THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 49

 By sheer coincidence, there are two movies about brain-control -- the same situation I find myself in whenever I notice the YouTube app. 

ROAR OF THE DRAGON (1932): You know the story about the Alamo, right? OK, move the location from Texas to Manchuria. Now change the Alamo to a hotel, Davy Crockett to a drunken riverboat captain, the American soldiers to tourists, and the Mexicans to Chinese bandits. Presto: Roar of the Dragon. 

Richard Dix returns to these pages as Capt. Carson, the cynical sot who finds his purpose in life when under fire. (Unsurprisingly, Dix is less believable playing a drunk than when he really was drunk in the Whistler movies.) He's got the hots for Natascha, the girlfriend of bandit-leader Vronksy. Natascha is played by Gwili Andre, RKO's unasked-for answer to Greta Garbo (or is it Marlene Dietrich?). While Andre is a looker and fairly sexy, her talent is limited to keeping her eyelids at half-staff -- there's a reason why Roar of the Dragon was the highlight of her brief movie career before returning to whence she came, modeling. In front of camera, I mean, not with clay.

Other than ZaSu Pitts and her "oh dear" hand-fluttering routine, the most familiar supporting actor is the great Edward Everett Horton, who gets a dramatic turn -- perhaps for the only time in his career -- when the woman he loves is killed by a bandit. Grabbing a machine gun, the formerly timid Horton starts firing like a madman before getting knifed in the back. Want more unexpected violence? Well, there's an elderly Jewish man getting captured by the bandits, trussed up on a pole and set on fire, forcing Carson into machine-gunning him to death to put him out of his misery. 

One of the loudest early talkies I've ever experienced, Roar of the Dragon features people yelling, guns firing, music blaring, and babies crying (no child-protective services here!), almost continually during its 69 minutes While the pace drags a bit during its final third, you sure won't fall asleep. 

BONUS POINTS: A newspaper headline reads RIVERBOAT CAPTAIN BEATS OFF BANDITS. Now wait a minute!...

REVOLT OF THE ZOMBIES (1936): One of the all-time great movie promotional images -- but anyone wanting to see a full-scale zombie revolt will have to fast-forward to the final three minutes. Otherwise, this is one of those low-budget indies about a man straying where no man should go. Like, into certain low-budget indies.

Armand Loque has discovered the secret of zombie-making in post-World War I French Cambodia. This little talent comes in handy when he decides to take over the village where he and his fellow-geeks are currently encamped. His ultimate target is Cliff Grayson, who is engaged to Claire Duval, the woman Loque loves. Why didn't this egghead put the spell on her?

Hoping to cash in (a little late) on their low-budget, now-legendary cult fave 1932 hit White Zombie, siblings Edward and Victor Halperin decided that any movie with the Z word would bring in the ducats. Not without Bela Lugosi, the star of the original, it wouldn't. Still, Dean Jagger does a fine job as the doomed Armand Loque. (I've always wondered why it took him so long to break into A pictures, since he's always better than his surroundings.) Too, Robert Noland, as Cliff, isn't bad either; where both actors fail is in their love-dovey moments with Dorothy Stone as Claire, where their dialogue sounds straight out of a 19th-century melodrama. 

Another drawback with Revolt of the Zombies is its shabby sets. While the Halperins were able to rent classy soundstages at Universal for White Zombie, here they had to settle for Jagger walking in front of a blow-up photo of Cambodia's Angor Wat temple to set the unconvincing scene. Even if current prints were restored (in addition to its rough quality, it's missing a few minutes), it would look older than a 1936 release. Whatever good can be gotten from Revolt of the Zombies is Dean Jagger's often sensitive performance and his occasionally uncanny resemblance to Anthony Perkins. Too bad there aren't all that many zombies.

BONUS POINTS: The tight close-ups of Jagger's eyes when he's turning on the hoodoo that he do so well belong to Bela Lugosi, lifted from White Zombie. Jagger was probably grateful not that have a light shining straight into his pupils.

THE LADY AND THE MONSTER (1944): Erich von Stroheim must have felt like he'd
hit the end of the road, getting third billing behind B-lister Richard Arlen and (gulp) top-billed Vera Hruba Ralston in a Republic picture with a goofy title. No need, though, for this is an unexpectedly good, if Hollywoodized, adaption of the bizarre 1942 novel Donovan's Brain by Curt Siodmak, who co-wrote the script. 

