Eric BloreFilmography

Fancy Pants

Actors: Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Bruce Cabot, Jack Kirkwood, Lea Penman, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Fancy Pants is a musicalized remake of the oft-filmed Harry Leon Wilson story Ruggles of Red Gap, tailored to the talents of "Mr. Robert Hope (formerly Bob)". The basic plotline of the original, that of an English butler entering the service of a rowdy nouveau-riche family from the American West Read More

Love Happy

Actors: Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, Chico Marx, Ilona Massey, Vera-Ellen

Synopsis: The Marx Brothers' final starring feature Love Happy began life as a solo vehicle for Harpo. The financiers wouldn't go for this, insisting that all three Marx boys appear on screen. Thus, Chico was hastily written into the proceedings, while Groucho made what amounted to a guest appearance as Read More

The Wind in the Willows

Synopsis: Wind in the Willows was originally released as the second half of the 1949 Disney animated feature Ichabod and Mr. Toad. While the first portion of the film was devoted to a sprightly adaptation of Washington Irving's "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", the second portion was a cartoonization of one of Read More

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad

Actors: Bing Crosby, Basil Rathbone, Eric Blore, Pat O'Malley, John Floyardt

Synopsis: Ichabod and Mr. Toad is a two-part Walt Disney cartoon feature based on a pair of well known stories. The first half of the film is an adaptation of Washington Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, all about gawky 17th century schoolteacher Ichabod Crane and his love for the beautiful Katrina. The Read More

Romance on the High Seas

Actors: Doris Day, Jack Carson, Janis Paige, Don DeFore, Oscar Levant

Synopsis: This cute film is Doris Day's film debut and in it she plays Georgia Garrett, a substitute traveller on an ocean cruise. Her friend Elvira Kent (Janis Paige) had scheduled the cruise but at the last minute cancels when she suspects that her husband is cheating on her and she decides to stay at Read More

The Lone Wolf in London

Actors: Gerald Mohr, Nancy Saunders, Eric Blore, Evelyn Ankers, Richard Fraser

Synopsis: Michael Lanyard, aka the Lone Wolf, ventures into Sherlock Holmes territory in this series entry. When a cache of internationally famous diamonds is stolen, Scotland Yard automatically suspects Lanyard (Gerald Mohr). While trying to prove his innocence, Lanyard is approached by Sir John Helmscott (Vernon Steele Read More

Winter Wonderland

Actors: Lynne Roberts, Charles Drake, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Though Republic's Winter Wonderland sounds like a vehicle for the studio's resident skating star Vera Hruba Ralston, she's nowhere to be seen in this 71-minute comedy. Instead, Lynne Roberts plays heroine Nancy Wheeler, the daughter of a farmer (Roman Bohnen) whose property is in close proximity Read More

The Lone Wolf in Mexico

Synopsis: In this entry in the enduring series, the suave jewel thief finds himself helping the police break up a ring of diamond smugglers. Along the way, he winds up accused of both robbery and murder. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

The Notorious Lone Wolf

Actors: Gerald Mohr, Janis Carter, Eric Blore, John Abbott

Synopsis: Three years after its previous "Lone Wolf" entry Passport to Suez, Columbia Pictures revitalized the B-picture series with The Notorious Lone Wolf. Gerald Mohr succeeds Warren William in the role of jewel thief-turned-detective Michael Lanyard, while Eric Blore is back as Lanyard's faithful valet Read More

Abie's Irish Rose

Actors: Joanne Dru, Richard Norris, Michael Chekhov, J.M. Kerrigan, George E. Stone

Synopsis: Abie's Irish Rose, the surprise hit of the 1922-23 Broadway season, was old-fashioned when it was first filmed in 1928, and this 1946 remake, though updated by playwright Anne Nichols, was even more anachronistic. It's the story of what happens when Jewish-American Abie Levy (Richard Norris) Read More

Two Sisters from Boston

Actors: Kathryn Grayson, June Allyson, Lauritz Melchior, Jimmy Durante, Peter Lawford

Synopsis: By 1946, MGM's musical output was in the hands of two men: the incisive, progressive Arthur Freed, and the sentimental, old-fashioned Joe Pasternak. It was Pasternak who held the reins on Two Sisters from Boston, a period piece set in New York. June Allyson and Kathryn Grayson arrive fresh from Read More

