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Trents Last Case (1952)
A Woman's Kiss That Killed
Filmmaker(s): Herbert Wilcox

When a wealthy business man is found dead reporter Philip Trent is sent to investigate. Against the police conclusions, he suspects the assumed suicide is really a murder, and becomes highly interested in the young widow and the dead man's private secretary.

Hidden should be a superb movie in the mystery tradition. It has a truly complex plot that has several reveals, and a suitably Holmes-like detective. The problem is that we see the detective working things out like a Poirot would. But we learn absolutely nothing...


Published September 30, 2022
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Jim Hanvey Detective (1937)
Sly but not slick - Jim Hanvey tops them all! Guy Kibbee ....his most loveable role!
Filmmaker(s): Phil Rosen

Jim Hanvey is a genial but top-notch detective who has retired to his country home. An insurance company hires him to find a missing emerald so they won't have to pay out the $100,000 for which the jewel is insured. It doesn't take him long to find the emerald, but he discovers that finding it was the easy part; the difficult part is getting it back to its rightful owner, and he winds up involved in a murder in which an innocent man is framed.

Straw Dogs can do better than watching most current movies by noodling around with old detective movies from the 30’s. They are generally not very good, but collectively they defined the base for our most common idiom. This one, thankfully, has no racist comedy player....


Published May 13, 2022
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Alibi Mark (1937)
Filmmaker(s): Joseph Henabery

When an out-of-work Chicagoan travels west as a hobo on a freight train, he finds himself falsely accused of murder.

Signs of Trauma, Film as Meal what a strange film. My interest in these comments is in the qualities of introspection: where the viewer is placed in the narrative and how different layers of that stance are manipulated. The CCC, as duly described in this...


Published October 2, 2022
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Inside the Room (1935)
Filmmaker(s): Leslie S. Hiscott

A French sleuth in England helps the police solve a series of murders linked by the diary pages of a dead woman.

Clean on Top, Dirty on Bottom are several events in US history that damaged the nation. We will not recover from the Civil War for generations if current politics remain, as they surely will. Prohibition and abortion. Wars. Book burnings. Among these is the Hayes act....


Published August 14, 2022
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The White Cockatoo (1935)
Try to pick the killer, Try to pick the next victim!
Filmmaker(s): Alan Crosland

In a spooky hotel on the coast of France, two bands of crooks are working independently of the other in an attempt to steal the inherited fortune of an American girl, Sue Tally. Along the way the heiress is kidnapped, three murders are committed, a girl appears in two places at once, mysterious persons roam about the old hotel at night and mysteriously disappear, and there is a hidden room without any doors.

Bible Verses pride myself on being able to say something both useful and positive about a film, a discipline a wise man taught as a practice for the more useful challenge with souls we meet. The dynamics overlap in narratives that each carry. I found it...


Published October 2, 2022
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Schlitz On Mount Washington (1935)
Filmmaker(s): Christopher Young

Schlitz is a tourist in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Ignoring posted warnings which say that you shouldn't climb Mount Washington (the tallest mountain in New England) in bad weather, Schlitz pushes onward up the mountain, briefcase in hand. He gets lost in the snow, becomes entangled in mischief spun by a quirky hermit, and finally ends up skiing down Tuckerman's Ravine at perilous speeds, losing his briefcase several times.

Benny Hill’s Slippers would have been one of the shorts on a program designed to fill out a date night. It is just filler, basically slapstick on skis. The joke is that the performer is an extraordinary expert to be able to appear so clumsy....


Published October 9, 2022
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Roswolsky’s Mistress (1921)
Filmmaker(s): Felix Basch

Mia Verhag loses her job as a chorus singer when she rejects the advances of the theatre director. While she is in the grips of despair, she encounters the millionaire Roswolsky, who takes her to his luxurious house and gives her a key to the garden gate, allowing her to visit the surrounding park whenever she pleases. This chance meeting sends rumours flying everywhere, and soon Mia appears on the front pages of all the newspapers as Roswolsky’s mistress. The city’s merchants and creditors compete to lend her money, and she lands the leading role in the theatre’s new production. There, she falls in love with Count Albich – but, believing the rumours, he avoids her. Mia follows him to Monte Carlo, while Roswolsky himself falls genuinely in love with her and plots to take Albich out of the running. A grand drama is set to unfold.

Industrial Revolution came to this as a warmup for what trusted folks say will be an important viewing in her ‘Hamlet’ made this same year. This is a woman who invented women in film, so popular she went by ‘The Asta’. She was so powerful that...


Published June 17, 2025
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Hamlet (1921)
Filmmaker(s): Svend Gade, Heinz Schall

A free adaptation of Shakespeare′s drama. The Danish queen masquerades her daughter as a boy, and thus, the girl lives her life as 'Prince' Hamlet. Her father poisoned by a venomous snake placed by the treacherous Claudius, Hamlet fakes madness to investigate without suspicion.

Citizen Asta has long been attractive to vain actors, despite its opposing energy. Mel Gibson! Olivier! So many… And such committed variety. There are four notable things. The first is that the play may be the richest long form narrative in history, essentially inventing poetic metaphor....


Published June 17, 2025
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The Arrival from the Darkness (1921)
Filmmaker(s): Jan S. Kolár

One of the first Czechoslovak films to be shown abroad--a fantasy horror, filmed on the fully furnished premises of the Berlin film studio Am Zoo. The central role is portrayed by the “arrivee from darkness”, Ješek, who is awakened from a deathly sleep. The film represents unusual sparks of creative efforts and the ambitions of creative community around the director Jan S. Kolár, who was inspired by international trends and techniques.

Parallel Realities this is yet another instance of a woman actress, made a star by her filmmaker lover. The story is a valentine to her charm and beauty, sufficient to bend reality. She indeed became a star until talkies made her accent unsellable. Here, she...


Published June 25, 2025
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The Secret of House No. 5 (1912)
Filmmaker(s): Kai Hansen

Choose your own Revolution the basic info first. This is the first 15 minutes of a silent film without inter-titles that we are told is both a vampire story and a mystery. The people appear and act as any actors would representing the upper class...


Published March 2, 2025
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