Prof. Franz Mueller and his assistant Dr. Patrick Corey have finally achieved the dream of keeping the brain from a dead man -- in this case, investor W.H. Donovan -- alive in a jar. Much to the dismay of Corey's sweetie Janice Farrell, Donovan starts communicating with him telepathically. (Dames are so jealous!). As Mueller juices up the formula in the jar to make the brain chattier, Corey receives orders to arrange a new trial for a young man imprisoned for murder. With his personality deteriorating to the point of violence, Corey's left with no choice but to silence the little girl who saw the prisoner at the murder site. Don't blame the man, blame the brain!

Republic Pictures opened the purse strings for The Lady and the Monster, giving it the sheen of a Warners production. Director George Sherman and his crew did a dandy job, too, lighting Richard Arlen's face in a way that reflects his ugly -- evil -- new personality. No longer in the Rolodexes of the major studios, Erich von Stroheim still has what it takes to make an audience take notice, reciting  dialogue in his typical clipped delivery as if he thought this were actually worthy of him.

Bringing up the rear as the nominal star, Vera Hruba Ralston can't even react convincingly to seeing a brain in a jar, appearing more like she's suffering from a mild case of dyspepsia. (In her many, many close-ups, she resembles Teri Garr satirizing her.) If Republic honcho Herbert Yates wanted to do his mistress a favor, he'd have kept out of pictures to avoid being made a laughingstock. Ms. Ralston's contribution and the unfortunate tacked-on happy ending aside, The Lady and the Madman is one of the cooler Republic productions.

BONUS POINTS: Several years earlier, George Sherman directed another sci-fi/medical/crime movie, The Return of Dr. X. You know, the one with Humphrey Bogart as a vampire. 

PLUNDER ROAD (1957): Sometimes, all you need in a movie is 75 minutes of a seemingly successful crime going to hell for everyone involved. If nothing else, Plunder Road will discourage you from robbing $10-million in federal gold bars, no matter how easy it looks. 

The crime itself is interesting because it's something of an updated Western, seeing that the five criminals pull off a train heist Utah before heading to California. But instead of riding horses, they're driving three trucks filled with the loot disguised as or hidden by other items. It's just a darn shame that they didn't anticipate police roadblocks going up. Guess they haven't watched enough movies!

Speaking of watching movies, Plunder Road has an interesting mix of actors in both familiar roles and playing against type. In the former is Stafford Repp (you remember him as the Irish cop in the Batman series) still in his bad guy years, forever obnoxiously chewing gum; the always-welcome Elisha Cook, Jr. looking forward to using his loot to move to Rio with his son; and the more-obscure Steven Ritch as Frankie, who puts his race-car skills to good use trying to avoid the cops. 

Yet the most interesting actors are former leading men Gene Raymond and Wayne Morris. Once A-listers, over time they aged out of their charming manner and good looks and into character parts like the ones they play here. Their grim expressions and cold-blooded ways -- Morris shoots an old gas station attendant without blinking an eye -- show a versatility denied during their star-making days two decades earlier. You have a rough idea of how they and the others in Plunder Road are going to wind up, but that's beside the point. It's the actors that count, and they make it worth watching.

BONUS POINTS: Plunder Road teaches you how to blow up a train with the fuse of a bomb hooked up to a dashboard cigarette lighter. Easier than you think!

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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "THE LOST SQUADRON" (1932)

 Once Gertrude Stein's "Lost Generation" trope caught on like the Spanish Flu, it was inevitable Hollywood would cash in. The Lost Squadron -- the word was even shoehorned into the title -- follows three disillusioned World War I pilots -- Gibby, Woody, and Red -- along with their former mechanic, Fritz, returning to an America more interested in giving them parades than a helping hand.

Gibby's pre-war girlfriend, Follette Marsh, has dumped him for the bright lights of show biz. Woody turns to drink when discovering his business partner has absconded with all their money. Red's old employer won't rehire him, while Fritz is broke. Thank you for your service! Now get lost.

Laugh it up while you can, guys. It's all
downhill from here.

As time passes without any hope for them in their hometown of New York, Gibby, Red, and Fritz hobo their way in a boxcar to Hollywood, where Woody, now established as a stunt flyer, gets them hired on a movie he's currently working on.

It's a good deal, until Gibby discovers his ex-gf Follette is the leading lady and married to the director, the tyrannical, Arthur von Furst. Eventually, two of the pilots will be dead by murder and suicide respectively, while the third will fatally shoot the director. All in a $50-a-day's work!

Red, Fritz, and Gibby, post-war. Get a job,
you bums!