Kitty

Actors: Paulette Goddard, Ray Milland, Patric Knowles, Reginald Owen, Cecil Kellaway

Synopsis: Kitty is the "Pygmalion" legend, 18th century style. London aristocrat Ray Milland takes it upon himself to make a lady of a guttersnipe (Paulette Goddard, complete with a cockney accent not to be believed). Milland and fellow conspirator Constance Collier aren't bothering with the girl out of the Read More

Easy to Look At

Actors: Gloria Jean, Kirby Grant, George Dolenz, J. Edward Bromberg, Eric Blore

Synopsis: In this musical, a talented aspiring costume designer leaves her small town to seek her fortune in the Big Apple. The girl, who is also a singer, soon begins establishing herself in the fashion industry, but when a rival accuses her of stealing a pattern, her career is nearly destroyed. Read More

Penthouse Rhythm

Actors: Kirby Grant, Lois Collier, Edward Norris, "Slapsie Maxie" Rosenbloom, Eric Blore

Synopsis: If Penthouse Rhythm is paced more like a two-reel comedy than a mini-musical, it may be because the director was Mack Sennett alumnus Eddie Cline. Kirby Grant, Lois Collier, Judy Clark and Edward Norris play Dick, Linda, Patty and Junior, young members of a singing quartet. The kids have trouble Read More

Men in Her Diary

Actors: Peggy Ryan, Louise Allbritton, Ernest Truex, Virginia Grey

Synopsis: In 1912, John Bunny and Flora Finch starred in the one-reel farce The New Secretary, wherein Bunny's wife hires a homely stenographer to keep her hubby from straying. 33 years later, this old chestnut was reheated for The Men in Her Diary. The cute-as-a-button Peggy Ryan "dresses down" to portray Read More

San Diego, I Love You

Actors: Jon Hall, Louise Allbritton, Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Louise Allbritton, a talented but neglected film star of the 1940s, plays the oldest sister in a large motherless family. Papa (Edward Everett Horton) is an erstwhile inventor working on a collapsible life raft, which Allbritton tries to promote to a handsome financier (Jon Hall) who mistrusts Read More

Forever and a Day

Actors: Brian Aherne, Merle Oberon, Ida Lupino, Gladys Cooper, C. Aubrey Smith, Claude Rains, Robert Cummings, Anna Neagle, Roland Young

Synopsis: The 80-star cast of Forever and a Day would certainly not have been feasible had not most of the actors and production people turned over their salaries to British war relief -- a point driven home during the lengthy opening credits by an unseen narrator. The true star of the film is a stately old Read More

One Dangerous Night

Synopsis: In this entry in the "Lone Wolf" series, the sleuth and former jewel thief, the Lone Wolf finds himself accused of killing a blackmailer in front of the three women he was harassing. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Submarine Base

Actors: John Litel, Alan Baxter, Fifi D'Orsay, Eric Blore, Iris Adrian

Synopsis: In this wartime drama, an ex-gangster proves himself a decent man when he helps defeat the Nazis while he is hiding out on a tiny island. At first the gangster looks as if he has joined the German soldiers by providing them with a location for refueling their U-boats. Later an American ship is Read More

Passport to Heaven

Passport to Suez

Actors: Warren William, Ann Savage, Eric Blore, Robert Stanford, Sheldon Leonard

Synopsis: Though it's not made readily apparent by the title, Passport to Suez was the 10th entry in Columbia's "Lone Wolf" series. Warren William returns as amateur sleuth Michael Lanyard, aka the Lone Wolf, while Eric Blore is his faithful valet Jamison. In this outing, Lanyard finds himself in Read More

Heavenly Music

Holy Matrimony

Actors: Monty Woolley, Gracie Fields, Laird Cregar, Una O'Connor, Alan Mowbray

Synopsis: A man trying to leave his fame behind discovers the perils of choosing to be the wrong unknown person in this farcical British comedy. Priam Farli (Monty Woolley) is an eccentric but famous and well-respected artist who prefers to work in total seclusion -- so much so that he's spent the last 20 Read More

