THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 25

 My sleep routine has taken a new turn. After lights out, I fall asleep for what seems like eight hours, to discover just 45 minutes have passed. From that point on, I toss and turn for a while before sleeping for an hour, then repeat the whole business before waking up for good between 4:30 and 6:00. What else is there to do from that point other than fire up the DVR, YouTube, or streaming app to discover what most people just pass by, often for good reason?

CROSS EXAMINATION (1932): I'm always on the lookout for 1930s B-pictures that A) are
courtroom dramas, B) have generic titles, or C) were made by studios with names that didn't match their ambitions. Artclass Pictures' Cross Examination ticks all those boxes. David Wells is on trial for the murder of his wealthy father Emory. Plenty of people have a motive: David (for being written out of the will); Emory's servants (ditto); Emory's wife (for having an affair with his lawyer); and David's girlfriend Grace, who just doesn't like the old coot. But the appearance of a surprise witness upends the trial, leading to the confession of the real killer. Why hasn't this happened to any jury I've been on?

Unlike many other movies of its genre, Cross Examination opens with the trial, not the murder; you see the crime's build-up and aftermath -- but never the killing itself -- via flashbacks provided by the witnesses' statements. The jurors (and the audience) must paste together everything to decide whether Wells is guilty or not. It's an interesting twist to the usual courtroom dramas of its day, and one that a poverty row studio needed to do to stand out from the crowd. And per usual with indie B's of its time, Cross Examination's cast is a mixture of former stars on their way down (H.B. Warner as lawyer Gerald Waring), mid-level actors on loan from one of the majors (Sally Blane as Grace), and those nobody ever heard of (Don Dillaway as David). 

Being low-budget, Cross Examination is also a fine example of speedy filmmaking. Almost all the witnesses are filmed from the same angle, suggesting they were done in succession (probably on the same day), as are the close-ups of the judge, and Grace's tearful reactions. Being low budget also meant a minimum of second takes, so we get to see actors going up on their lines once in a while. But do you speak perfectly every time you open your mouth?

BONUS POINTS: At least four cast members were born in the 1870s, with two as early as 1871 -- the year cable cars were invented, and Ulysses S. Grant was president. Spooky stuff.

THE VAMPIRE BAT (1933): In a little Bavarian town, villagers are being murdered, all with

the same two little punctures in their throat. While the locals are convinced a vampire is the culprit, neither detective Karl Brettschneider nor Dr. Otto von Neimann are so superstitious. Their doubts are confirmed when the deaths continue after the main suspect, the bat-loving Herman Gleib, is hounded to death by the townsfolk. Von Neimann's assistant, Ruth Bertin, discovers the real mastermind behind the killings is her boss, even though he never leaves his laboratory -- proving that doctors won't make housecalls even to commit murder.

I'm not giving away the ending. When you're watching a movie featuring Lionel Atwill as a scientist, you tend to know how the thing will end. A production of low-rent indie studio Majestic Pictures, The Vampire Bat shares the look of the horror pictures coming out of Universal, thanks to using the latter's soundstages, as well as the casting of a who's-who of horror: the aforementioned Atwill, Fay Wray, and Dwight Frye. Leading man Melvyn Douglas (fresh from Universal's spooky The Old Dark House), lends the proceedings a dash of class and a boyfriend for Wray, the typical "pretty assistant" that labs always have on hand.

Oh, and you know what every Bavarian town seems to have? A village idiot, and nobody plays one like Dwight Frye. Channeling his role of Renfield in Dracula while using the childish syntax of Sesame Street's Elmo, Frye steals every scene as the creepy Herman, demonstrating why he was forever typecast as this kind of character; it's a shame he's killed mid-way through the movie. If only the same could be said of the dreadful "comic relief" (a misnomer if there ever was one) provided by Maude Eburne as Ruth's Aunt Gussie, who should have been the first victim of Dr. von Niemann's gruesome blood-draining contraption.