If nothing else, The Lost Squadron reveals the fallacy that the men who fought in Vietnam were the first veterans to face unemployment, addiction, and betrayal by the country they served.  Audiences must have felt too guilty to buy tickets to The Lost Squadron, seeing that it lost $125,000 in its original release.

Mary Astor demonstrates just one of her many
looks of misery for co-star Erich
von Stroheim.

The stars of Lost Squadron play to type. Richard Dix is the rugged, haunted Gibby; Robert Armstrong is Woody, the boastful sot with a death wish; and Joel McCrea's handsome, charming Red successfully woos Woody's sister. As Fritz, Hugh Herbert does his usual Ed Wynn-clone routine, although turns unexpectedly dramatic near the end. Poor Mary Astor doesn't have much to do in her thankless role of Follette except look unhappy, possibly because her name is Follette and not something normal like Julie or Betty. But it's Erich von Stroheim who dominates The Lost Squadron much like his character, the sadistic Arthur von Furst, does on the set of his movie. 

Von Furst even uses a swastika in his company's
logo. OK, so it's backwards, but still.

Never speaking when bellowing will do, brimming over with contempt for his actors and crew, von Furst is a not-so-borderline psychopath, hoping for real plane crashes, insulting the extras (I would notice that), and emotionally torturing his wife. (Hey, babe, you wanted to be in the movies!) Von Stroheim was likely drawing upon his own career as a similarly demanding director a decade earlier, whether filming in Death Valley in the middle of summer, or (allegedly) taking over a huge set to shoot a bacchanalian party sequence that turned into a real, weekend-long orgy. Top that, Mr. Spielberg!

Von Furst is speechless. Because he's dead.

Intense a director as he was, von Stroheim never attempted what von Furst does here: tamper with Gibby's plane in order to kill him. (The stunt players union would never allow such a thing today.) Things don't work out as planned, as Woody takes the doomed plane up instead. Red, figuring out who was behind the crash, hogties von Furst in the hangar until he can be dealt with later. (The Director's Guild would never allow this today, either.) 

It's here The Lost Squadron takes on a radically different tone in its final nerve-wracking 20 minutes, part-horror, part proto-noir, climaxing when Gibby, Red, and Fritz decide what to do after von Furst is shot by... Well, it isn't clear who did it; each takes the blame for their own reasons. But while Red is the likely culprit, it's Gibby who makes the ultimate sacrifice, leading to a completely out-of-left-field finale that you'll find either moving or unintentionally hilarious. But as far as I'm concerned, the characters of The Lost Squadron went through enough hell to earn a little heaven.

Well, if that's the way you feel about it...

Best pre-code moment of The Lost Squadron: Gibby goes up alongside Woody to warn him into landing the tampered plane. Woody responds by playfully giving him the finger. Maybe if he had said "Thank you," the movie would have turned a profit.

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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "TOO MANY KISSES" (1925)

Richard Gaylord, Jr. has been shipped overseas to the Basque region by his rich businessman father. It seems Jr. keeps getting in trouble with the ladies, a hobby Daddy finds expensive after each break-up. Jr. has been assigned to find the valuable mineral turidium. If he stays away from the dames for six months, he gets 50% ownership of the company. Who needs sex when you're the turidium king?

When was the last time the phrase
"Breach of promise" was heard in a courtroom?

 

 

Enter stage left Yvonne Hurja, the beautiful daughter of the Spanish guy that Jr. is working with. Enter stage right, the cruel Captain of the Guards, Don Julio, who has his eyes on Yvonne. And if this what made the movie interesting, it would be exit off the couch for the viewer right then and there.

Made in late 1924, released in 1925, lost until 1971, and restored in 2020, Too Many Kisses is six reels of silliness mixed with romantic comedy and melodrama. It likely would have remained forgotten had it not been for one unlikely piece of casting. For despite the presence of Richard Dix and William Powell as Jr. and Don Julio respectively, Too Many Kisses is known only for the screen debut of Harpo Marx.

Harpo celebrates breaking into movies
before his brothers.

 

What Harpo had over his siblings regarding silent movies was his own silence -- even if, in Too Many Kisses, he has two lines of dialogue (via subtitles). Yet if you watch closely, he stands with his mouth agape in typical Harpo-style when he's supposed to be talking. My guess is that he had become so used to almost 20 years of doing a dumb act that talking just didn't  come naturally in performance. Or maybe he forgot what he was supposed to say.

Laddero Marx.

It's nice to see that Harpo's persona was fully-formed by now. His first appearance, sound asleep and snoring so hard that he's moving straw back and forth, wouldn't have been out of place in any of his subsequent movies. And while there's no chance (or need) for him to play his usual instrument, Harpo does get another Harpoesque moment when he's accompanying Don Julio's musical wooing of Yvonne by "playing" a ladder like a guitar. (His character is billed in the credits as "The Village Peter Pan", which I suppose is nicer than "Village Idiot".)

It would take almost a century for Harpo (right)
to be considered stealing a scene from
William Powell.

Harpo stays primarily in the background for most of the movie; he might not have been even noticed in many scenes by moviegoers who weren't familiar with his stage work. But he's there enough, particularly in the second half, so that a Marx fan doesn't go away entirely disappointed.

More observant (i.e., boring) people like me will notice that not only does he walk like the Harpo we've always known, but that he's playing more like his overly-sympathetic MGM character rather than the earlier, anarchic style at Paramount. Ironic, then, that Too Many Kisses is a Paramount picture.

Richard Dix would lose that silly look in his noirish 1940s dramas, while William Powell
wouldn't be caught dead in an outfit like that again.

 

So what of Too Many Kisses' real stars? Being more familiar with their sound movies, I could "hear" Richard Dix and William Powell speaking their subtitles. But either they improved by the end of silents, or director Paul Sloane instructed them to overact whenever possible. Dix's reaction to sitting next Frances Howard (as Yvonne) is strictly Jerry Lewis. Powell is more subtle, yet appears to be the template for every sneering villain of the time.

Despite being beautifully restored with its original tints -- and a lovely piano score by Harpo's son Bill -- Too Many Kisses is strictly for the diehard Marx Brothers fans who need to see everything they ever did, whether it's worth watching or not. And after they see this the first time, they can rewatch it to see if, as rumor has it, Zeppo Marx really is an in-joke extra. It'll take their mind off the rest of the movie.  

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To read about how good Richard Dix could be, click his name below.

MOVIE OF THE DAY: "VOICE OF THE WHISTLER" (1945)

Auto magnate John Sinclair is working himself to death. Friendless and without family, he suddenly proposes marriage to a nurse, Joan Martin. He wants to spend his remaining days with someone who cares, offering her "my entire fortune for a few months of your life." 

To Joan, who grew up poor, this sounds dandy -- until Sinclair gradually regains his health... and discovers that she's sick of living in a lonely lighthouse with a husband she loathes... and her former fiance comes by, rekindling old feelings... 

The fourth in Columbia's Whistler movies based on the popular radio series, Voice of the Whistler shows how loneliness affects the lives of its principal characters. By the end, it has killed two of them physically, and one psychologically. Try pitching an idea like that at one of the major studios today, see where it gets you.

Voice of the Whistler appears to rise above its B-movie status by opening with a newsreel straight out of Citizen Kane. From that point on, however, it's onto the slightly shabby Columbia soundstages, starkly furnished and with as few knickknacks as possible in order to save some dough. 

The sense of cheapness even affects the dialogue. When John Sinclair initially decides he needs a vacation, he books passage on a steamer to Duluth. Duluth?! Dude, you're a multi-millionaire! At least try Block Island. 

Sinclair is taken under Sparrow's wing.

Nobody in Voice of the Whistler is who they appear to be.  Sinclair initially passes himself off as an ordinary guy named John Carter. Ernie Sparrow, who cares for Sinclair when the latter collapses on the street, was once a great boxer in the UK, but found true happiness as a cabdriver in Detroit. (Yes, this is fictional.) Joan Martin seems like the nicest nurse in town, until her grasping, greedy side comes to the fore. Her ex-fiance Fred, a friendly doctor, decides, literally overnight, to murder Sinclair. You'll never look at your neighbor the same way again.

"Pay no attention to the fiance behind
the window!"

Nurse Joan in particular is a real piece of work. Breaking the news to Fred that she's marrying Sinclair, she barks, "I've given you the chance to get ahead and you've failed!", adding for good measure, "You're soft!" After six months stuck with Sinclair, she spits at her now-healthy husband, "I've kept my part of the bargain. You haven't!" Joan might have taken the Nightingale Nursing Pledge, but she really needs to brush up on her interpersonal skills.

Living in a Maine lighthouse miles from
anyone else with a rich husband who
didn't die and a dumbass boxer who smells
like seafood -- what's not to love?