The Sky's the Limit

Actors: Fred Astaire, Joan Leslie, Robert Benchley, Robert Ryan, Elizabeth Patterson

Synopsis: After a four-year absence, Fred Astaire returns to RKO Radio for the Ginger Rogers-less The Sky's the Limit. Astaire plays a war hero who wants to spend a quiet furlough in New York. Since the city is poised to give Astaire a ticker-tape welcome, he sneaks into town incognito. He meets Read More

The Moon and Sixpence

Actors: George Sanders, Herbert Marshall, Doris Dudley, Steven Geray, Eric Blore

Synopsis: The Moon and Sixpence, W. Somerset Maugham's account of the life of artist Paul Gauguin, was brought to the screen as a labor of love by writer/director Albert Lewin. George Sanders plays Charles Strickland, a staid London broker who kicks over the traces to become an artist. Strickland pursues Read More

Counter-Espionage

Actors: Warren William, Eric Blore, Hillary Brooke, Thurston Hall, Fred Kelsey

Synopsis: Counter-Espionage was the ninth film in Columbia's "Lone Wolf" series, based on characters created by Louis Joseph Vance. Warren William stars as Michael Lanyard, the suave ex-criminal known as The Lone Wolf. This time around, Lanyard is in London during the Blitz, where he finds himself up to his Read More

Happy Go Lucky

Actors: Mary Martin, Dick Powell, Eddie Bracken, Betty Hutton, Rudy Vallee

Synopsis: In this lighthearted musical comedy, Marjory Stuart (Mary Martin) is a girl who works in the hatcheck room at a Manhattan nightclub and dreams of being a rich socialite herself. Toward that end, Marjory wants to land a rich husband, so she saves up her money and takes a cruise to the Caribbean Read More

New York Town

Actors: Fred MacMurray, Mary Martin, Robert Preston, Akim Tamiroff, Lynne Overman

Synopsis: Fred MacMurray is a breezy New York street photographer; Mary Martin is a small town girl hoping to make her fortune in the Big Apple. Fred and Mary meet, bicker, fall in love, fall out of love, fall in love again, and so it goes. The main story is occasionally leavened by subplots involving such Read More

Redhead

Actors: June Lang, Johnny Downs, Eric Blore, Frank Jaquet, Weldon Heyburn

Synopsis: Gorgeous June Lang, plays the title character in Redhead. Johnny Downs costars as a spoiled, ill-tempered rich boy. In desperation, his father pays Lang $10,000 to wrap Johnny around her little finger-and then steer him into a worthwhile life. Once this is accomplished, June, who's fallen in love Read More

The Shanghai Gesture

Actors: Gene Tierney, Victor Mature, Ona Munson, Walter Huston, Phyllis Brooks

Synopsis: Josef von Sternberg made his first return to exotic Shanghai since 1932's Shanghai Express in this baroque conflagration, based on a 1925 play by John Colton that required 30 revisions before it was sufficiently sanitized to pass muster with Hays Office censors. The film takes place in the Read More

Road to Zanzibar

Actors: Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Dorothy Lamour, Una Merkel, Joan Marsh

Synopsis: The second Bing Crosby/Bob Hope "Road" picture casts Crosby as a penny-ante sideshow promoter and Hope as Crosby's only client, "Fearless Frazier." Under Crosby's tutelage, Hope has been shot from a cannon, zapped in an electric chair and nearly strangled by an octopus. Now they're practically Read More

Secrets of the Lone Wolf

Actors: Warren William, Ruth Ford, Roger Clark, Victor Jory, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Michael Lanyard, the reformed criminal known as the Lone Wolf, is played in this Columbia B picture by the suave Warren William. The script contrives to have Lanyard's faithful butler Jamison (Eric Blore) to be mistaken for his boss by a gang of jewel robbers. They force poor Jamison to Read More

Sullivan's Travels

Actors: Joel McCrea, Veronica Lake, William Demarest, Franklin Pangborn, Robert Warwick, Porter Hall

Synopsis: In Preston Sturges' classic comedy of Depression-era America, filmmaker John L. Sullivan (Joel McCrea), fed up with directing profitable comedies like "Ants in Your Plants of 1939," is consumed with the desire to make a serious social statement in his upcoming film, "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?" Read More