The Vampire Bat, long available only in murky 16mm prints, has been given a sparkling restoration, including the original tinting of the lynch mob's fiery torches. It's quite effective, even if it doesn't make sense, seeing that everything else is in black and white. 

BONUS POINTS: Majetic Pictures and Vampire Bat producer Phil Gladstone were also the brains behind the brilliant, bizarre The Sin of Nora Moran. (You still haven't bought the Blu-ray? What are you waiting for?)

YOU, THE PEOPLE (1940): From 1935 to 1947, M-G-M released occasional two-reelers under the umbrella title Crime Doesn't Pay, with a formula that never varied. At the beginning of each short, a different unknown contract player identifies himself as "Your M-G-M crime reporter" and, predating Dragnet by several years, assures us that the story we are about to see is true, with only the names being changed. He then throws it over to yet another studio actor -- often identifiable by face if not name -- who, as a police chief or mayor of an unidentified city, introduces the criminal case we're about to see. 

Underworld kingpin "Boss" Bailey is doing whatever it takes to get his puppet, Mayor James Wheelock, re-elected. Bailey's posse pressure city workers and small business owners to cough up donations under threat of job loss or physical violence, and begin cynical whispering campaigns that suggest voters stay home on election day using the old both-sides-are-crooks gag (which may or may not be true in real life). Having been beat up for not donating to Wheelock's campaign, civil servant William Wright is deputized to investigate Bailey and his crew, who are rounded up by the police on election night. 

You, the People is unexpectedly shocking in portraying how dirty the criminal element will play in order to get their way; in this case, it involves, among other things, murdering a City Hall worker and almost burning down a warehouse filled with authentic ballots on the evening of the election. And the yellowbelly mayor is in full compliance! 

As with all the Crime Doesn't Pay entries, the short abounds with young actors the studio had hopes for (which usually never panned out); older actors on their last legs; and journeymen who appeared to have worked incessantly until they dropped dead. The latter includes John "Great Caesar's Ghost!" Hamilton as the honest mayoral candidate, and familiar character actor C. Henry Gordon (whose bad guy parts usually included an Italian accent) sneering his way through the role of Boss Bailey. If You, the People is any indication, we're going to have a hell of a presidential election in 2024.

BONUS POINTS: In his seventh movie appearance, Hugh Beaumont (aka Ward Cleaver of Leave it to you know who), is an everyman who sees through the crooked mayor, and urges the owner of a diner not to listen to people who insist that voting doesn't count. We could use more everymen like him.

LA MACCHINA AMMAZZACATTIVI (1952): For any monolinguists out there, the title translates to The Machine to Kill Bad People -- and wouldn't you like to have one? Cynical photographer Celestino Esposito sure would, just to get rid of all the people in his Italian village he considers egotists and oppressors of the working class. And so a mysterious stranger arranges for him to do just that. All Celestino needs to do is take a picture of an already existing photograph of someone. SNAP! The victim dies in the same pose as in the photo. Soon, Celestino is ridding the villagers of people he dislikes, acting as judge, jury, and paparazzo. To his disappointment, the villagers he was trying to help become just as bad as those he killed, leading him to look for a way to reverse the damage.

You might not believe it, but La Macchina Ammazzacattivi is an often laugh out loud comedy. Director Roberto Rossellini cast what seems to be the most ordinary-looking actors in Italy, and surrounded them with authentic locals as extras, making it at times look like the strangest documentary you've ever seen. (Only the usual Italian post-dubbing and the extras occasionally glancing at the camera reminds you this is just a movie.) The only person more traditionally unattractive than Gennaro Pisano (as Celestino) is the actor (whose name I can't match up to any still) who plays his chief nemesis. There's something about the Italian language, or at least the way they and everybody else here continually yells it at each other, that makes their subtitled dialogue even more funny than it already is.

A subplot about a rich American moving to the village with his wife and adult daughter keeps things humming. The American is intent on building a hotel atop a piece of land that locals have been using for a cemetery, and intends on bribing the mayor in order to make it happen. (How do you say Crime Doesn't Pay in Italian?)

Available on Max, La Macchina Ammazzacattivi’s one problem, if you could call it that, is the dialogue often comes so fast and furious you don't always have time to look away from the subtitles in order to enjoy the actors' lively facial expressions. If only more comedies this entertaining and perceptive had such "problems". 

BONUS POINTS: Whoever dubbed in a donkey's braying should have gotten a raise for providing the funniest phony animal sound in movie history.

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THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 20

 One A-list feature sneaked into the list this time around, just to remind you I've got a scintilla of good taste. But only a scintilla. 

BEGGARS IN ERMINE (1934): Steel factory owner John "Flint" Dawson is forced out of his job when crippled in an accident arranged by his board of directors rival Jim Marley -- who then runs off with Dawson's wife and baby. Still wealthy, Dawson travels the country organizing disabled beggars into a fraternity with the help of blind peddler named Marchant. Dawson invests 10% of the beggars' earnings while providing food and housing for them in all major cities. He's also been quietly providing for his daughter Joyce, orphaned when her mother died, while still finding time to plan a way to take back his factory from the money/power-hungry Marley. 

I'm not sure what's more fantastical in Beggars in Ermine: the ability to organize the nation's beggars or that a rich businessman would actually do such a thing. It's a credit to the great Lionel Atwill's talent that he's able to make both impossibilities fully believable. And this is an actor better known for roles on the wrong side of morals. Dawson has lunch with his workers, provides them with stock in their company, and is always looking out for their best interests --everything Jim Marley hates. There's a vaguely socialistic bent in Beggars in Ermine which resonates today. Call it paternal capitalism.

This was the first time in over 25 years that I first watched Beggars in Ermine. While it's a pleasure to see it restored from its previous worn-out public domain condition, it didn't hold up quite as well as I'd hoped. The subplot involving Joyce and Marley's son Lee could have been eliminated, thus trimming 10 of its 72 minutes, which would have fully focused on its near-fantasy story.  It would have been nice, too, if Marchant (played by Henry B. Walthall) didn't play the same damn song over and over on his accordion. What I appreciated more this time around, though, was the movie's assumption that audiences in 1934 would be savvy enough to understand its discussions of selling, buying, and shorting stocks, much of which went straight over my head. I wish Dawson were around to organize financial idiots like me.

BONUS POINTS: Only a Poverty Row studio like Monogram could misspell the name of Henry B. Walthall in the credits, despite him being in over 300 movies since 1908. Love his fedora and sunglasses, too.

CITY FOR CONQUEST (1940) Truck driver Danny Kenny turns to boxing to help send his kid brother Eddie to music school. Meanwhile, Danny's lifelong sweetheart (at least he thinks so), dancer Peggy Marsh, goes on tour with the lecherous, underhanded Murry Burns. As Danny and Peggy occasionally reunite, their careers rise and fall. By the end, Danny, losing his eyesight, is now operating a newsstand; Peggy is back to being a hoofer in low-rent vaudeville houses; and Eddie conducts his symphony at Carnegie Hall.

City for Conquest seemed vaguely familiar, as if I'd seen it parodied by Carol Burnett or Mad magazine. And maybe I had. Like the previously discussed Cry of the City, City for Conquest is one of those paint-by-numbers yet emotionally effective dramas that studios turned out with the ease of combing one's hair. A passel or two of familiar Warner Brothers's contract players, starting with James Cagney and Ann Sheridan, further help to make City for Conquest something like the best community theatre group you've ever seen (and I mean that as a tribute to their welcome familiarity, not their talent). Only Frank Craven's unnecessary appearances as a Greek chorus (billed as The Old Timer) slows things down. (His part was cut to almost nothing in City for Conquest's 1948 re-release, but restored decades later, which wasn't necessarily a good idea).

