Wells Root Movies

Hanley (Rick Jason) and his men are stranded in the middle of enemy territory when they are refused transportation by arrogant British commando Major Cole-Hughes (Michael Evans). Thus, it is no small surprise to Hanley when, later on, Cole-Hughes demands that Hanley and Kirby (Jack Hogan) accompany him on a mission to seek out and destroy a German V-2 launching site. The swaggering, bombastic Cole-Hughes provides a fascinating contrast to the taciturn, no-nonsense Hanley--but will the two men be able to smother their mutual animosity for the Greater Good? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Based on the novel I Cover the Waterfront, this uninspired crime melodrama stars Ron Foster as Skip Hanlon, a reporter who inadvertently gets involved in tracking down a criminal operation on the waterfront. Hanlon falls in love with Janey Fowler (Merry Anders) whose father is a sea captain doing some questionable work for the Mafia. When one of the mafiosi gets too hot to stay in the U.S., the elder Fowler (Barry Kelley) ships them out of the country. After the reporter decides to blow the whistle on the sea captain, circumstances lead him closer to danger and farther from the object of his affection. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In an episode originally filmed for Maverick's third season--and originally intended as the fourth-season opener--Bret and Bart Maverick (James Garner, Jack Kelly) inherit a stagecoach line from their late Uncle Micah. Unfortunately, they have also inherited Micah's mountainous debts--and to make matters worse, the coach line is being systematically plundered by flamboyant highwayman Ramsey Plum (a pre-Beverly Hillbillies Buddy Ebsen). This episode marks the final series appearance of James Garner as Bret Maverick, though he would return to the role for a 1981 TV revival of Maverick, as well as a 1994 theatrical feature. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this South Seas adventure, a sea captain teams up with lovely island princess help her vanquish the brutal smugglers who are forcing her people to dive for pearls. There are French colonialists on the island and a judge is there to ensure justice. Unfortunately, he is crooked, and after the smugglers are captured he gives them a choice: they can help him retrieve a sunken treasure or they can go to prison. They choose the former, but afterward, they double-cross the judge. Fortunately, the sea captain is still around to see that justice is served. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Insane doctor H.L. Orr (Peter Brocco) is convinced that he can control Superman (George Reeves) with a mind-altering drug. Before long, Orr and his henchman Rausch (Larry Blake) have kidnapped Lois Lane (Phyllis Coates) and Jimmy Olsen (Jack Larson) to lure Superman into a trap. Once he is "captured", the Man of Steel appears to be totally at the mercy of Orr's demon drug! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Mistaken identity and underhanded dealings set the stage for this adventure story based on Anthony Hope's classic novel. Rudolph Rassendyll (Stewart Granger) is a British tourist visiting the nation of Ruritania in the Balkans. A number of people comment upon Rassendyll's remarkable resemblance to Prince Rudolph, who in a matter of days is to be crowned the nation's new king, and the prince's staff even arranges a meeting between the two men. But Rudolph's devious brother believes it is he who should be the king, and he arranges for Prince Rudolph to be poisoned the night before his coronation. Desperate, Rudolph's minders beg Rassendyll to participate in the ceremony in Rudolph's place so that the usurper cannot take the throne. Rassendyll agrees, and the ceremony goes off without a hitch, but when the brother's men discover this subterfuge, they imprison the real Prince as they threaten to reveal the secret of the new "king." Rassendyll's dilemma is compounded when he finds himself falling in love with Princess Flavia (Deborah Kerr), Rudolph's intended. This was the fourth screen adaptation of The Prisoner of Zenda; a fifth, which focused on the tale's comic possibilities, starred Peter Sellers and was released in 1979. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