The Lone Wolf Takes a Chance

Actors: June Storey, Warren William, Henry Wilcoxon, Eric Blore, Thurston Hall

Synopsis: The title of this series entry may strike some as a tad redundant: After all, isn't crook-turned-sleuth Michael Lanyard, aka the Lone Wolf, always taking a chance? On this occasion, Lanyard (Warren William) and his trusty valet Jamison (Eric Blore) are framed on a murder charge. The actual Read More

Lady Scarface

Actors: Dennis O'Keefe, Frances Neal, Judith Anderson, Mildred Coles, Eric Blore

Synopsis: A partial remake of 1936's Wanted: Jane Turner, Lady Scarface is a seedy but entertaining tour de force for the great Judith Anderson. Embittered over the ugly facial scar which covers the left side of her face, a woman named Slade becomes a criminal mastermind. The cops have no idea that Read More

The Lady Eve

Actors: Henry Fonda, Barbara Stanwyck, Charles Coburn, Eugene Pallette, William Demarest, Eric Blore

Synopsis: (Preston Sturges) wrote and directed this classic romantic comedy starring Henry Fonda and Barbara Stanwyck, who are involved in a scintillating battle of the sexes, as Sturges points up the terrors of sexual passion and the unattainability of the romantic ideal. Henry Fonda plays Charles Pike Read More

Confirm or Deny

Actors: Don Ameche, Joan Bennett, Roddy McDowall, John Loder, Raymond Walburn

Synopsis: Don Ameche, an American news bureau chief stationed in London, is frustrated by the British government's censorship of his wildly speculative dispatches to the United States. Joan Bennett is the government Teletype operator assigned to make sure that Ameche doesn't send out any story that hasn't Read More

Three Girls About Town

Actors: Joan Blondell, Binnie Barnes, Janet Blair, John Howard, Robert Benchley

Synopsis: Faith, Hope and Charity motivate the wacky storyline of Columbia's Three Girls About Town--or to be more exact, gorgeous sisters Faith, Hope and Charity Banner, played respectively by Binnie Barnes, Joan Blondell and Janet Blair. Faith and Hope are gainfully employed as New York hotel hostesses Read More

The Lone Wolf Meets a Lady

Actors: Warren William, Jean Muir, Eric Blore, Victor Jory, Warren Hull

Synopsis: The lady in question in this delightful whodunit is Joan Bradley (Jean Muir), a former secretary who is about to marry her employer's son, Bob Pennison (Warren Hull). Mrs. Pennison (Georgia Caine) graciously lends her future daughter-in-law a priceless necklace, but when Joan returns to her Read More

The Lone Wolf Strikes

Actors: Warren William, Joan Perry, Eric Blore, Alan Baxter, Astrid Allwyn

Synopsis: In this entry in the long-running series, the reformed master jewel thief rushes to help a lovely heiress whose pearl necklace has been stolen by other thieves. Using his consummate skill, the Wolf pulls a deft switcheroo and substitutes the real ones for fakes. He then brings the real necklace Read More

The Lone Wolf Keeps a Date

Actors: Warren William, Frances Robinson, Bruce Bennett, Eric Blore, Thurston Hall

Synopsis: Warren William is back as suave thief-turned-sleuth Michael Lanyard, alias the Lone Wolf, in Columbia's The Lone Wolf Keeps a Date. Freshly arrived at the Miami airport after a sojourn in Havana, Lanyard and his general factotum Jamison (Eric Blore) rescue beautiful Pat Lawrence (Frances Robinson) Read More

Earl of Puddlestone

Actors: James Gleason, Lucille Gleason, Russell Gleason, Harry Davenport, Lois Ranson

Synopsis: Earl of Puddlestone was released minus a director credit out of respect for megger Gus Meins, who committed suicide shortly after its completion. This latest entry in Republic's "Higgins Family" series once more stars James Gleason, his wife Lucille and his son Russell as Joe, Lil and Sidney Read More

The Man Who Wouldn't Talk

Actors: Lloyd Nolan, Jean Rogers, Richard Clarke, Onslow Stevens, Eric Blore

Synopsis: The Valiant, a stage play by Holworthy Hall and Robert M. Middlemass, starred Paul Muni in the 1929 film version. The play was filmed a second time in 1940 as The Man Who Wouldn't Talk, this time with Lloyd Nolan in the lead. Nolan is peripherally involved in a crime; he accidentally kills the Read More

