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HOWARD KEEL was MGM's robust baritone who would still be making big musicals for his home studio--but DESPERATE SEARCH was designed to keep the actor busy when there were no musical assignments ready for him. It's strictly a programmer for the bottom half of a double bill, running only one hour and thirteen minutes.

Keel acquits himself well--strong and earnest--as the pilot who is part of a search organized to find his two children missing in a plane crash. His ex-wife, PATRICIA MEDINA, is on hand to stir up a little love rivalry over his affections. JANE GREER is the current wife, anxious that the organizers listen to her husband's idea of where to look for the downed plane. KEENAN WYNN is Keel's pilot friend.

The children are shown stranded in the wilds of British Columbia with a cougar lurking nearby adding danger to their already dire situation. LEE AAKER plays the sturdy and resourceful youngster with the sister who is hysterical most of the time--something that could have been toned down a bit for my taste.

An interesting trifle with nice work from Keel, Greer and Medina.

Donny and Janet Heldon are visiting their father bush pilot Vince Heldon and his new wife Julie in Canada. They have fly home alone to their mother in Seattle. The plane goes down in the wilderness and the kids are alone against the wild. The exes and others struggle in a search for the missing plane.

This is half good. The adults' squabbles are rather dull. There is surprisingly little action in their half of the movie. They don't make flying around all that exciting. Their melodrama and their discussions are all low key. This movie should be all about the kids. Little Janet is really good at crying and the cougar is actually scary. Donny is being too adult sometimes but the kid is a good little actor. The two kids facing off against the cougar is the best part of this movie.

Desperate Search (1952)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Interesting drama from MGM about father (Howard Keel) and his new wife (Jane Greer) who must search the wilderness after a plane crashes with the man's two children. Things get a little testy as his ex-wife and the mother (Patricia Medina) of the children shows up and causes more harm that good. The introduction by Robert Osbourne mentioned that MGM was trying to cut out their multi-million dollar pictures and try their hand at smaller productions and this here is one of them. The film isn't a complete success but it's certainly a lot better than its reputation would have you believe. I think the obviously small budget hurts the film somewhat as there's a lot of action that we never get to see. This includes the actual plane crash, which in most disaster type pictures would have been the film's highlight. Instead, we briefly see the plane on fire and that's pretty much it. Another minor problem is a few goofs including, after the crash, the two kids being shown without a cut and their hair and clothes appear like they just stepped out of a trailer and not out of a plane crash. With that said, the film still offers some pretty intense scenes especially when the children come under attack by a mountain lion. There are at least three of these scenes and each on is pretty intense. Another plus is that Keel and Greer are very good in their roles. This isn't the type of picture you'd expect to see them in but both do good jobs. Medina easily steals the film as the ex-wife who never overplays the part yet still manages to be very believable and actually turns out to be one of the most hated villains in a film like this. Keenan Wynn does a good job in his part as does Lee Acker as the 9-year-old son. I don't normally bash child actors but Linda Lowell plays his younger sister and I must say she gives one of the worst performances I've ever seen from a child. The screenplay has her mostly crying and screaming, which is fine but unfortunately the child couldn't cry and it's obvious the director just had her screaming to make up for this. Here scenes are all pretty bad when trying to "act" like she's crying and it becomes very obnoxious. The limited budget doesn't give us too much footage in the wilderness but at 71-minutes the film goes by pretty quickly and manages to be entertaining despite a few problems.

Desperate Search isn't the best old movie out there to choose from, but if you're looking for a higher-end B movie that's exciting, you might want to check this one out. Howard Keel is a divorced dad who only gets to see his kids once a year. When he puts little Lee Aaker and Linda Lowell on an airplane to return to their mother's house, he has no idea it might be the last time he ever sees them. . .

The airplane crashes, and both nervous parents, Howard and his ex-wife Patricia Medina, are left in limbo since no one even knows where the crash occurred. Keep in mind this was made in 1952, when cell phones and GPS technology didn't exist. Also, at that time, it was a really big deal to put two young children on an airplane alone and ask the stewardess to look out for them! The good news for Howard and Patricia is that they're both airplane pilots, so they can both aid in the "desperate search" for their kids. The bad news is that Howard's current wife, Jane Greer, suspects she might lose the love of her husband.

Parts of the movie are incredibly exciting, in particular when a very mangy and hungry mountain lion makes an appearance. Parts of the movie are confusing, when Patricia Medina shows up. She looked so much like Jane Greer I continually got them mixed up and didn't know which scenes involved which actress! I enjoyed seeing Howard Keel in a dramatic non-singing role, and boy, was he curt! I lost track of how often he snapped at Jane, poor thing. Still, he looks awfully handsome in the cockpit.

"Desperate Search" is a film that lost a lot of money at the box office. I can't say for sure why this happened but wonder if perhaps word got out that the child actors (particularly the little girl) were really annoying.

Two kids are on a DC-3 airliner and the plane crashes in the winderness. Somehow the children survive but the rest of the passengers and crew do not. Judging by how darned annoying the little girl is, I wish that some others had survived instead! Regardless, the pair are stranded and a search party is out looking for them. And, it just so happens that the kids' parents both are pilots and assist in the efforts.

Much of the time the little girl, Janet, is on screen, she's either crying, whining about SOMETHING or crying for her father. I know kids would be hysterical in such a situation....at least for a little while. But her behavior was not just annoying and off-putting but it seemed over the top as well. I just can't imagine audiences back in the day liking to see this awful kid on the screen....and probably were hoping a bear or mountain lion would just eat her!

Without Janet, the film was mildly interesting. But it really hurt the story to have her in it because I can't imagine any parent WANTING to find this brat.