The Film Detective has a pleasant surprise for film buffs
and collectors in general this past week with the release of a dozen new films
restorations on DVD.
Leading the way — and that is always very subjective — is
director George Marshall’s Christmas of 1934 film release of 365
Nights in Hollywood. Starring
songstress Alice Faye in one of her early film roles (filmed and released in
the same year as George White’s Scandals (her film debut), she plays the role
of newbie actress (a remarkable resemblance to Jean Harlow, who was at the peak
of her career about this time) who enrolls in a phony acting school. There she meets Jimmy (James Dunn) and the
two manage to outwit the proprietors of the school — something of a forerunner
to the type of films that Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland would perform in at
MGM within a few years.
From the same year, 1934, comes director William Nigh’s
romantic mystery, Monte Carlo Nights, teaming Mary Brian (Man on the Flying Trapeze,
Charlie Chan in Paris, Affairs of Cappy Ricks, etc.) with John Darrow,
who is a man, wrongly convicted, on the run who finds help from an unlikely
source in bringing the real killer to justice.
In 1935 director Clifford Sanforth delivered an indie
mystery with the odd title (for the period) of Murder by Television. A professor (played by Charles Hill Mailes)
invents major improvements to television broadcasting and everyone is out to
get it!
On the night of the first presentation of his new invention
he is murdered and Police Chief Nelson (Henry Mowbray) locks up everyone in the
creepy old house (the murder scene) until he can crack the case. June Collyer plays the professor’s daughter
and none other than Bela Lugosi is one of the suspects!
Westerns? If you are
a Western fan, then this Jan. 17 package from the Film Detective has you
covered. Included in the mix are: The
Driftin' Kid (1941, Starring Tom Keene and Betty Miles, with “Rusty the
Wonder Horse); Red Ryder rides in Vigilantes of Boomtown (1947, with Allan
Lane as Red Ryder and Robert Blake as his sidekick, Little Beaver); Wagon
Trail (1935, starring Harry Carey and Gertrude Messinger, with “Sonny
the Marvel Horse”) and Water Rustlers (1939, with Dorothy
Page and Dave O’Brien … Stanley Price is the villain).
Rounding out the film restorations in this group are: My
Dog Shep (1946, Lanny Rees — who played Junior Riley in The
Life of Riley television series — stars as a runaway orphan whose only
friend is a stray dog); Sunny (1941, Anna Neagle stars under
the Big Top); Hollywood: My Home Town (1965, vintage Hollywood home movies …
hosted by Ken Murray); Garden of Eden (silent 1928,
starring Corinne Griffith and Charles Ray with direction by Lewis Milestone)
and Fangs
of the Wild (1939, starring Rin Tin Tin, Jr., with human actors Dennis
Moore and Laura Walters).
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