Jim BannonFilmography

Man's Favorite Sport?

Actors: Rock Hudson, Paula Prentiss, Maria Perschy, John McGiver, Charlene Holt

Synopsis: Roger Willoughby (Rock Hudson) is a super salesman of sporting goods who sells fishing equipment but knows nothing about the sport. Roger's boss Cadwalader (John McGiver) gets an idea from publicity director Abigail (Paula Prentiss) to enter him in a fishing contest, and the inept angler has a Read More

A Gathering of Eagles

Actors: Rock Hudson, Rod Taylor, Mary Peach, Barry Sullivan, Kevin McCarthy

Synopsis: A Gathering of Eagles stars Rock Hudson as a colonel in the peacetime Strategic Air Command. His devotion to his duty as a wing commander takes a toll on his men, his marriage, and his own well-being. It is to Hudson's credit that he was willing to put his image on the line with this essentially Read More

Inside the Mafia

Actors: Cameron Mitchell, Elaine Edwards, Robert Strauss, Jim L. Brown, Ted de Corsia

Synopsis: Thanks to the notorious gangland conference in Appalachian, New York, the word "Mafia" was on everyone's lips in 1959. Rushing to capitalize on this fact was the low-budget expose Inside the Mafia. Grant Richards plays a Lucky Luciano type who is about to return to the US after several years' Read More

Chicago Confidential

Actors: Brian Keith, Beverly Garland, Dick Foran, Beverly Tyler, Elisha Cook, Jr., Paul Langton, Douglas Kennedy, Jack Lambert, Phyllis Coates

Synopsis: Chicago Confidential may not have been the best of the late-1950s "expose" films, but it certainly boasted one of the most impressive casts. Based on the factual best-seller by Jack Lait and Lee Mortimer, the film stars Brian Keith as a State Attorney who vows to bring corrupt Chicago union Read More

Maverick: Stage West

Synopsis: Having been summoned Westward by a letter from her husband, who claims to have a valuable silver mine, Linda Harris (Erin O'Brien) arrives to find that she is now a widow. Enlisting the aid of Bret Maverick (James Garner), Linda embarks upon a perilous journey through Indian territory in search of Read More

The Adventures of Champion [TV Series]

Actors: Barry Curtis, Jim Bannon

The Great Jesse James Raid

Actors: Willard Parker, Barbara Payton, Tom Neal, Wallace Ford, James Anderson

Synopsis: Within its own modest limits, The Great Jesse James Raid is a well-crafted western. Willard Parker plays Jesse James, who when the film opens is seen comfortably settled into respectable retirement. At the instigation of the unscrupulous Bob Ford (Jim Bannon), Jesse leaves hearth and home behind Read More

Jack Slade

Actors: Mark Stevens, Barton MacLane, John Litel, Paul Langton

Synopsis: The psychological makeup of a dangerous gunman is probed in Jack Slade. Beginning with his childhood, Slade (Mark Stevens) is shown to be extremely unbalanced; in fact, he kills his first man at age 13. Growing up in the West, Slade comes to the conclusion that his gun is his only friend. At Read More

Phantom from Space

Actors: Ted Cooper, Rudolph Anders, Noreen Nash, James Seay, Harry Landers

Synopsis: Phantom from Space is a far better film than its lurid title and skintight budget would indicate. The scene is Santa Monica, where the community is plagued by what seems to be a serial killer. Thanks to a pre-credits sequence, the audience knows that the murderer is a visitor from outer space, who Read More

Rodeo

Actors: Jane Nigh, John Archer, Wallace Ford, Gary Gray, Frances Rafferty

Synopsis: Hard-working leading lady Jane Nigh attains top billing in 1952's Rodeo. It's all about rough-and-ready gal Nancy Cartwright (Nigh) who takes over a travelling rodeo after the manager skips town with the payroll. Under her guidance, the show becomes a money-making proposition. Unfortunately, in Read More

Lawless Cowboys

Actors: Whip Wilson, Jim Bannon, Fuzzy Knight, Lee Roberts, Pamela Duncan

Synopsis: Monogram's Whip Wilson western series was in its final year of existence when Lawless Cowboys hit the screen. Set in the contemporary West, the film casts Wilson as a Texas Ranger on the trail of a crooked gambling ring. The bad guys are doing their best to fix the results of local rodeo events. Read More

Stagecoach Driver

Nevada Badmen

Synopsis: The "badmen" of the title in this average western from Monogram are Waller (I. Stanford Jolley), a greedy express agent and Banker Jensen (Bill Kennedy, who conspire to separate Bob Bannon (Kenne Duncan) from the gold found on his property. Bob's brother Jim (Jim Bannon) and his two pals Whip Read More