But all bets are off when Fred visits them at their Maine lighthouse, where Ernie Sparrow also lives because... well, it's not clear what he's doing there, other than having accepted Sinclair's invitation. If I thought I had six months to live with a pretty wife, having a washed-up Cockney pugilist hang around cracking wise would be the last thing I'd want around me 24/7. 

No fool he, Sinclair immediately figures out that Fred has come for more than fried clams and a can of New England Ale. In one of the sickest moments of any of the Whistler movies, Sinclair manipulates Fred into murdering him, only to turn the tables at the very last minute. And Ernie doing the same to him. And Joan doing the same to them.

As with the best of the entries in the series, Voice of the Whistler creates an uneasy tone right from the beginning, gradually amping things up until its startlingly strange finale. You leave the Whistler movies as if awakening from a particularly troubling dream that you can't immediately shake off, somewhat like being married to me.


Of course, none of the Whistler movies would be half as good without Richard Dix, the Bogart of the B's, as their perennially doomed "hero." Dix plays Sinclair with a stark reality and empathy that appears shockingly personal.

When we first meet him, Sinclair is a walking corpse, rich in money and celebrity, but devoid of any life. Regaining his health, he appears to be the happiest, heartiest person on earth. By the end, the now-insanely jealous Sinclair transforms into a stone-cold killer. In each phase, Dix is totally convincing.

Don't mess with Dix.

Once a leading man in silents and early talkies, Richard Dix saw his fortunes wane over time. Alcoholism, too, had by now taken its toll; in Voice of the Whistler, Dix can be heard occasionally slurring his dialogue, and not because he's tired. This unintended glimpse into the real man offers an emotional resonance lacking in many actors of his time or today's. 

Indeed, Richard Dix became an even better, more interesting actor as he drifted into B's and his health deteriorated. He seems to be willing his characters to life as he himself was dying. Watch Voice of the Whistler and picture any contemporary actor his age -- only 52, but looking much older -- doing the same job. It isn't a coincidence that when he could no longer work, Columbia shot only one Whistler movie without him before ending the series. Richard Dix was irreplaceable.

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(Click on the Richard Dix label below for more of his movies.)

MOVIE OF THE DAY: "THE POWER OF THE WHISTLER" (1945)

Forget about I Love a Mystery and The Shadow Strikes. The movies based on The Whistler are how to bring a radio series to the screen. From their unsettling opening theme music (whistled, of course) to their violent climaxes, the Whistler  B-movies -- ranging from fine to terrific -- put many A's to shame.

The Power of the Whistler, one of the best in the series, tells of the story of fortune teller Jean Lang, who predicts death within 24 hours for William Everest, an amnesiac she meets in Greenwich Village. As Jean and her sister Frances try to put together William's past from the items in his pocket -- a train schedule, lighter, doctor's prescription, and the like -- they gradually discover that the gentle-spoken man isn't quite as gentle as he seems. But as predicted, William keeps his appointment with death right on time.

"I don't know who you are, you don't know
who you are -- come home with me!"

For all its quiet terror, there's a charming, unintended naivete running through The Power of the Whistler. When William has a dizzy spell upon first meeting Jean, she suggests he sit down somewhere close by. "The owner of this car won't object, I'm sure!" she chirps merrily. And when the driver finally does appear, he happily gives them a lift to where they want to go. (This is supposed to be New York, remember.)

That's not a flattering look for him.

Now, say you're a young woman who meets a guy 25 years your senior, and you have no idea who he is. Would you bring him back to the apartment you share with your younger sister so he can stay the night? Of course! There's nothing strange about this, nor how your sister's parakeet suddenly turns up strangled to death when your back is turned. On the other hand, he makes a swell over-easy egg for breakfast the following morning! (The parakeet is just one of three cute little animals who meet a grisly death at his hands. Yeah! That's what I'm talkin' about!)

Frances brings William's scrip to the drug store where it was filled. Turns out it's a prescription for poison. As the druggist says, "There's not much call for it." I would hope not. Is it unusual to fill out a prescription for poison at CVS these days? (William forged the scrip himself, but please.)

William, meanwhile, has strong-armed Jane into accompanying him to visit a "friend" in New Jersey he's suddenly remembered -- the judge who sent him up the river. By now, Frances and her boyfriend Charlie have figured out that William is "an escaped maniac" -- the only kind of maniac they have in these movies. The police were never notified because the prison warden believed William had been cured anyway. That's a very good reason to keep the information from the public. Especially when William sends the warden a birthday cake laced with poison. (Oh, so that's what it was for!)

"Your name's written in ink?
That's good enough for us!"

If that doesn't give you faith in the system, William gets through a police dragnet by offering foolproof ID: a name written on the label of the suit jacket he stole from the prison warden upon his escape. Surely there must be some sort of happy middle between outright incompetence and getting X-rayed at the airport. Fortunately for all, William meets a particularly nasty end in a hayloft that even had my usually-peace loving wife cheering.

Nor have I seen a cop in Central Park
during broad daylight.

Per usual with the Columbia B's, the sets for The Power of the Whistler are drab, but help set the mood. The Central Park scenes, meanwhile, feature ambient studio sounds -- the closing of a door, a chair squeaking on the floor -- I've never heard during my visits. No problem -- at least the actors say their lines correctly! And despite what they say, there are no Dexter or Harris Streets in New York, so don't expect to visit them on your next TCM Movie Tour. 


The Whistler movies appear to be a blueprint for the much-later Twilight Zone. In this case, your host is The Whistler, who always speaks the same introduction: "I am the Whistler, and I know many things, for I walk by night. I know many strange tales, hidden in the hearts of men and women who have stepped into the shadows." He works for the NSA now.

You might want to pay attention to that whistling
shadow behind you, mister.

The Whistler himself -- itself? -- is best described as Fate in sardonic human form, seen only as a shadow with a trench coat and fedora, waiting patiently for the losers in his tales to meet a ghastly end they can never escape.

The other thread running through all but one of the Whistler movies is Richard Dix, one of the most underrated actors of the '40s. Continually described in The Power of the Whistler as "good-looking," he has instead the appearance of a man who's seen too much of life's darker side. He is, to use an archaic phrase, "ruggedly handsome," a description no longer used for today's pretty-boy actors. Just for comparison, Dix is 52 in The Power of

the Whistler, the same age that Tom Cruise is now.
 
Switching with ease from compassionate to terrifying in the bat of an eye, Dix -- as in The Ghost Ship -- gives extraordinary depth to William Everest, a character that other actors would play as a jacked-up nut job. He starts his morning saying grace at the breakfast table. By the evening, he's murderously approaching Jean with a genuinely bloodcurdling expression in his eyes -- and is absolutely convincing both times. By any standard, Richard Dix is the real power of The Whistler.

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To read about I Love a Mystery, go here.
To read about The Shadow Strikes, go here.
To read about another radio-to-movie feature, Inner Sanctum, go here.
To read about The Ghost Ship, go here. 

MOVIE OF THE DAY: "TRANSATLANTIC TUNNEL" (1935)

The idea of a tunnel running from England to the USA seems something of a fool's commute. The idea has actually been discussed from time to time, but Gaumont British Pictures got there in 1935 with the art-deco sci-fi epic Transatlantic Tunnel. If the Second Avenue Subway contains as much melodrama and intrigue as this movie -- marital problems,  blindness, double-crossing, murder, a disease called "tunnel sickness," underwater volcanoes -- those poor sandhogs are in for a hell of a time.

How many people were decapitated opening
the trunk?

It's a credit to the British filmmakers' honesty that the character behind the tunnel, Richard McAllen, is an American. Apparently, Brits weren't forward-thinking (or foolhardy) enough to come up with such an insane idea. As with all sci-fi movies, Transatlantic Tunnel takes place in the future -- that is, the 1940s and beyond. This allows the filmmakers to show off all kind of jim-dandy inventions, including television, wall-installed Skypes called televisors, trains and cars shaped like torpedoes, and private planes that resemble badly-made scones. Doesn't life today seem dull by comparison?

"How many times do I have to tell you? I'm on the
phone, not hiding behind the wall!"

None of these material things, of course, prevents human drama from taking its toll. Gossip rags hint that McAllen is having an affair with British debutante Varlia Lloyd. His wife Ruth, having gone blind working in the tunnel as a nurse, walks out on him, taking their son with her. McAllen's friendship with his associate, Robbie, is stretched almost to the breaking point. A couple of the moneymen financing the project plan to dump their shares, and, in the resulting panic, buy up the rest to control the whole thing. (One of the financiers is murdered when he backs out of the deal.) McAllen's son Geoffrey, now a young man, is killed in a tunnel explosion, joining hundreds of other fatalities that have already incurred. All this to prevent climate change from airplanes zooming over the Atlantic? No thanks, bub, I'll take my chances with the melting icebergs.

You'd think by then, they'd have invented
an iPhone instead of having to use
pencil and paper.

