Nancy Brinckman Movies
- 1947
Slave Girl is the sort of fare that the Universal higher-ups used to dismiss as "tits and sand;" nonetheless, this kind of entertainment (along with the equally lowbrow Abbott and Costello and Ma and Pa Kettle pictures) paid the bills for the studio's more ponderous projects. The slave girl of the title is Yvonne DeCarlo, one of many in servitude to a 19th century Tripoli potentate (Albert Dekker). Two-fisted American diplomat George Brent, accompanied by brawling sailors Broderick Crawford and Andy Devine, has been sent by his government to negotiate the release of hostages captured by the potentate. When negotiations break down, DeCarlo agrees to help Brent free the prisoners through more direct means, provided he takes her away with him. If Slave Girl was supposed to have been taken with a straight face, Universal would never have included brief cutaways to a wisecracking camel (!), whose name is "Humpy" and whose voice is provided by Buddy Hackett. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Yvonne De Carlo, George Brent, (more)
Filmed (in 16 mm) at Big Bear Lake, CA, and directed by stuntmen Richard Talmadge and Harvey Parry, this minor comedy-drama featured hayseed second banana Britt Wood and newcomer John Day (aka John Daheim) as a couple of travelers stranded at a mountain resort. After rescuing a group of girls from a runaway carriage, Steve (Day) and Speedy (Wood) are hired as drivers by Tom Barton (Edward Kane), the owner of the Grey Mountain Lodge. The place, however, is soon overrun by a gang of payroll robbers, the leader of whom, Gerald (Eddie Parker), is Tom's nephew. The police are called when a necklace is reported stolen during a party and Officer Kelsey (Fred Kelsey) suspects Tom to be the culprit. The real thief, of course, is Gerald, who attempts to flee in the gang's airplane. Happily, Steve and Speedy are in hot pursuit in the lodge's food delivery truck and the gang is rounded up. Detour to Danger was the third and final of three low-budget films produced by Jack Seaman and Richard Talmadge and released on states' rights. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Day, Nancy Brinckman, (more)
- 1946
This initial entry in Monogram's Bowery Boys series is also the second remake of the 1933 film He Couldn't Take It (the original script was by no less than Dore Schary, billed for reasons best known to himself as Jeb Schary). Leo Gorcey stars as Slip Mahoney, a pugnacious type whose volatile temper loses him one job after another. Slip's sister Mary (Pamela Blake), secretary to construction executive Sayers (John Eldredge), persuades her boss to use his influence to get Slip a job as a process server. After successfully repossessing a car belonging to nightclub thrush Jeannette (Claudia Drake), Slip and his fellow "skip tracer" Sach Jones (Huntz Hall) endeavor to serve a subpoena to homicidal gangster Patsy Clark (Mike Mazurki). Though the boys get quite a going over from the "playful" Patsy, they not only successfully complete their mission, but also prove that the supposedly respectable Sayers is a criminal mastermind. Essentially a vehicle for Leo Gorcey, Live Wires pushes the rest of the Bowery Boys (Bobby Jordan, Billy Benedict et. al.) into the background; it wasn't until the second series entry In Fast Company that the former "East Side Kids" truly became a team again. Bernard Gorcey, who later played sweet-shop owner Louie Dumbrowski, is seen herein as a small-time gambler. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, (more)
- 1946
Crooked newspaper columnist Jeff Mann (James Cardwell), who apparently was blackmailing half the criminal gangs in the city, is murdered in his own office, and a police officer is killed the same night in the alley outside the newspaper's building -- and the prime suspect is the Shadow, the mysterious masked adventurer with the ability to cloud men's minds so they can't see him. The Shadow is, in reality, millionaire playboy and dilettante criminologist Lamont Cranston (Kane Richmond), who is about to get married to Margo Lane (Barbara Read); he's vowed to give up being the Shadow, but now he has to investigate this case to clear himself, much to Margo's