Ridin' the Outlaw Trail

Actors: Charles Starrett, Smiley Burnette, Edgar Dearing, Peter Thompson

Synopsis: Charles Starrett plays lawman Steve Forsythe in Ridin' the Outlaw Trail. Somewhere along the line, of course, Steve is obliged to don the mask of The Durango Kid, mysterious righter of wrongs. The "wrongs" in this instance include the theft of $20,000 in gold, and the "kidnapping" of a Read More

Wanted Dead or Alive

Synopsis: No relation to the TV series of the same name, Wanted: Dead or Alive is a Monogram "B" western, vintage 1951. Its star is the studio's answer to PRC's Lash LaRue: Whip Wilson. Riding into a small town, a stranger (Whip) is accused of being a fugitive criminal. He eventually clears himself, but not Read More

Canyon Raiders

Synopsis: Whip Wilson only gets to crack his trademark weapon once in this economic Western filmed in toto at the Iverson Movie Ranch in Chatsworth, CA. A government agent, Wilson arrives in the near ghost town of Tunis, where his friend (Jim Bannon) is in trouble with a couple of horse thieves. The Read More

Unknown World

Actors: Victor Kilian, Bruce Kellogg, Otto Waldis, Jim Bannon, Tom Handley

Synopsis: Assembled by the same production team responsible for the minor sci-fi classic Rocketship X-M, Unknown World isn't quite in the same league as its predecessor. The plot is set in motion by Dr. Jeremiah Morley (Victor Kilian), who theorizes that mankind could save itself during a nuclear attack by Read More

The Fighting Redhead

Actors: Jim Bannon, Don Kay Reynolds, Emmett Lynn, Peggy Stewart

Synopsis: Though Eagle Lion's "Red Ryder" westerns were not as well received as the earlier entries from Republic, they still managed to turn a profit. In Fighting Redhead, the heroic Ryder is played by Jim Bannon, with Don Kay Reynolds -- aka Little Brown Jug -- as Ryder's youthful Indian chum Little Read More

Jiggs and Maggie out West

Actors: Joe Yule, Renie Riano, George McManus, Tim Ryan, Jim Bannon

Synopsis: Monogram's Bringing Up Father series, based on the popular comic strip by George McManus, hit a high point of sorts with 1950's Jiggs and Maggie Out West. Joe Yule Sr. (Mickey Rooney's father) and Rene Riano are perfectly cast as nouveau riche Jiggs and Maggie, who head thataway when Maggie Read More

Kill the Umpire

Actors: William Bendix, Una Merkel, Ray Collins, Gloria Henry, Richard Taylor

Synopsis: William Bendix is perfectly cast as a diehard baseball fan who hates umpires with every fibre of his being. Bendix' devotion to baseball has lost him job after job, so his father-in-law (Ray Collins)--who happens to be an umpire--forces Our Hero to enroll in umpire school. Eventually Bendix learns Read More

Sierra Passage

Actors: Wayne Morris, Lola Albright, Roland Winters, Lloyd Corrigan

Synopsis: Sierra Passage was the first of a brief series of program westerns produced by Monogram and starring Wayne Morris. The film casts Morris as Johnny Yorke, the sharpshooting star of a travelling show run by Sam (Roland Winters) and Thad (Lloyd Corrigan). Johnny hopes someday to run across the man Read More

Cowboy and the Prizefighter

Actors: Jim Bannon, Emmett Lynn, Don Haggerty, Karen Randle

Synopsis: Jim Bannon's final "Red Ryder" western was the Cinecolor effort Cowboy and the Prizefighter. Aiding and abetting the red-headed Ryder is his youthful Indian sidekick Little Beaver (Don Kay Reynolds, aka Little Brown Jug) and a tough galoot named Steve (Don Haggerty), whose life the hero saves in Read More

Daughter of the Jungle

Actors: Lois Hall, James B. Cardwell, William Wright, Sheldon Leonard, Jim Nolan

Synopsis: In this low-budget Africa-set jungle adventure, the excitement begins when a small plane crash-lands deep in the dense tropical forest. Everyone survives the landing, but now they must survive the many dangers there as they journey through the jungle to safety. It doesn't help that two of the Read More

Ride, Ryder, Ride!