You may be wondering by now if the tunnel is even worth this heartache. The world leaders, deciding if they're willing to back the project, aren't so sure. When one declares the tunnel will provide only "useless employment," another says, "That's the kind they prefer." (Hey, how did Harry Reid get in here?)  But the overriding reason for the tunnel's construction, as repeated over and over, is to bring about world peace. But nobody ever explains how! They should have paid attention to the French representative, an arms manufacturer, who admits, "When your tunnel is built, all of the other nations will come to me for guns to blow it up." Merci, mon ami. (His line echoes a similar sentiment during an equally-cynical scene in The Man Who Reclaimed his Head.)

The wonderful world of alanite steel.

You may be wondering, too, just how a transatlantic tunnel can possibly be built. Well, I guess you weren't counting on radium drills and alanite steel. That's the cool thing about science-fiction -- if something is impossible, just make up stuff to defy it. Another side-effect of living in the future, by Transatlantic Tunnel's sights, is that apparently nobody ages over time except McAllen's son -- and he's killed on his first day on the job. That'll teach you non-aging little whippersnapper!

Richard Dix and Leslie Banks discover just
how hot it can get drilling through a
volcano.

Richard Dix, nearing the end of his leading-man days, was probably hired to play Richard McAllen because he looks and sounded to Brits like the typical American -- part genius, part caveman, not quite handsome but someone who can fill out a tux.  British actor Leslie Banks -- perhaps best known for the original UK version of The Man who Knew Too Much -- plays McAllen's friend Robbie with his usual flair, even as he spends most of the time with his

Even this UK promotional card
for the movie kept Leslie Banks
in right profile.

right profile to the camera, the left side having been paralyzed during service in World War I. (I bet you thought I was going to make a crack about him being a two-faced actor. Never.) George Arliss and Walter Huston -- "classy" actors from the UK and US -- make guest appearances as the British Prime Minister and American President respectively. Arliss fans will be happy to know that he continues his time-honored technique of dramatically pointing his finger in the air while giving speeches. Why doesn't anybody do this anymore?

My wife would love this staring down at her
in the living room every day.

A fascinating film, Transatlantic Tunnel wouldn't appeal today to the average movie fan, if only because its soft, faded image and occasionally muffled audio cry out for a restoration that is unlikely to come. Yet some of its "farfetched" ideas have already come true. McAllen, we learn early on, has already built the English Channel tunnel, although his other tunnel, linking the Bahamas to Miami, remains unrealized, to the grateful thanks of the anti-immigration crowd.

 Transatlantic Tunnel is actually a remake of the German movie Der Tunnel, and one from France entitled -- you'll never guess -- Le Tunnel. In England, it seems to have premiered as -- hold on to your hats -- The Tunnel before taking on its final title in America. The release in Spain, as El Tunel Transatlantico, also provided its most bizarre poster, one I would use my kid's college savings to purchase. I'd say it's worth its weight in alanite steel. 

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Richard Dix didn't always play such noble characters, as he proved quite well in The Ghost Ship.

Can't get enough of profiteering world leaders dragging their nations into war?  Read about The Man Who Reclaimed His Head.

MOVIE OF THE DAY: "THE GHOST SHIP" (1943)

You think Lt. Commander Queeg made life on the USS Caine intense?  Allow me to introduce you to Capt. Will Stone of the cargo ship Altair. Crewmen have a habit of dying under his command, and not in acts of war. Stone is in fact, to quote Third Officer Tom Merriam, "a homicidal maniac!" And you thought fantasizing about stolen strawberries was cause for mutiny.

One of the several classy B-movie thrillers produced by Val Lewton for RKO Radio, The Ghost Ship delivers the goods for its entire 69-minute running time. From the opening scene, where even a blind man warns that no good can come of sailing on the Altair, to its startlingly bloody climax, The Ghost Ship is one more example of how Lewton's "little" B's managed to outshine the A's they ran with in theaters. 

Newly-hired Officer Tom Merriam initially admires the fatherly Capt. Stone. Stone has a gentle voice, a firm but decent way of commanding a ship and a knack for zen-like aphorisms like, "You have no right to kill that

"This is your Captain speaking.
 I'm going to kill you in five minutes."

moth. Its safety doesn't depend on you."  But as days pass, Merriam comes to realize that there's a dark side to the Captain. Like when Stone arranges for the "accidental" death of a crew member he doesn't particularly care for. And thanks to Stone's otherwise placid demeanor -- along with the respect accorded to his rank -- the crew ignores Merriam's warnings.  It's only when the radioman stumbles upon proof of Stone's plan to murder Merriam -- and pays for it by being thrown overboard -- does the anybody start to wake up.