South of Suez

Actors: George Brent, Brenda Marshall, George Tobias, James Stephenson, Lee Patrick

Synopsis: South of Suez is where diamond-mine foreman John Gamble (George Brent) plies his trade. When his boss is murdered, Gamble is held for murder, forcing him to take it on the lam. With the reluctant aid of heroine Katherine Sheffield (Brenda Marshall), Gamble endeavors to prove his innocence. He is Read More

'Til We Meet Again

Actors: Merle Oberon, George Brent, Pat O'Brien, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Binnie Barnes

Synopsis: 'Til We Meet Again is an inflated remake of 1932's One Way Passage. As in the original, the hero is a convicted murderer en route to the death house by way of a merchant ship; the heroine is suffering from a terminal illness. Once more, hero and heroine fall in love, each keeping the facts of his Read More

The Boys from Syracuse

Actors: Allan Jones, Joe Penner, Martha Raye, Rosemary Lane, Charles Butterworth

Synopsis: Considering that it was adapted from a Broadway musical by Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart and George Abbott, The Boys From Syracuse must rank as a disappointment, though it manages to remain entertaining throughout its surprisingly brief 74-minute running time. Like its theatrical predecessor, the Read More

Music in My Heart

Actors: Tony Martin, Rita Hayworth, Edith Fellows, Alan Mowbray, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Boasting Tony Martin and Rita Hayworth and bandleader Andre Kostelanitz as its leading players, it's surprising that Music in My Heart isn't better than it is. Martin plays European-born actor Robert Gregory, who while rehearsing for a Broadway musical falls in love with chorine Patricia O'Malley Read More

Island of Lost Men

Actors: Anna May Wong, J. Carrol Naish, Eric Blore, Ernest Truex, Anthony Quinn

Synopsis: Anna May Wong and J. Carroll Naish, so memorably teamed in Paramount's Dangerous to Know, are costarred once more in Island of Lost Men. Naish plays ruthless jungle plantation owner Gregory Prin, who runs his domain like a dictatorship and treats his workers little better than slaves. Into Prin's Read More

$1,000 a Touchdown

Actors: Joe E. Brown, Martha Raye, Eric Blore, Susan Hayward, John Hartley

Synopsis: This film should have been a press agent's dream: Hollywood's two greatest "big mouths," Joe E. Brown and Martha Raye, together in the same picture. Brown and Raye play a show business couple who inherit a near-bankrupt college. They decide to build up the school's scraggly football team in hopes Read More

A Gentleman's Gentleman

Synopsis: A wealthy man's valet, Blore, concocts a blackmail scheme about an attempted poisoning when his employer passes out at a party in this farcical comedy. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

A Desperate Adventure

Actors: Ramon Novarro, Marian Marsh, Margaret Tallichet, Eric Blore, Andrew Tombes

Synopsis: In this romantic comedy, a passionate French painter nearly goes berserk when he learns that his well-meaning friends have stolen one of his paintings so it can be exhibited. Their ploy works beautifully, and he becomes famous. Unfortunately, it is an embarrassing picture of his dream girl and he Read More

Swiss Miss

Actors: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Della Lind, Walter Woolf King, Eric Blore

Synopsis: American mousetrap salesmen Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy journey to Switzerland, reasoning that where there's cheese, there's mice. When they innocently try to pay their dinner bill with phony money, Stan and Ollie are put to work in the kitchen of the Alpen Hotel. Their enforced stay coincides Read More

Joy of Living

Actors: Irene Dunne, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Alice Brady, Guy Kibbee, Jean Dixon

Synopsis: Given the talent involved, The Joy of Living should have been far better than it is. Irene Dunne plays Maggie, a popular musical-comedy star saddled with a possessive, spendthrift family. Maggie would like to leave the house once in a while and experience "real life," but her parents (Alice Brady, Guy Kibbee Read More

Breakfast for Two

Actors: Barbara Stanwyck, Herbert Marshall, Glenda Farrell, Eric Blore, Frank M. Thomas

Synopsis: In this screwball comedy, Valentine Ransome (Barbara Stanwyck) is an heiress who falls for Jonathan Blair (Herbert Marshall), a carefree playboy who owns part of a large steamship line. However, Valentine doesn't especially like Jonathan's brassy fiancé, Carol Wallace (Glenda Farrell), and thinks Read More

Shall We Dance?

