Billy The Kid’s Range War (1941, directed by Sam Newfield)

Posted on February 28, 2025 by Jedadiah Leland

Billy the Kid was a big damn hero.

At least that’s the claim of Billy The Kid’s Range War, in which Billy (played by middle-aged Bob Steele) is a do-gooder with a comedic sidekick named Fuzzy (Al St. John) and a hankering to help Ellen Gorman (Joan Barclay) bring a new stagecoach line to town. Williams (Karl Hackett) does want to the Gorman family to success so he hires Buck (Rex Lease) to dress up like Billy the Kid and ride a horse that looks like Billy the Kid’s and commit crimes, like killing Ellen’s father. Framed for all those crimes that he didn’t commit and with his best friend (Carleton Young) ordered to arrest him, Billy decides to go under cover so that he can clear his good name. Someone pretending to be Billy the Kid got him into this mess. Now, Billy’s going to get out of it by pretending to be someone else.

The action is pretty standard for a B-western. Mostly, it’s interesting to see a movie where Billy the Kid is actually a nice guy who gets framed. No wonder a whole generation grew up with no idea about true history of the American frontier. Sam Newfield directed a handful of Billy the Kid films and the capable Bob Steele starred in most of them but this is the only one that I’ve sat down and watched and it actually left me missing the production values of the Johnny Mack Brown films. For fans of these type of westerns, there’s the promise of seeing familiar actors like George Cheseboro and Ted Adams doing there thing. Even the outstanding character actor Milton Kibbee makes an appearance. For those who do not like westerns, this film is not going to change their minds.

Despite the promise of the title, there is no range war in this movie. There’s just Billy the Kid, trying to clear his good name.

Lisa Marie Review An Oscar Nominee: Here Comes Mr. Jordan (dir by Alexander Hall)

Posted on January 17, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

1941’s Here Comes Mr. Jordan tells the story of Joe Pendelton (Robert Montgomery).

Joe’s a boxer, an honest and kind-hearted guy who is in training for the big title fight. Despite the concerns of his trainer, Max (James Gleason), Joe decides to take his own private airplane out for a flight. A freak accident causes the plane to go into a nosedive and Joe suddenly finds himself standing amongst the clouds with a bunch of other people who are waiting for their chance to enter Heaven.

7013 (Edward Everett Horton), an angel, explains that he took Joe’s soul up to heaven when he saw that the plane was about to crash. Joe is not happy about this. He wants his title fight! 7013’s superior, Mr. Jordan (Claude Rains), checks his records and discovers that a mistake has been made. Joe was supposed to live until 1991 and he was also supposed to win the boxing championship. Unfortunately, Max has had Joe’s body cremated. Mr. Jordan decides to put Joe’s soul into the body of someone else who is scheduled to die. Joe asks to be put in the body of an athlete so that he can pursue his boxing career.

Instead, Joe ends up in the body of a middle-aged banker named Bruce Farnsworth. Farnsworth has been poisoned by his wife (Rita Johnson) and her lover (John Emery). At first, Joe refuses to become Farnsworth but when he sees his murderers taunting Bette (Evelyn Keyes), whose father was defrauded by Farnsworth, Joe changes his mind. His murderers are shocked when Farnsworth turns out to be alive. Bette is shocked when the previously cold Farnsworth helps her get back the money that her father lost. And Max is shocked when Farnsworth calls him to the mansion and explains that he’s really Joe Pendleton. Only with Joe/Farnsworth plays the saxophone badly does Max believe what Joe says. Joe asks Max to train him for the boxing match that he was scheduled to fight while alive. Max agrees but Mr. Jordan warns Joe that, if he’s going to fulfill his destiny and become champ, it’s not going to be as Bruce Farnsworth, regardless of the fact that Joe/Farnsworth and Bette have now fallen in love.