Unexpected actors include 25 year-old Anthony Quinn as the slimy Murry Burns -- his rape of Sheridan is kind of implied without being shown; soon-to-be legendary director Elia Kazan as Cagney's childhood friend-turned-gangster named Googi; and, in his movie debut, Arthur Kennedy as Eddie (he looks like he could be Cagney's brother). Anatole Litvak's masterful direction on what was obviously a big-budget production gives City for Conquest a look as epic as its title. And I dare you not to get choked up at Cagney and Sheridan's climactic reunion. A truly great '40s movie. But watch a waterfront backdrop shake when a car drives by. Great doesn't mean perfect, y'know.

BONUS POINTS: Old Timer Frank Craven was one of the writers of Laurel & Hardy's best feature, Sons of the Desert. 

THE MAD MONSTER (1942): PRC had no shame in ripping off ideas from the major
studios, so it was inevitable they would get around to the werewolf genre. Dr. Lorenzo Cameron -- a scientist of the so-you-think-I'm-mad-do-you? school -- has perfected transferring the blood of a wolf to his half-wit assistant Petro. Good news: Lorenzo intends to give the formula to the military in order to create a monster army to fight the Axis. Bad news: First, he's going to sic Petro on his former university colleagues who got him fired because of stunts like this. Talk about cancelling people!

George Zucco was fast becoming poverty row's go-to actor for nutty characters. And in The Mad Monster, Zucco as Cameron takes it to the next level in a lengthy scene hallucinating a conversation with all his past nemeses. It's rather strange watching what seems to be a "classy" actor happily wallowing in hogwash like this -- I'm certain he broke out in laughter more than once after director Sam Newfield called "Cut!" But as if to make Cameron and Petro even less empathetic to the audience, the first victim is an innocent little girl. That way, we want to see those guys pay for their crimes, because, well, maybe those professors deserved to get clawed to death. 

Glenn Strange's make-up as Petro as the werewolf makes him look more like a hillbilly in need of dental work and a haircut rather than a monster. To further save time and thought, The Mad Monster's writers trot out the old saws of the scientist's beautiful daughter dating a reporter (the inexplicably top billed Johnny Downs) who solves the crime; a thunderstorm in the final reel; and Cameon and Petro dying in a house fire -- before the military gets the chance to turn their troops into werewolves. Next time, maybe.

BONUS POINTS: Glenn Strange's unintentionally(?) hilarious performance of  Petro (before his werewolf transformation) is a carbon copy of Lon Chaney, Jr. in Of Mice and Men. I told you PRC only ripped off from the best. 

LIGHTHOUSE (1947): After discovering her low-rent boyfriend Sam is a two-timer, the spiteful
Connie marries his much older boss, lighthouse keeper Hank. While Sam is quite aware of Connie's -- ahem -- past, Hank remains blissfully unaware until her drunk friend JoJo spills the beans. Soon after, Hank is nearly killed in a mysterious fall into the ocean. While hospitalized, Connie grows to love him, while losing all affection for Sam. But a nosy insurance investigator gets Hank to thinking that his near-fatal slip into the sea might not have been an accident after all, setting up a three-way showdown. 

One of PRC's last releases, Lighthouse bears a strong resemblance to the superior The Voice of the Whistler from two years earlier. It starts out well enough, with PRC's signature low-budget atmosphere, squalid settings (a waterfront dive, the dump shared by Connie and JoJo, a lighthouse well-lived in by two guys), and starring a solid B-movie triumvirate. John Litel (Two-Dollar Bettor) plays Hank as a nice but clueless sap -- how does a guy this blind to reality run a lighthouse? As Sam, Don Castle (Roses are Red) continues his strange career as a Clark Gable-lookalike who sounds like one of the Bowery Boys, while June Lang (Connie) is simply a woman lacking the sense God gave geese. They look like the kind of unfortunates who'd get caught up in a sleazy phare-a-trois (look it up).  

In a way, the best actors are the two who don't initially seem important, but who set in motion Hank's growing mistrust of his bride. Marion Martin's JoJo continues PRC's solemn tradition of extraordinarily blowsy, big-mouth women with hair peroxided to an inch of its life. Charles Wagenheim (there's a B-movie actor's name!) is Quimby, the suspicious insurance investigator who warns Hank that Connie is an untrustworthy slut (in so many words). Lighthouse is actually pretty good until falling apart in its final moments with a happy ending rather than a depressing climax featuring at least one murder and the survivor(s) wishing they never met each other. Doesn't that sound like a better movie?

BONUS POINTS: You'll never forget the incessant flute-heavy eight-note leitmotif, whether you want to or not.

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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "THE MAN WHO RECLAIMED HIS HEAD" (1934)

Let's test your knowledge of current events. Who spoke the following passionate words?

"The people must be told who their enemies are. The unseen foe who maneuver nations into war. They must know the duplicity of men who profit from human misery and death. [...] As long as munitions stay in the hands of private enterprises, war will always be around the corner."

Was this the keynote speaker at the Libertarian Party Convention? Sen. Bernie Sanders on the Senate floor? An anonymous protestor outside last year's G8 summit? 

No, no, and no. The correct answer: Claude Rains on a Universal Studios soundstage in 1934. Now do you remember?

Possessing one of the more freakish titles in moviedom, The Man Who Reclaimed His Head is an uncompromising anti-war drama, resonating today as a startlingly contemporary attack on the hellish marriage of corrupt politicians and greedy businessmen who create war purely for their own financial gain. If the "Occupy" movement ever holds a film festival, this should be the closing night attraction. 

Paris, 1916. Paul Verin  has dedicated his life to promoting world peace. Always poor, Verin is given the chance to make money when hired to write anti-war editorials for newspaper publisher Henry Dumont-- editorials for which Dumont takes credit. But as the temptation for political power and monetary riches grows, Dumont eagerly sells out to the munitions manufacturers. 

When Verin is drafted at the outbreak of World War I, Dumont is able to keep him on the front lines, edging him closer to death -- all the while putting the moves on Verin's wife, Adele. Discovering the truth about his former friend, Verin goes AWOL and, in a fit of insanity, turns the movie's metaphoric title into shocking reality. 

Never push a pacifist to the brink.

Told in flashback as Verin confesses to a lawyer, The Man Who Reclaimed His Head is a wonderful showcase for Claude Rains, only his second movie since his star-making turn in The Invisible Man. Blessed with a mellifluous voice and eyes that can register love, loathing or madness when called for, Rains gives his anti-war dialogue, as the one quoted above, a resonance that holds up even better today than it did in 1934. A committed pacifist, Verin proclaims, "Give me a child's mind for the first 12 years of his life and I'll sweep war from the face of the earth." As my daughter can affirm, my goals are a little different. Give me a child's mind and I'll fill it with old movies, unfunny jokes, and the collected writings of Charles Krauthammer. I think we know who'll turn out better.

"At least I'm taller than your husband."

As usual, nobody plays the slick villain like Lionel Atwill as the murderously duplicitous Henry Dumont. Bad enough he uses Adele to guilt-trip her husband in trying to sell out his beliefs for financial gain. Dumont then tries to get Verin killed on the battlefront so he can have his way with her. But what's really shocking is how easily Dumont, an expert at mob psychology, manipulates the idiot masses into following whatever line he happens to be peddling. Call it the Rush Limbaugh Syndrome.

Like Men Must Fight from a year earlier, The Man Who Reclaimed His Head blames cynical power brokers for wars. The difference is, however, here we actually see those madmen plotting their war aboard a luxury liner. One of them, the manufacturer of chemical gas, appears to have second thoughts:

BUSINESSMAN #1: I hate to think of all that blood being spilled. My dear countrymen -- I  wonder just what is the duty of patriotism?
BUSINESSMAN #2: And you're the man who makes liquid fire!
BUSINESSMAN #1: Well, what good is it? The peace conference banned it.
BUSINESSMAN #3: Oh, they'll forget all their silly scruples once the first shot's fired!
  