Actors: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore, Jerome Cowan

Synopsis: The seventh of RKO's Fred Astaire--Ginger Rogers musicals, Shall We Dance casts Astaire as a world-renowned ballet dancer and Rogers as a musical comedy headliner. Rogers' manager Jerome Cowan concocts a phony romance between his client and Astaire in order to garner publicity for them both. Read More

It's Love I'm After

Actors: Leslie Howard, Bette Davis, Olivia de Havilland, Patric Knowles, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Bette Davis and Leslie Howard play an egotistical Broadway acting team famous for their romantic scenes. In truth, Davis and Howard are crazy about each other, but they spend so much time bickering that they never get around to marriage. The relationship is complicated by young heiress Olivia De Havilland Read More

Hitting a New High

Actors: Lily Pons, Jack Oakie, Eric Blore, Edward Everett Horton, John Howard

Synopsis: In this musical, a nightclub singer (Lily Pons) secretly aspires to sing at the Met. To help her, her agent (Jack Oakie) decides to dress her up as "Ooga-Hunga, the Bird Girl" and send her off on a merry chase of an influential opera lover (Eric Blore) who has gone on an African safari. When he Read More

The Soldier and the Lady

Actors: Anton Walbrook, Elizabeth Allan, Margot Grahame, Akim Tamiroff, Fay Bainter

Synopsis: Based on a story by Jules Verne and featuring battle footage from a French film version of the tale, this epic action-adventure follows a courageous courier of the Czar Alexander II as he struggles to deliver vital information to Russian troops fighting a losing battle against the invading Tartar Read More

Quality Street

Actors: Katharine Hepburn, Franchot Tone, Eric Blore, Fay Bainter, Cora Witherspoon

Synopsis: Previously filmed with Marion Davies in 1927, the lightweight James M. Barrie play Quality Street proved an ideal vehicle for Katharine Hepburn ten years later. The setting of the Barrie original was switched from 1805 Scotland to 1815 Regency England, to avoid a preponderance of brogues and to Read More

Smartest Girl in Town

Actors: Ann Sothern, Gene Raymond, Helen Broderick, Eric Blore, Erik Rhodes

Synopsis: Ann Sothern is a magazine model looking for a rich husband. Wealthy Gene Raymond attends a photo shoot; Sothern mistakes him for a male model and resists his advances. Eventually she falls for Raymond and decides to cease her search for quick wealth. The story resolves itself in a fast-moving Read More

Two in the Dark

Actors: Walter Abel, Margot Grahame, Wallace Ford, Gail Patrick, Alan Hale

Synopsis: Wandering around in the darkness, an amnesiac (Walter Abel) can't shake the feeling that he's murdered someone. When it develops that a prominent (if somewhat shifty) theatrical producer has been killed, our hero thinks that he's guilty. But unemployed actress Marie Smith (Margot Grahame) isn't Read More

Sons O' Guns

Actors: Joe E. Brown, Joan Blondell, Beverly Roberts, Eric Blore, Winifred Shaw

Synopsis: In this musical comedy, a pacifistic song-and-dance man is compelled to don a military uniform for one of his acts. Before he can blink, he finds himself fighting in Germany. Later he is tossed into jail after being accused of being an enemy spy. He escapes and somehow manages to capture a Read More

Piccadilly Jim

Actors: Robert Montgomery, Frank Morgan, Madge Evans, Eric Blore, Billie Burke

Synopsis: British humorist P. G. Wodehouse wrote the story upon which Piccadilly Jim was based. Frank Morgan and Robert Montgomery play a well-to-do father and son, who find themselves rivals in love. The object of their affection is Madge Evans, who likes them both but favors the son. Everything could have Read More