dismay. Police Inspector Cardona (Joseph Crehan) wants to prove the Shadow committed the murders, and Mann's editor Brad Thomas (Robert Shayne) is calling for the Shadow's blood in his newspaper's editorial pages. This leaves Cranston with his hands full, especially after Margo -- anxious to get him to the altar -- tries to solve the case herself, at one point even masquerading as the Shadow. Between keeping her out of his way and staying ahead of the real culprit, the police, and the gangs that Mann was blackmailing, Cranston and his valet Shrevie (George Chandler) just about get themselves killed a couple of times, amid a string of comedic and mysterious twists that lead right back to the murder scene for the identity of the killer. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Kane Richmond, George Chandler, (more)
- 1945
The second of two "East Side Kids" entries with horse-racing backgrounds (the first was That Gang of Mine), Mr. Muggs Rides Again stars Leo Gorcey in the title role. Thanks to the chicanery of crooked gamblers, Muggs (Leo Gorcey), an honest jockey, is banished from the track. But Muggs is less concerned about his own fate than he is over the plight of horse farm owner Ma Brown (Minerva Urecal), who is facing foreclosure. While helping Muggs take up a collection on behalf of Ma, her niece Elsie (Nancy Brinkman), falls in love with Gaby (Gabriel Dell), one of the gamblers. At Elsie's request, Gaby agrees to tell the racing commission that Muggs is innocent of the charges levelled against him. The other gamblers try to silence Gaby permanently, and also dope Ma Brown's horses, but Muggs and the rest of the East Side Kids (Huntz Hall, Billy Benedict et. al.) come to the resuce. The film's best scene, a visit to a sideshow fortune-teller, has absolutely nothing to do with the plot, but who cares? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, (more)
- 1944
Paramount Pictures did their patriotic duty with this World War II era musical, with a number of the studio's biggest stars making cameo appearances. Tony West (George Raft), his sister Kitty (Grace McDonald), and their father Nick (Charles Grapewin) tour together as The Three Wests, a failing act just scraping by in the latter days of vaudeville. With job opportunities drying up on the East Coast, Tony persuades the family to take their chances in California, and for once luck is with him. Not long after arriving in Hollywood, Tony is hired as a chorus boy on a musical starring Latin bombshell Vera Zorina (Gloria Vance). Cocky Tony offers Vera some much-needed advice on her dancing. She's intrigued by his confidence, and a romance blooms; soon, the two marry. Tony becomes a major star as Vera's on and off screen dancing partner, but when World War II breaks out, Tony's conscience gets the better of him. Tony is 4-F because of a bad knee, but he's ashamed to admit this, even to Vera, who thinks he's avoiding the service out of cowardice. Vera eventually gives Tony his walking papers, and desperate to show his support of our troops, Tony organizes an all-star U.S.O. revue bringing much needed entertainment to America's fighting men overseas. Follow the Boys also features guest shots by Marlene Dietrich, W.C. Fields (demonstrating trick billiard shots), Orson Welles (doing his magic act), Dinah Shore, The Andrews Sisters, Jeanette MacDonald, Sophie Tucker, Randolph Scott, Lon Chaney Jr., and Maria Montez, among many others. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George Raft, Vera Zorina, (more)
- 1943
Fall In was the fourth of Hal Roach's 1940s comedies revolving around the misadventures of Doubleday, an army recruit blessed--or cursed--with a photographic memory. This time, Doubleday (William Tracy) and his pal Sgt. Ames (Joe Sawyer) crash a fancy fund-raising dinner. They redeem themselves by capturing a Nazi spy, who poses as a super-patriot named Arnold Benedict (!) A zany sequence at a gambling table and a wild climactic free-for-all highlight this above-average entry. A Hal Roach "Streamliner" designed for the lower half of double bills, Fall In clocked in at a swift 48 minutes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- William Tracy, Joe Sawyer, (more)