Chess game of the damned.

Their silly scruples. Things get uglier when we learn that these "patriotic" men are selling weapons to the enemy through a dummy corporation in Switzerland. To their disappointment, they realize this could lead to the destruction of their munitions plants with their own weapons -- and, unfortunately for them, end the war. It's up to Henry Dumont -- who has sold each of them them stock in his publishing company at 5,000 francs a share -- to give some sage advice regarding "a general understanding to conserve all our natural resources." In other words, he explains, corner the market on oil and drive up the price, creating a handsome profit for all concerned. No way this really happens, right?

I first saw The Man Who Reclaimed His Head when it was run as part of a horror movie show on local television. I'd never heard of it, but the title, cast, and year of production certainly sounded promising. Around the 20-minute mark, I realized I was watching something far different than what was promised. As the years passed, I looked out for it again, but it seemed to have disappeared into movie heaven. Only a week ago -- after roughly 40 years -- I discovered it on YouTube. 

Having become more cynically aware to the ways of the world, I was stunned to see how ruthlessly, depressingly honest a movie it was. And although there isn't a werewolf, invisible man or electrically-revived corpse in its 82-minute running time, The Man Who Reclaimed His Head truly is a horror movie -- one that continues to play out in real life every day.

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To read about Men Must Fight, click here.

MOVIE OF THE DAY: "LADY IN THE DEATH HOUSE" (1944)

Back in the 1940s, if a neighborhood theater manager wanted to put fannies in the seats, he couldn't do better than Lady in the Death House. The title alone is rich with promise. But there's also that fabulous poster with the blood-red silhouette, the woman in the lower corner looking on disbelief and a tagline hyping a whole new genre: soap opera noir.

Then there are the opening credits -- the shadow of an electric chair, the title spelled out in letters resembling electricity. And the great Lionel Atwill in the lead! All of this is what B-movie fans salivate for. You could probably watch it in your head without ever actually having seen it. A couple of unexpected twists, along with a cast game for anything, ultimately made this PRC release worth the time it took to tell its strange, convoluted story. Maybe because it's only 55 minutes long.

A typically-subtle PRC touch.

Convict Mary Logan is finishing up a letter to criminologist Dr. Charles Finch before she walks the last mile. The warden obviously didn't get the memo about shaving prisoners' heads before they're electrocuted. Judging by her bouffant, this prison must have a Rodolfo Valentin outlet on the premises. My wife would gladly kill me for this kind of pampering.

Just as Mary's ready to take the hot squat, we flashforward to Dr. Finch talking to a gaggle of reporters at his apartment. That's a common thing in old movies -- newspaper reporters hanging around their subject's living room, partaking in his liquor and cigarettes, no sense of competition among them. Nobody's taking notes because their hands are filled with booze and smokes. It's a wonder that cities like New York could afford 12 daily newspapers. 

"At least we weren't smoking.
Mayor Bloomberg would kill us!"

Finch gives the lowdown on how Mary wound up in the death house. One evening, Finch was at his favorite restaurant, the Grotto. Or, actually, the only restaurant set PRC could afford.  He had struck up a conversation with Dr. Dwight Bradford when they were distracted by a typical accident you see when dining out: a woman's dress catching on fire thanks to a flambe knocked over by her drunken date. Bradford uses Finch's coat to put out the flames, because, well, who wants to ruin their own coat?

"But honey, I'll bring them back!"

As you might have guessed, this immediately leads to true love. Unfortunately, the only thing standing between the couple and the altar is Bradford's job: he's the executioner at the state prison. Not that he particularly enjoys it; it simply pays the bills while he's working on a formula to revive the dead. (That prison must execute a hell of a lot of people to finance a hobby like this.)  Here's the beauty part: Mary can't abide by his perfectly legitimate government job, yet has no trouble with him trying to bring corpses back to life. Dames!