That hook is up to no good.

The hallmark of Lewton's movies is atmosphere.  Long shadows, foggy evenings, eerie footsteps -- it doesn't matter who the director is (in this case, Mark Robson), Val Lewton's fingerprints are all over his productions, and The Ghost Ship is no exception. Consider it an oceanic film noir, where even a dangling hook seems to come alive, ready to kill at the Captain's orders.

Great characters abound. Capt. Stone, of course, dominates the movie, rarely raising his voice yet terrifying nonetheless. At times, he doesn't even need to speak; the casual way he arranges for one of the seamen to get crushed to death by an anchor chain is truly chilling. Yet, unlike many

Capt. Stone makes his point quite clear.

actors of his time might have done, Richard Dix gives Stone depth and a little empathy. Stopping in port, he refuses the proposals of a woman who's loved him 15 years with little to show in return. Stone has his reasons -- he knows, even confesses, that a lifetime at sea is making him insane yet appears to be powerless to do anything about it. At the same time, his crew obeys his every word because... well, Stone puts it best while holding Merriam at gunpoint, his voice barely above a whisper:

I'm Captain. And as long as I wear these stripes, there isn't a man in the crew that'll believe you or help you. You'll find them too lazy, too cowardly. Too disinterested. That's what I want you to learn, Merriam. Men are worthless cattle. And a few men are given authority to drive them. 

"Authority" -- that's the word that Stone uses over and over, at times like a prayer, at others a deadly threat, always caressing it like rosary beads. And yet, his nasty description of the crew is pretty much on the money. They are disinterested in hearing about Merriam's take on Stone, too cowardly to question the man with stripes on his uniform, too psychologically lazy to investigate the living evil that haunts their ship. The Ghost Ship is an allegory on power that goes unchecked until it's almost too late, whether at sea, in the workplace or the political world.

Richard Dix is no joke.

Richard Dix, remembered even less now than he was when mentioned as a joke in Blazing Saddles, gives an understated, frightening performance, his eyes conveying emotions almost too painful to contemplate. That he really does look like a weather-beaten sea captain rather than a movie star -- it's shocking he was only 50 at the time -- makes him all the more convincing. A pity Alfred Hitchcock never got to work with him; Dix could have easily played Joseph Cotten's role in Shadow of a Doubt, another 1943 picture about a guy with a decidedly cynical view of mankind.

"Skelton Knaggs" is not
a declarative sentence.

You can always count on fine character actors in Lewton movies, and The Ghost Ship has a shipful of them. In addition to Dix, there's Skelton Knaggs, a Brit whose scarred, pockmarked face is as unique as his name. Although his character, Finn, is a mute, his thoughts are heard throughout the movie, something of a Cockney Greek chorus. He's the only other person onboard who appears to believe that Stone is a little, well, off his nut, and becomes Merriam's guardian angel over time.

"Just wait 'til I pack on another 100 pounds.
Then I'll  really kick your ass."

It took me at least 20 minutes to recognize the unbilled Lawrence Tierney as one of Stone's soon-to-be victims. Just a couple of years away from his run as RKO's resident psycho gangster, Tierney would later hit a long rough patch, thanks to his favorite hobbies of getting drunk and beating up cops. (During the 1970s, tourists in New York probably had no idea that the guy at the reins of their horse-drawn cab in Central Park was once one of the best bad guys in the movies.) He scored a late-in-life comeback as the gang leader in Reservoir Dogs, while Seinfeld fans may remember him as Elaine's menacing father. By then, the gruff, bald, hulking actor, unrecognizable from his RKO days, was 72 years old but more in demand -- and scarier -- than ever. Good for him.

Typical of posters of the time,
that woman on the right appears nowhere
in the movie.

For years, The Ghost Ship was something of a ghost movie, having been pulled from circulation shortly after its original 1943 release due to a plagiarism suit. Once in a while I'd read a rave review by someone lucky enough to score a pirated copy. By the time of its first legitimate appearance on DVD a few years ago, I was afraid that it was going to be one of those over-hyped "lost" movies that, once found, would prove to be a disappointment.

It wasn't. The Ghost Ship deserves to be ranked with The Body Snatcher, Cat People, The Seventh Victim and all the other classic Val Lewton productions. Its return is to be celebrated. And maybe make Richard Dix something other than a Mel Brooks punchline once again.

 

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