btfkelly

Bobby Phillips (Frankie Thomas) is the collateral damage that results in a bitter divorce between Mom (Kay Francis) and Dad (Edward Arnold). Dad's older and travels a lot, Mom's regretful and totally focused on escape. Bobby goes through the intense grief that accompanies such a situation and the script heaps on additional sharp sticks in the eye. We watch Bobby (surrounded by his friends) discover his Mom with another man and later we squirm with him as he testifies at trial against one of his parents.

Post-divorce, we see additional grief heaped upon the adolescent Bobby by the hapless Mom and the oblivious Dad. The story is somewhat heavy handed, but overcomes underplaying (to the point of disappearance) by Kay Francis and overplaying by Edward Arnold, whose trademark laugh could have been meted out in much smaller doses here. To its credit, the script doesn't point the blame at one parent or the other, but focuses on how young Bobby deals with it all. The performance given by Frankie Thomas is somewhat uneven, I think,but he was given a lot of dramatic baggage to deal with and a director who seems to have been asleep at the switch much of the time.

Dave Durand, later of East Side Kids renown (?), is the only supporting player worth mentioning here, as he gives an entertaining and energetic performance as Bobby's school chum mentor. Everyone else seems to have had the life sucked out of them by the black hole of Kay Francis' malaise or caught whatever virus made Edward Arnold go into supernova mode periodically.

This movie deals a heavily stacked deck, but is still moving at times, mostly thanks to Frankie Thomas.

Rip McCool (David Brian) has 19th century San Francisco at his mercy since he has all the money and they have none. Angry villagers are lining up outside the bank before it opens in the morning so that they can clean out what little there is or kick some banker (Mercedes McCambridge) butt.

Friends, enemies and the ambivalent gather in Rip's upholstered parlor to plead for themselves and the town. Through a series of flashbacks, we see the roller coaster journey of an ambitious man coming up through Hard Knocks University, who has managed to frustrate and confound all with whom he comes in contact. They want to like him, but he just won't let 'em. An exception is Rip's loyal man Friday (Lon Chaney, Jr.), who knows why Rip is a hard case and unlike the other characters, has seen a positive side of his nature. He may just be easily impressed.

The suspense turns on whether McCool will bail out the city or let it go to the pelicans. The city's fate is to be decided by single game of stud poker between McCool and his arch rival the banker. This can of corn is worth watching and should be better known. MGM production values and fine performances by almost everyone provide an enjoyable watch. Barbara Billingsley (aka June Cleaver) has a nice bit and I found it gratifying to see Lon Chaney, Jr. in a role that allowed him to do more (emotionally) than he normally was asked to do.

All in all, pretty enjoyable.

In Prison Shadows, hero Gene (Ed Nugent)Harris has been sent to prison for killing a boxing ring opponent for a reason which only makes sense to Al Martin, the scriptwriter. Gene is paroled to a fight promoter who bills him as Killer Harris. The promoter is aided by Gene's betrothed, wicked gal Claire (Lucille Lund) and a crooked fight manager. All told, Claire is stringing Gene, the promoter and the fight manager. All together they plot to have Killer Harris kill all his opponents so that they can get rich quick from all that good publicity. Honest.

Dumber than the plot is Gene (Killer) Harris who loves Claire, his dog and donuts, not necessarily in that order. Gene is blind to Mary (Joan Barclay)Grant's love. Mary shows up when Gene gets out of the clink, while Claire sharpens her femme fatale skills. Mary is mostly ignored by Gene, but makes due by tending to the dog, being secretary to the evil promoter and giving Gene lessons on how to properly dunk donuts. Honest.

But back to the dog as existential hero. Hollywood has given us daring dogs, cute dogs, drunken dogs and brave dogs, all usually partnered with humans that weren't anywhere near as smart as the dogs, whatever condition the dogs are in. This film could be considered a splendid example of the heroic dog formula. There is a twist here however. This dog, whose name I hopefully will never remember, does two dog tricks: leaping into the outstretched arms of any human who wants to hold the delightful little fur ball and sabotaging any sincere effort by a human to correctly dunk donuts. Just Ed Sullivan stuff, so far. Dogginess is only a pose however, until the moment arises when the cute little dickens can become a detective and uncover a key clue that eventually leads to the hero solving the mystery of why only Irish fighters are murdered. Or something. The solution involves towels, Chinese herbs, a now deceased dog and police force members whose average age appears to be about ninety. Not enough to hook you, yet?

There are three scenes that I will not live long enough to forget: the aforementioned donut dunking seminar spiced with syrupy flirting and accompanied by the dog doing a medley of his tricks; Gene doing roadwork in tweed trousers, a cardigan sweater and fedora; and the obligatory thrilling climax when a police stenographer (age 93) pops out of a gym locker pen and pad in hand.

Finally, intended as comic relief, but mostly functioning as a major depressant, is Syd Saylor,whose mugging and shtick are lost on me. Jerry Lewis fans might like him, though. Most comic, however, aside from the performances, is the method of murder practiced by the baddies. Truly creative and unique in cinema history as far as I know. One for the it's so bad, it's good collection.