"You look guilty. That's good enough for me!"

Mary has a secret of her own: she's being shaken down by Willis Millen, a former associate of her late father, a two-bit crook, in exchange for not telling her boss her real identity. Millen is found dead in her apartment; circumstantial evidence points to Mary being the killer. (As a cop on the scene says, "This isn't one of those cases that depends on clues." Just the guy you want in public service.) Finch isn't convinced, and starts his own
investigation. 

A crazy slut, at that.

Finch is suspicious of Mary's younger, sluttish sister Susie. ("Although emotionally unstable," Finch admits in hindsight, "she was not vicious." No, just a slut.) He knows Susie is hiding something, but can't get her to talk even when her sister is sentenced to the chair. And fulfilling the fantasies of every guy who's been dumped by a woman, Bradford is scheduled to pull the death switch on Mary. High-five!

Had the makers of Lady in the Death House continued on this path, news of Mary's innocence would have arrived seconds after she got fried. Bradford would then drag her back to the lab and pull a Dr. Frankenstein on her. Mary's eyes would have blinked open and next thing you know, it'd be honeymoon of the living dead. Although I'm not keen on happy endings for crime films, I'd have found that acceptable.

Prisons had really cool lighting in those days.

But that's not what the boys in re-write went for. Instead, Bradford chickens out and not only refuses to execute his ex-honey, but tries to prevent anyone else from doing it, too. Good thing, too, since Finch finds the real killer. Only the Governor has the power to cancel Mary's execution, but he's at a roadside diner with his driver. This being over a half-century before cell phones became pandemic, it's up to a radio announcer to order the Governor to call the prison before Mary becomes a human Reddy Kilowatt. 

All ends well. Mary moves to Chicago with Bradford, who gets a new job that doesn't involve killing innocent prisoners, freeing up his time to reanimate the dead. For some reason, this still doesn't seem strange to anyone concerned.

It's not just the plot of Lady in the Death House that gets you dizzy. It's constantly going back and forth in time, with opticals between scenes resembling a particularly hyper windshield wiper. Other times, the special effects department varies things a bit by wiping clockwise, then counterclockwise, often within the space of mere seconds. This is the earliest example of cinematic ADD I've ever seen. 

Low-budget movies like this, stuffed with no-name actors, give you a good idea of what "regular" people looked like then. Everybody, other than Lionel Atwill, looks just different enough to step in front of a camera, but not for an important production. They can memorize and recite their dialogue more or less convincingly. All the men wear pencil-thin mustaches, that apparently being the style of the day. And as for Jean Parker -- the woman who plays Mary Logan -- I recognized her from Laurel & Hardy's The Flying Deuces and nothing else. But when you're in a Laurel & Hardy movie, other credits are superfluous.

America's most debonair orgy-meister.

Lady in the Death House is a far cry from Lionel Atwill's glory days in movies like Murders at the Zoo where he sews shut the mouth of a romantic rival in the very first scene. But you'd never know it by watching him. As with other character actors of his time -- Henry Daniell and George Zucco, to name just two -- Atwill immediately elevates any movie he's in with his stage-trained polish, diction and charisma. He's a pro no matter how skimpy the budget or bizarre the script.

Atwill was once a reliable player in A-pictures -- the one-armed policeman in Son of Frankenstein, the not-so mad scientist in Dr. X among the best-remembered -- until a perjury conviction involving one of his legendary porn-fueled orgies made him actor-non-grata among the studio-head hypocrites who were guilty of far worse. 

Atwill spent his last years shuttling between low-rent jobs at Universal and PRC.  Always dependable for a good quote ("All women love the men they fear. All women kiss the hand that rules them"), he's kind of like Claude Rain's mysterious step-uncle. Perfectly civilized, a wonderful raconteur, but someone you wouldn't want to babysit your kids. 

But damn, could he throw a porn-fueled orgy. High-five!

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