The Ex-Mrs. Bradford

Actors: William Powell, Jean Arthur, James Gleason, Eric Blore, Robert Armstrong

Synopsis: The "ex" of the title is daffy mystery-writer Jean Arthur, former wife of urbane doctor William Powell. When Powell becomes the prime suspect in a murder case, Arthur endeavors to solve the case herself -- and to reclaim her ex-hubby in the process. After a well-directed semiclimax at a race Read More

Swing Time

Actors: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Victor Moore, Helen Broderick, Eric Blore

Synopsis: The sixth of RKO's Fred Astaire -Ginger Rogers pairings of the 1930s, Swing Time starts off with bandleader Astaire getting cold feet on his wedding day. Astaire's bride-to-be Betty Furness will give him a second chance, providing he proves himself responsible enough to earn $25,000. Astaire Read More

Folies Bergère

Actors: Maurice Chevalier, Ann Sothern, Merle Oberon, Eric Blore, Ferdinand Munier

Synopsis: This French-language version of the 1935 Hollywood musical Folies Bergere retains the original star (Maurice Chevalier) and director (Roy Del Ruth) and Busby Berkeley's big-scale production numbers. It also follows substantially the same plot: A nightclub entertainer (Chevalier), is hired to pose Read More

I Dream Too Much

Actors: Lily Pons, Henry Fonda, Eric Blore, Osgood Perkins, Lucien Littlefield

Synopsis: If Columbia could make an acceptable movie star out of opera-diva Grace Moore, then RKO Radio could do the same with Lily Pons. At least that was producer Pandro S. Berman's reasoning when he cast Pons in the 1935 musical romance I Dream too Much. The actress plays Annette, a rural French musical Read More

Top Hat

Actors: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton, Erik Rhodes, Helen Broderick

Synopsis: One of the best of the Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers musicals, Top Hat centers on a typical mistaken-identity plot, with wealthy Dale Tremont (Rogers), on holiday in London and Venice, assuming that American entertainer Jerry Travers (Astaire) is the husband of her friend Madge (Helen Broderick) Read More

To Beat the Band

Actors: Hugh Herbert, Helen Broderick, Roger Pryor, Fred Keating, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Hugh Herbert plays a middle-aged bumbler who is about to inherit a multimillion dollar estate. But there's a catch: Herbert must be married to a widow--any widow--within three days. Roger Pryor plays a suicidal young man who offers to marry young Phyllis Brooks, then kill himself and make Brooks a Read More

The Casino Murder Case

Actors: Paul Lukas, Alison Skipworth, Donald Cook, Rosalind Russell, Arthur Byron

Synopsis: S. S. Van Dine's intelligent, insufferable amateur sleuth Philo Vance is the protagonist of The Casino Murder Case. Paul Lukas plays Vance, who is brought to the mansion of a wealthy, eccentric widow (Alison Skipworth) by a mysterious unsigned letter. Several murders are committed in the elderly Read More

Diamond Jim

Actors: Edward Arnold, Jean Arthur, Binnie Barnes, Cesar Romero, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Screenwriter Preston Sturges never lets the facts get in the way of a good story in this colorful filmed biography of turn-of-the-century millionaire Diamond Jim Brady. The hearty Edward Arnold stars as Brady, who parlays a small-time railroad supply firm into a thriving financial empire. Once Read More

Behold My Wife

Actors: Sylvia Sidney, Gene Raymond, Julie Compton, Laura Hope Crewes, H.B. Warner

Synopsis: A wealthy young heir rebels when his snooty parents refuse to allow him to marry a lovely young secretary. Deciding to teach them a lesson, he goes West where he falls in love and marries the daughter of a Native American chief. He brings her home to meet his parents, who are naturally appalled Read More

I Live My Life

Actors: Joan Crawford, Brian Aherne, Frank Morgan, Aline MacMahon, Eric Blore

Synopsis: Feeling stifled by her wealthy existence, flighty heiress Kay (Joan Crawford) falls in love with poor archaeologist Terry (Brian Aherne). The couple seems happiest when they're yelling at one another, indicating perhaps that screenwriter Joseph L. Mankiewicz was none too fond of either character. Read More

Seven Keys to Baldpate

Actors: Gene Raymond, Margaret Callahan, Eric Blore, Erin O'Brien-Moore, Moroni Olsen