In this drama set at the end of WW I, Sgt. Jocko Wilson leaves England to return to Australia. He brings with him, two Belgian orphans whom he will raise as his own. He later sends the girl to boarding school while his son becomes the Australian lightweight boxing champion (the Sgt. himself was a former boxer). He uses his considerable prize money to buy an estate and then turns it into a hotel. Years pass and suddenly a singer whom Jocko loved and left in England reappears. Though she is quite wealthy, she is still angry at being jilted. she ends up winning the hotel in a card game. When WW II erupts, she and Jocko renew their love. Meanwhile the brother and sister discover that they are not related and are free to act on the mutual attraction they had been fighting for so long. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Some 25 years before his "discovery" in In Cold Blood, 9-year-old Bobby (later Robert) Blake made his feature-film starring debut in MGM's Mokey. When his widowed father Herb (Dan Dailey Jr.) remarries, little Mokey Delano (Blake) has a lot of trouble getting accustomed to his stepmother Anthea (Donna Reed). Though Andrea is gentle and loving, Mokey resents her presence, and does everything he can to make her life miserable. Only when he's on the verge of being packed off to reform school does Mokey realize how wrong he's been. A rare directorial effort by screenwriter Wells Root, Mokey features not only Bobby Blake but two of his "Our Gang" series costars, Cordell Hickman and Billy Thomas, the latter better known as "Buckwheat". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Lionel Barrymore and Ronald Reagan star, respectively, as grandfather Henry Jones and grandson Gil Jones, two proprietors of a Mexican ranch, in The Bad Man. Gil is overjoyed to discover that his childhood sweetheart, Lucia (Laraine Day) has returned to town, but feels slightly dismayed by her marriage to Morgan Pell (Tom Conway), a Manhattan businessman. Later that day, Mexican outlaw Pancho Lopez (Wallace Beery rides into town and causes trouble for the good folks by rustling all of their cattle and injuring Gil. Meanwhile, Morgan admits to Lucia that he's worried about the possibility of her still being in love with Gil, but she reassures him that this isn't the case, and reminds him of her undying commitment to their marriage. One month later, Mr. Hardy (Henry Travers, a banker, arrives at the ranch, and acts suspiciously by revealing his overeagerness to foreclose. In a desperate move, Henry makes a feeble attempt to stave off Hardy's actions by trying to convince Gil to marry Hardy's daughter, Angela (Nydia Westman). Meanwhile, "Red" Giddings (Chill Wills secretly pines for Angela, who is the great love of his life.
Morgan then crops up and offers $20,000 for the ranch, alerting Henry to an ulterior motive -- he gets Morgan and Hardy to confess their suspicion of oil on the property. Gil hastily signs the deed that gives the ranch over to Morgan. Just when matters cannot seem to get any worse, Lopez turns up once again and takes everyone hostage, except for Gil, who has trekked off to the barn. Lopez makes none-too-subtle advances to Lucia and indicates his warm feelings toward Henry, as well as his innate dislike of Morgan and Hardy. When Henry decides to play off of this dislike by informing Lopez of both men's attempts to wrangle the ranch away from him, a bidding war ensues, and Lopez craftily attempts to determine how much ransom he can get for his captives. Gil then draws a gun on him, but is overcome by Lopez's men; Lopez prepares to hang Gil, but suddenly recognizes Gil as the same man who saved his life several years earlier. He then works toward fixing the financial problems that are plaguing the Joneses, and the romantic problems that are plaguing Gil, Lucia, Red and Angela. Based on a war-horse stage play by Porter Emerson Browne, The Bad Man had been previously filmed in 1923 and 1930; Boris Karloff starred as a Chinese warlord in a thinly disguised 1937 reworking of The Bad Man, titled West of Shanghai. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

MGM had a tendency to overglamorize the sort of rough-hewn film fare that Warner Bros. offered to its public without adornments. Such was the case of Flight Command. Instead of Warners' streetwise James Cagney, the MGM film stars pretty-boy Robert Taylor as the obligatory hotshot cadet who chafes at the authority and discipline of a naval flight squadron. While Warners might have done without a romantic subplot, MGM contrives to have Taylor fall for the wife (Ruth Hussey) of squad commander Walter Pidgeon. And whereas Warners would have told this story compactly in 90 minutes, MGM lolls around for nearly two hours before Taylor's anticipated redemption and "make good" scene. MGM newcomer Red Skelton shows up in Flight Command for comedy relief, which turns out to be neither. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this interesting drama, a highly respected straight-arrow Irish cop is pleased when his son follows him onto the force. Unfortunately, the son is more interested in promotions than in upholding the law and he makes few friends among his peers. When he shoots a child caught stealing, the others frame him and he is sent to prison where his attitude becomes even worse than before. Upon his escape, the bad seed goes on a crime spree. He then learns that his wife has just borne him a son. When he goes to the hospital to see the babe, his father, who set this trap, arrests him and sends him back to the pokey, proving that in this case, justice is thicker than blood. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Ronald Colman stars in David O. Selznick's classic production of Anthony Hope's swashbuckling adventure. The film takes place in a mythical Central European kingdom with Colman in a dual role as King Rudolf V and Rudolph Rassendyl, a visitor from England who's a distant cousin to the prince. Arriving in the city of Strelsau, the inhabitants are startled by Rudolph's resemblance to the prince. Spotted by two of the prince's aides, Captain Fritz von Tarlenheim (David Niven) and Colonel Zapt (C. Aubrey Smith), the Englishman is taken to meet the prince at his hunting lodge. The two lookalikes have dinner together as the prince tells Rudolph of the preparations for his upcoming coronation as king. The next morning, Zapt wakes Rudolph and informs him the prince had been drugged the night before and is now in a coma. Because of their similar appearance, Zapt prevails upon Rudolph to impersonate the prince at the coronation, otherwise the prince's evil brother Black Michael (Raymond Massey) will be crowned in his place. With the assistant of Zapt and von Tarlenheim, Rudolph bluffs his way through the coronation, successfully fooling Michael, who is shocked to see his brother alive. Crowned king, Rudolph then meets Princess Flavia (Madeleine Carroll), the prince's fiancee. As they proceed to the reception, Princess Flavia is amazed how kindly the prince is now treating her. Rudolph is falling in love with her, but Michael suspects something foul and dispatches Rupert of Hentzau (Douglas Fairbanks Jr.) to investigate the matter further, preparing to gain control of the throne at any cost. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide