Harrison's Reports (1954)

70 HARRISON’S REPORTS May 1, 1954 “Laughing Anne” with Margaret Lockwood, Wendell Corey and Forrest Tucker (Republic, July 1; time, 91 min.) A pretty good romantic adventure melodrama, photographed in Technicolor. Credit is due producer-director Herbert Wilcox for the manner in which he has captured the flavor of Joseph Conrad's widely-read novel. The action is fast enough to hold one’s attention throughout, and there are plenty of sex situations. The scenes of attempted murder hold one in tense suspense. The color photography is not the best that has yet come from Great Britain, but just the same it enhances the beauty of the jungle scenes as well as the sequences at sea. Some of the exteriors were shot in Malaya and some at the studio in London, but they have been integrated so skillfully that they impress one as if they were shot on the spot. Wendell Corey is very good as the subdued but manly skipper of a trading schooner, and his love for Margaret Lockwood is believable. One is sympathetic to Miss Lockwood, who does excellent work in an unpleasant role. Forrest Tucker is good as Miss Lockwood’s morose lover, and Ronald Shiner is breezy and humorous as Corey’s chief aide. Miss Lockwood’s renditions of two tuneful songs are worthy of special mention. The action takes place in the 1880’s and is told partly in flashback; — Forrest Tucker, a heavyweight fighter, wins the right to challenge John L. Sullivan for the championship, but his refusal to make a deal with underworld crooks for a “fixed” fight results in a brawl that leaves Tucker’s hands so injured as to make him useless as a fighter. He drifts to the Eastern Seas, accompanied by Margaret, his mistress, who had once been the toast of the Paris demi-monde. While earning a hving as a singer in a sordid Javenese bar, Margaret meets Corey and stows away on his ship. Shiner, Corey’s general handyman, begs Corey to take Margaret to Singapore. En route, Corey falls under Margaret’s spell and asks her to marry him, but she declines the offer out of loyalty to Tucker. Some years later, while stopping at a lonely settlement to pick up a cargo of old dollars called in by the government, Corey meets Margaret again, sunk in squalor but still wearing the frayed finery of happier days. He learns that she is still with Tucker but with her now is a little boy whom Corey believes to be his own son even though Margaret denies it. Meanwhile Tucker learns about Corey’s valuable cargo and plans to seize it. Margaret learns of Corey’s danger and signals him with her famous laughter, enabling him to beat off Tucker and his thugs. Enraged at Margaret’s betrayal. Tucker goes after her and strikes her with a club just as he is shot dead by Corey. With her dying breath, Margaret begs Corey to take the boy away with him as his father. Thus Corey and the youngster set sail together. Herbert Wilcox produced and directed it, from a screenplay by Pamela Bower, based on the story by Joseph Conrad. Adult entertainment. “The Forty-Niners” with Wild Bill Elliott, Virginia Grey and Henry Morgan (Allied Artists, May 9; time, 71 min.) Those who play western melodramas need not fear to book this one, for it is so well directed and acted that the characters and their actions seem real and believable. This time Wild Bill Elliott, as a U. S. Marshal, poses as a gunman in order to learn the identity of three murderers, and he succeeds in attaining his objective in a logical way. Elliott is excellent in his role. Henry Morgan, too, does a fine piece of acting as a card sharp who becomes regenerated and who helps Elliott to trap the killers, even though he himself was imphcated in their misdeeds 'although not in the murder. The action keeps the spectator’s interest tense all the way through. There is no comedy relief. The photography is good : — Elliott is sent by his superiors to a gold-boom town in California to learn the identity of three murderers. Arriving there, he poses as a killer himself and soon strikes up a friendship with Morgan, a card sharp, after saving him from being lynched for cheating in a poker game. Morgan, grateful to Elliott, suggests that they become partners because his skill with the cards and Elliott’s ability with a gun should make them a fortune. Elliott pretends to agree, hoping that Morgan would lead him to thp killers. In due time Morgan leads Elliott to Lane Bradford, the sheriff, and John Douchette, Bradford’s partner in a saloon and gambling casino, both implicated in the murder. Morgan, for years in love with Virginia Grey, Douchette’s wife, attempts to double-cross his two former accomplices, but in doing so he is fatally wounded by Douchette. In a gunfight, Elliott kills Bradford in self-defense and then arrests Douchette. A letter written by Morgan before his death, coupled with testimony from Stanford Jolly, an ex-convict, clears up the case and sends Douchette to jail. Vincent M. Fennelly produced it, and Thomas Carr directed it, from a story and screenplay by Dan Ullman. Family. “The Long Wait” with Anthony Quinn, Chau-les Coburn and Peggie Castle (United Artists, May; time, 93 min.) “The Long Wait” has the ingredients to satisfy those who enjoy tough and tense melodramas that are highlighted by underworld activities, murders and plentiful sex. Based on Mickey Spillane’s best-selling novel of the same name, it offers an involved but tension-packed story of a cunning, two-fisted amnesia victim who, seeking a clue to his identity, finds that he is accused of murder and of a bank robbery. The action is marked by considerable violence before the hero proves his innocence, uncovers the real culprits, and regains his memory. Anthony Quinn is highly effective as the tough-as-nails hero who tangles with an assortment of unsavory characters, including four beautiful women who find him irresistable. Some of the love scenes between Quinn and the girls are on the torrid side, and these scenes, coupled with some of the brutal action depicted, hardly makes it a picture that is suitable for the kiddies. The direction is expert and the photography fine. The story opens with Quinn hitching a ride on a truck and becoming an amnesia victim after the truck becomes involved in an accident. After working for two years in the oil fields, he obtains a possible lead to his identity when he secures a photograph of himself that came from a town called Lyncastle. He hurries there and soon learns that he had been a teller in a bank owned by Charles Coburn; that he was suspected of robbing the bank of $250,000; and that circumstantial evidence pointed to him as the murderer of the town’s district attorney. The authorities, however, did not have sufficient evidence to hold him for the crime. Checking old newspaper accounts of the crime, Quinn learns that “Vera West,” his secretary at the bank, had disappeared at the same time that he had left town, and it becomes apparent to him that the answer to his guilt or innocence lies in finding the girl. His efforts to locate the girl lead him into conflict with Gene Evans, the town’s racketeer boss, who warns him to get out of town immediately. Quinn’s refusal leads to a series of attempts by Evans' hoodlums to kill Quinn. While combatting Evans’ efforts to dispose of him, Quinn comes in contact with Peggie Castle, Mary Ellen Kay, Shawn Smith and Dolores Donlan, each associated with Evans in some way, and each with a mysterious background that indicates that she might be the missing “Vera,” whose facial features had been changed by plastic surgery. After many intrigues, brutal beatings and narrow escapes from death, Quinn uncovers Coburn as the mastermind behind the robbery and the murder, having committed the crimes in association with Evans and several crooked detectives. He discovers also that Mary is the missing ”Vera,” that she had married him before his disappearance, and that she had hidden her identity to get close to Evans for information that would prove Quinn’s innocence. It was produced by Lesser Samuels, and directed by Victor Saville, from a screenplay by Alan Green and Lesser Samuels. Adults.