the last was The Road to Morocco), Road to Utopia is set during the Alaskan gold rush. Bob Hope and Bing Crosby play a pair of third-rate San Francisco entertainers, Chester Hooton and Duke Johnson, who are obliged to skip town in a hurry. They book passage on a ship to Alaska, where they run afoul of escaped murderers Sperry (Robert H. Barrat) and McGurk (Nestor Paiva). Through a fluke, Chester and Duke overpower the killers, then get off the ship in Skagway disguised as Sperry and McGurk so that they themselves can evade the authorities. The boys can't understand why everyone is so afraid of them, nor why saloon owner Ace Larson (Douglas Dumbrille) and Larson's moll Kate (Hillary Brooke) are so chummy. It turns out that Sperry and McGurk had stolen a deed to a valuable gold mine before escaping to Alaska. Sal Van Hoyden (Dorothy Lamour) is the rightful owner of that deed, thus she too shows up in Skagway, hoping to extract the document from Chester and Duke. Whenever the plot threatens to become too difficult to follow, narrator Robert Benchley shows up to explain things -- which of course only adds to the confusion. At any rate, the whole affair ends up with Chester, Duke, and Sal running through the snowy wastes, with the villains in hot pursuit. Duke nobly stays behind to fight off the bad guys himself, handing the deed to Chester and Sal and wishing them Godspeed. Flash-forward to 1945: Chester and Sal, both old and wealthy, are reunited with their equally aged pal Duke, who wasn't killed after all. Sal tells Duke that Chester has been a wonderful husband and father. Yes, father...and wait till you see who plays their child ("We adopted him!"). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A granddaughter's world begins to crumble when allegations of her grandfather say that he is a criminal. ~ All Movie Guide

Columbia Pictures "borrowed" a few pages from Damon Runyon when crafting this entry in the Durango Kid B-Western series. When an elderly desert rat realizes that the granddaughter he has never seen is due to arrive in Long Bend, the downtrodden old sod is too ashamed to admit that the money spent sending her through college came not from a rich gold mine but from panhandling at the saloon owned by Lucky Thorpe (Alan Bridge). The latter sees a welcome chance to whitewash stolen gold and arranges for Grubstake -- now known under his real name of Horace Higginbottom -- to suddenly strike it rich. Enter Texas Ranger Kim Allen (Charles Starrett), who dons the disguise of the Durango Kid to get the goods on Lucky and his corpulent chief henchman Nevada (Charles King). After clearing up a minor misunderstanding with good friend Tex Harding, the Kid is to hunt down the nasty saloon owner and his hired hands. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Future film producer Ross Hunter heads the cast of Columbia's A Guy, a Gal and a Pal. Hunter is the "guy", serviceman Jimmy Jones; the "gal" is Jimmy's sweetheart Helen Carter (Lynn Merrick), while the "pal" is the couple's self-appointed chaperone, 10-year-old Butch (Ted Donaldson). Helen's dilemma: should she marry Jimmy, or settle for financial security in the form of civilian Granville Breckinridge (George Meeker)? A clue to her decision: this is a Hollywood movie, and guys with names like Granville Breckinridge never get the girl in Hollywood movies. A Guy, a Gal and a Pal was directed by Oscar Boetticher Jr., who like Ross Hunter went on to bigger and better things-but only after changing his billing to Budd Boetticher. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide