Flaming Waters

Malcolm McGregor returns from his latest sea voyage to discover mother Mary Carr isn't in her home. She has lost all her money to an oil swindle by John Miljan. McGregor, Mrs. Carr, and pal John Gough head out to Oil City, meeting and rescuing Pauline Garon and her snobby aunt, Mamie Kelso along the way; Miss Garon's father is there, also ruined by Miljan, but too dumb to realize it. McGregor gets back his mother's money, thwarts Mljan and makes a lot of money when an oil well unexpectedly comes in, wins Miss Garon as his fiancee, and begins work on his own well. Miljan, of course, swear revenge! Will he and his lush mustache get it?

With a script by Fred Myton I wasn't expecting much; I have seen far too many of the movies he would write for PRC twenty years later. Yet in the hands of director F. Harmon Weight -- whom I had never heard of before -- this turned into a well acted story, with a truly socko denouement as McGregor must rescue both ladies from a roaring inferno of burning oil.

Mary Carr had a big hit in 1920's OVER THE HILL TO THE POORHOUSE, and thereafter made a career of playing little old ladies. She died in 1973 at the grand old age of 99.