Actors: Jim Bannon, Emmett Lynn, Peggy Stewart, Gaylord "Steve" Pendleton

Synopsis: Filmed in "glorious" Cinecolor by Eagle-Lion, this was the first of four "Red Ryder" westerns starring Jim Bannon in the title-role, Don Kay Reynolds (billed, a bit condescendingly, as "Little Brown Jug") as juvenile sidekick Little Beaver, Emmett Lynn as Buckskin, and Marin Sais as Red Ryder's Read More

Roll, Thunder, Roll

Actors: Jim Bannon, Don Kay Reynolds, Emmett Lynn, I. Stanford Jolley

Synopsis: Jim Bannon is back as enduring cowboy hero Red Ryder in Eagle-Lion's Roll, Thunder, Roll. As ever, Ryder's cohorts are Little Beaver and the Duchess, here played by "Little Brown Jug" (aka Don Kay Reynolds) and Marin Sais. This time, Ryder tries to prove that a series of cattle raids and ranch Read More

The Man from Colorado

Actors: Glenn Ford, William Holden, Ellen Drew, Ray Collins, Edgar Buchanan

Synopsis: Glenn Ford is top-billed in Man From Colorado, though he's anything but a hero. Ford plays a seriously disturbed Civil War vet who kills because he enjoys killing. William Holden, Ford's army buddy, tries to stem Ford's homicidal tendencies. When Ford is appointed the "hanging" judge of a Colorado Read More

Dangers of the Canadian Mounted [Serial]

Synopsis: This action adventure centers on the attempts of the courageous Canadian cops to stop crooks from finding a fabulous hidden treasure. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Trail to Laredo

Synopsis: Filmed at the Providencia Ranch (today's Forrest Lawn in Burbank, CA), this typical "Durango Kid" Western featured the Cass County Boys performing "Go West Young Lady" by Sammy Cahn and Saul Chaplin, in addition to series regular Smiley Burnette singing his own "It's My Turn" and "The Yodeler. Read More

Frontier Revenge

Synopsis: Produced on the cheap by Ron Ormond and his wife, June Carr, this Western was one of ten to star Lash LaRue and Al St. John, formerly of PRC. They are assigned to catch a gang of outlaws working out of Rhyolite, a town run by Duce Rago (Ray Bennett), who is posing as a legitimate businessman. With Read More

Miraculous Journey

Actors: Rory Calhoun, Audrey Long, George Cleveland, Jim Bannon, June Storey

Synopsis: In this psychological drama, a group of people are stranded in a remote jungle after a plane crash. The disparate reactions of each are chronicled through out the story as they learn to survive in their new jungle home. Fortunately, they are helped by a man who was similarly stranded several years Read More

Framed

Actors: Glenn Ford, Janis Carter, Barry Sullivan, Edgar Buchanan, Karen Morley

Synopsis: A man down on his luck runs afoul of a beautiful but dangerous woman in this superior low-budget film noir. Mike Lambert (Glenn Ford), while trained as a mining engineer, has fallen on hard times and is driving a truck when his rig breaks down in a small town. He soon meets the seductive Read More

T-Men

Actors: Dennis O'Keefe, Mary Meade, Charles McGraw, Alfred Ryder, Wallace Ford, June Lockhart

Synopsis: The moodily evocative docudrama T-Men stars Dennis O'Keefe as Dennis O'Brien, a treasury agent determined to bring a counterfeiting ring to justice. O'Brien and his partner Tony Genaro (Alfred Ryder) go undercover to gain the confidence of the ruthless Detroit mob responsible for the phony money. Read More

The Corpse Came C.O.D.

Actors: George Brent, Joan Blondell, Adele Jergens, Jim Bannon, Leslie Brooks

Synopsis: Reminiscent of the classic "screwball" comedy-mysteries of the prewar years, Columbia's The Corpse Came C.O.D stars Warner Bros. alumni George Brent and Joan Blondell as rival Hollywood-based reporters Joe Medford and Rosemary Durant. When movie star Mona Harrison (Adele Jergens) receives a dead Read More

The 13th Hour

Synopsis: The last of the Richard "The Jaw" Dix films. Dix, the trucking company owner, is pitted against time to discover who murdered a police officer rival of his. He must do so to clear his own name, as the murder was pinned on him. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

Johnny O'Clock

Actors: Dick Powell, Evelyn Keyes, Lee J. Cobb, Ellen Drew, Nina Foch

Synopsis: Three years after song-and-dance man Dick Powell reshaped his nice-guy image by playing hard-boiled gumshoe Phillip Marlowe in Murder My Sweet, he returned to film noir with this crime-based thriller. Johnny O'Clock (Dick Powell) and his partner Pete Marchettis (Thomas Gomez) operate a Read More