A romantic comedy that is blessed with two likable performances from Robert Montgomery and Evelyn Keyes and a great one from Claude Rains, Here Comes Mr. Jordan was nominated for Best Picture of 1941. It lost to How Green Was My Valley. While Here Comes Mr. Jordan really can’t compare to some of the other films that lost (amongst the other nominees were Citizen Kane and The Maltese Falcon), it’s still a wonderfully charming film that holds up well today. Everyone should be as lucky as to have a guardian who is as charming and urbane as Claude Rains is as Mr. Jordan.

In 1978, Here Comes Mr. Jordan was remade by Warren Beatty, who named his version of the story Heaven Can Wait. That version of the story was also nominated for Best Picture, though it lost to The Deer Hunter.

The Fabulous Forties #23: Freckles Comes Home (dir by Jean Yarbrough)

Posted on April 27, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 23rd film in Mill Creek’s Fabulous Forties box set was an hour-long “comedy” from 1942. The name of the film was Freckles Comes Home and I have to admit that I’m struggling to come up with anything to say about it. That’s the thing about these Mill Creek box sets. Occasionally, you’ll come across a really good movie and, even more frequently, you’ll come across a really bad movie. But often times, you find yourself watching filler. If I had to guess, Freckles Comes Home was probably a movie that was made to act as the 2nd half of a double feature. Not much money nor effort was put into it. It’s not terrible and it’s certainly not good. It’s just sort of there.

With a title like Freckles Comes Home, I was expecting this movie would be about a lost dog but it turns out that I was wrong. Freckles (played by Johnny Downs) is a human being. He’s returning home from college because a friend of his has inherited some real estate and isn’t sure what to do about it. While sitting on the bus home, Freckles spends so much time talking about how much he loves his hometown that the man sitting next to him decides that maybe he’ll make that town his home as well. Unfortunately, that man is Muggsy Dolan (Walter Sande). As you would expect with a name like Muggsy, Dolan is a criminal on the run.

Back in town, Freckles attempts to convince his father not to build a road that will go through his friend’s property. He also romantically pursues a childhood friend named Jane (Gale Storm), despite the fact that everyone insists that Jane can do better than Freckles. (Personally, I was wondering why — in the year 1942 — a young man like Freckles wasn’t overseas, fighting for his country. DON’T YOU KNOW THERE’S A WAR ON, FRECKLES!?) Meanwhile, Muggsy is plotting to rob the town bank…

And then there’s Jeff (Mantan Moreland), who is the porter at the local hotel. Jeff thinks that he has a machine that will allow him to find buried gold. And since Jeff is an African-American in a 1940s film, it’s impossible to watch the way the movie treats him without cringing. There’s a few scenes where Moreland, as an actor, subtly suggests that Jeff is smarter than the movie gives him credit for and certainly, Moreland’s performance is the most memorable in the film but that really doesn’t make the role any less demeaning.

Anyway, Freckles Comes Home was largely forgettable. I assume that audiences in the 1940s may have enjoyed it (especially if it was included on a double bill with a more interesting movie) but, seen today, there’s just not that much to be said about it. It exists, it’s something of a time capsule, and that’s pretty much all there is to say about it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GX4FzShQQ_I

The Seventh Annual Academy Awards: 1920

Posted on September 2, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Over on Through the Shattered Lens Presents the Oscars, we are reimagining Oscar history, one year at a time. Today, we take a look at 1920. Prohibition goes into effect, women finally get the right to vote, Harding is elected President, D.W. Griffith finally gets some recognition, and Fatty Arbuckle is the most popular man in Hollywood!

Through the Shattered Lens Presents The Oscars

William S. Hart, the Third President of AMPAS

1920 was a year of many changes.

On January 16th, the 18th Amendment went into effect and prohibition became the law of the land. Suddenly, it was illegal to transport and sell alcohol in the United States. As social reformers rejoiced, the government grew and ordinary citizens started to hoard whatever liquor they had. (Selling alcohol was illegal but drinking it was not.) Perhaps the people happiest about prohibition were the gangsters who now had a totally new market to exploit.

On August 26th, the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution passed and, finally, all women were granted the right to vote. And it came not a minute too late because it was time for the United States to elect a new president. Weary after the nonstop drama of 8 years of Woodrow Wilson, the American electorate turned to Warren…

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