Synopsis: The George M. Cohan-Earl Digger Biggers theatrical comedy/mystery Seven Keys to Baldpate had already been filmed in 1915, 1917, 1925 and 1929 when this 1935 version made its appearance. It turned out to be the second of four talkie remakes of the Cohan-Diggers piece, if one includes the Read More

The Good Fairy

Actors: Margaret Sullavan, Herbert Marshall, Frank Morgan, Reginald Owen, Alan Hale

Synopsis: Margaret Sullavan graduates from a girl's orphanage to an usherette's job at a Budapest movie theatre. Bibulous millionaire Frank Morgan makes a play for Margaret, but she keeps him at arm's length by picking a name from the phone book and insists that that's the name of her husband. The man Read More

Old Man Rhythm

Actors: Charles "Buddy" Rogers, George Barbier, Barbara Kent, Grace Bradley, Betty Grable

Synopsis: In this musical campus comedy, trouble ensues when a meddlesome, overprotective father enrolls in the same college as his son so he can watch over his love life. The son soon finds himself involved with a conniving golddigger who dumps him when she discovers that his family fortune has been Read More

The Gay Divorcee

Actors: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Alice Brady, Edward Everett Horton, Erik Rhodes

Synopsis: Based on Dwight Taylor and Cole Porter's play of the same name, The Gay Divorcee centers on Mimi (Ginger Rogers), a woman seeking a divorce from her husband. Mimi travels to an English seaside resort, pursued by the love-stricken Guy (Fred Astaire), whom she mistakes for the hired correspondent in Read More

Limehouse Blues

Actors: George Raft, Jean Parker, Anna May Wong, Kent Taylor, Montagu Love

Synopsis: It's "Never the twain shall meet" time again, this time in London's Limehouse district. George Raft stars as Harry Young, a half-caste saloonkeeper who shelters beleaguered white girl Toni (Jean Parker) from her tormentors (shades of Broken Blossoms). Harry falls in love with the girl, but mixing Read More

Passport to Heaven

Flying Down to Rio

Actors: Dolores Del Rio, Gene Raymond, Raul Roulien, Ginger Rogers, Fred Astaire

Synopsis: The top-billed stars in the extravagant RKO musical Flying Down to Rio are Dolores Del Rio and Gene Raymond. Forget all that: this is the movie that first teamed Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. We're supposed to care about the romantic triangle between aviator/bandleader Raymond, Brazilian heiress Read More

Tarnished Lady

Actors: Tallulah Bankhead, Clive Brook, Phoebe Foster, Alexander Kirkland, Osgood Perkins

Synopsis: Renowned American-born London stage star Tallulah Bankhead made her feature sound film debut in this drama based on Donald Ogden Stewart's story New York Lady. Bankhead plays Nancy Courtney, a gold-digging socialite who sets her sights on Norman Cravath (Clive Brook), a wealthy tycoon. Their Read More

My Sin

Actors: Tallulah Bankhead, Fredric March, Harry Davenport, Scott Kolk, Anne Sutherland

Synopsis: In all three of her 1931-32 movie vehicles, Tallulah Bankhead played variations of that familiar soap opera standby, the Fallen Woman. My Sin casts Bankhead as a college-educated nightclub entertainer named Carlotta, working in a seedy dive in Panama. Tormented by her blackmailing husband, she Read More

Laughter

Actors: Nancy Carroll, Fredric March, Frank Morgan, Glenn Anders, Dione Ellis

Synopsis: Laughter is a sophisticated romantic comedy belying the "fact" that most early talkies were stiff and dull. Nancy Carroll plays a Follies dancer who meets her goal of marrying a millionaire (Frank Morgan). Alas, her husband is a well-meaning bore, and soon Nancy begins seeking entertainment Read More

The Great Gatsby

Actors: Warner Baxter, Lois Wilson, Neil Hamilton, Georgia Hale, William Powell, Hale Hamilton

Synopsis: Accurately described as "a beautiful job" by novelist John O'Hara, this 1926 silent version of F. Scott's Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby stars Warner Baxter in the title role. Self-made millionaire Jay Gatsby lacks only one thing in life: the love of the beautiful, impulsive Daisy Buchanan (Lois Wilson Read More