The Thirteenth Hour

Synopsis: In this drama, a trucker's business is nearly destroyed after he is wrongfully accused of killing a policeman with whom he recently quarreled. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

The Devil's Mask

Actors: Anita Louise, Jim Bannon, Michael Duane, Mona Barrie, Barton Yarborough

Synopsis: This entry in the short "I Love a Mystery" series has detective Jack Packard and his sidekick Doc Young investigating the identity of a shrunken head that was discovered in a downed cargo plane. The head was one of four others discovered in the wreckage. It was notable as having belonged to a Read More

Out of the Depths

Actors: Jim Bannon, Ken Curtis, Ross Hunter, Coulter Irwin

Synopsis: Told in flashback, Out of the Depths strives to explain why its four male protagonists are bobbing around the Pacific in a lifeboat. The story proper begins as Captain Faversham (Jim Bannon) and his crew embark upon a secret mission which takes them into Japanese waters. The plan is to prevent a Read More

Renegades

Actors: Willard Parker, Larry Parks, Edgar Buchanan, Jim Bannon

Synopsis: Whenever budget-conscious Columbia laid out good money for Technicolor in the 1940s, it was usually for a musical or an "A" western. Renegades falls into the latter category. Fresh from The Jolson Story, Larry Parks stars as the son of a notorious, Scripture-spouting outlaw (Edgar Buchanan). Parks Read More

The Unknown

Actors: Karen Morley, Jim Bannon, Jeff Donnell, Robert Scott, Robert Wilcox

Synopsis: The Unknown was the last of three Columbia programmers based on the legendary radio series I Love a Mystery. Carried over from the radio version are Jim Bannon and Barton Yarborough as Jack Packard and Barton Yarborough, adventurers for hire. The plot concerns the efforts of amnesiac Nina Arnold Read More

Tonight and Every Night

Actors: Rita Hayworth, Lee Bowman, Janet Blair, Marc Platt, Leslie Brooks, Florence Bates

Synopsis: Based on a play by Leslie Storm, Tonight and Every Night is a musical wartime morale booster in which star Rita Hayworth is but one of a lively ensemble. Set in battle-scarred Britain, the action takes place in a seedy old music hall, which never misses a performance even at the height of the Read More

The Gay Senorita

Synopsis: In this drama, a young building contractor falls for a pretty Mexican woman who convinces him not to evict the inhabitants of a California barrio so he can replace it with developments. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

I Love a Mystery

Actors: Nina Foch, Jim Bannon, George Macready, Barton Yarborough, Carole Mathews

Synopsis: Based on Phillips Lord's popular radio serial, I Love a Mystery centers around the exploits of two pugnacious private eyes (marked down from the radio version's three heroes). The adventuresome Jack Packard (Jack Bannon) and Doc Long (Barton Yarborough) are hired by a nervous socialite (George Macready Read More

Sergeant Mike

Actors: Larry Parks, Jeanne Bates, Loren Tindall, Jim Bannon

Synopsis: In this patriotic war drama, a soldier becomes quite upset when he is transferred from the highly coveted machine-gun unit to the canine corps. He begins to change his opinion when he learns that his army dog Mike was a gift from an 8-year-old whose father was killed in the war. Now the soldier Read More

The Missing Juror

Actors: Jim Bannon, Janis Carter, George Macready, Jean Stevens, Joseph Crehan

Synopsis: Jim Bannon, fresh from his radio success on I Love a Mystery, stars in this taut suspenser. The jurors of a celebrated murder case are being bumped off one by one. Now only six jurors are left, and one of them has disappeared, whereabouts unknown. Bannon must find the missing juror before the Read More

The Soul of a Monster

Actors: Rose Hobart, George Macready, Jim Bannon, Jeanne Bates

Synopsis: Advertised as a pure-and-simple horror film, Soul of a Monster is actually an adroit variation on the "Faust" legend. George Macready plays Dr. George Winson, who is saved from the brink of death by the intervention of his loving wife Ann (Jeanne Bates). In desperation, Ann had offered to make a Read More

Riders of the Deadline

Actors: William "Hopalong" Boyd, Andy Clyde, Jimmy Rogers, Richard Crane, Robert Mitchum

Synopsis: Two newcomers, Robert Mitchum and Richard Crane, take center stage in this lavishly budgeted entry in the long-running Hopalong Cassidy series. The latter plays Tim Mason, a young hothead about to be inducted into the Texas Rangers on the behest of his good friend, Hoppy (William Boyd). Read More

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