Harrison's Reports (1948)

74 HARRISON'S REPORTS May 8, 1948 "River Lady" with Yvonne DeCarlo, Dan Duryea and Rod Cameron (Universal, June; time, 78 min.) Photographed in Technicolor, "River Lady" should go over fairly well with those who like plenty of action and excitement in their film fare. Critical patrons may find the plot too obvious to hold their interest. It is a well mounted, if spotty, outdoor melodrama, and not the least of its better points is the strikingly beautiful background of logging and timber country. The story itself is the old one about a powerful lumber syndicate trying to squeeze out the independent lumbermen in the area, all of which is tied in with a rather trite romantic triangle. The characterizations are stereotyped, and the story's dramatic content is never as persuasive as it tries to be, but what it lacks dramatically is made up for by the well staged brawls and the inevitable climatic battle at the finish between the opposing factions. The action takes place in 1860: — With the aid of Dan Duryea, a smooth but ruthless confidence man, Yvonne DeCarlo, wealthy owner of a Mississippi gambling boat, organizes a syndicate to squeeze out the territory's independent lumbermen. In love with Rod Cameron, a happy-go-lucky lumberjack, Yvonne urges him to marry her, but he declines, proclaiming that he intended to make his own way in life first. Yvonne, desperate, pays $50,000 for an interest in the failing business of John Mclntirc, an independent lumberman, with the understanding that he make Cameron his general manager without revealing her part in the arrangement. Cameron accepts the job. In the course of events, Helena Carter, Mclntire's daughter, falls in love with him. But Cameron retains his love for Yvonne and, within several months, feels himself financially able to announce his engagement to her. Determined to break up the impending marriage, Helena reveals to him Yvonne's part in getting him the job. Furious over Yvonne's meddling, and learning that she was head of the syndicate, Cameron breaks with her, marries Helena, and rallies the independents to form a combine to market their lumber. Yvonne, in revenge, sets out to break up the combine. With Duryea to do her bidding, she takes the lumberjacks away from Cameron by offering to pay them double wages. Cameron, however, succeeds in getting the men back. In a final move, Yvonne orders Duryea and his cohorts to create a log jam to prevent Cameron from delivering his lumber to the mills. A terrific fight ensues on the river, culminating with Duryea's death. Realizing that her love for Cameron was hopeless, Yvonne gives up the fight and bows out of his life. Leonard Goldstein produced it and George Sherman directed it from a screen play by D. D. Bcauchamp and William Bowers, based on the novel by Houston Branch and Frank Waters. The cast includes Lloyd Gough, Jack Lambert and others. Unobjectionable morally. "Waterfront at Midnight" with William Gargan, Mary Beth Hughes and Richard Travis (Paramount, June 25; time, 63 min.) A fairly interesting "cops and robbers" melodrama; it should serve adequately as a supporting feature on a doublebill. The story is not particularly novel, but it has human interest and is well-contrived. Moreover, expert direction has given it a swift pace and a goodly quota of excitement and suspense that is neatly maintained throughout. A novel twist to the story is where the villain murders the hero's wayward brother, then tricks the hero into believing that he (the hero) had killed him. The hero's grief saddens one, but at the finish he learns of the trickery and captures the crooks. The performances are uniformly good: — Having been reduced in rank for arresting Richard Travis, leader of a waterfront gang of thieves, on flimsy evidence, William Gargan is reinstated as a police lieutenant to cope with the rise in ship lootings. Gargan warns Travis that he was out to get him. Meanwhile Travis learns that Richard Crane, Gargan's younger brother, was in need of a job; he sees to it that he is employed by a rent-a-car agency owned by him. Shortly thereafter, Crane becomes involved in a shooting committed by one of Travis' henchmen and, as his price for silence, demands that Travis cut him in on his nefarious schemes. Gargan learns of his brother's tie-up with Travis when he catches him and the others looting a ship. The crooks make their escape by blowing up the police launch. Gargan, unhurt, goes into hiding after letting it be known that he had been killed. Crane, embittered over his brother's "death," gets into a fight with Travis and is murdered. Discovering that Gargan was still alive, Travis tricks him into following two of his henchmen to a boatshed where, after drawing his gunfire, they toss Crane's body down a flight of steps, leading Gargan to believe that he had killed him. Heartbroken, Gargan resigns from the force. Meanwhile Mary Beth Hughes, Travis' sweetheart, gets into an argument with him because of his attentions to another woman. He discards her. In revenge, she reveals to Gargan the trickery in connection with his brother's death. Gargan confronts the gangster and, in the fight that ensues, Travis dies when he falls backwards and is impaled on a pair of knitting needles. It is a Pine-Thomas production directed by William Bcrke from an original screen play by Bernard Girard. The cast includes Horace McMahon, Cheryl Walker, Paul Harvey and others. Unobjectionable morally. "The Fuller Brush Man" with Red Skelton and Janet Blair (Columbia, June; time, 91 min.) A pretty good comedy-mystery, with the accent on slapstick. Cast in the type of role that suits his brand of humor. Red Skelton has a field day as an inept brush salesman who becomes involved in a murder. There is little sense to the story, but it serves nicely as a framework for the many funny gags and situations. The most hilarious part of the picture is the final chase sequence, which takes up every bit of two reels or more. This sequence takes place in a huge warehouse loaded with surplus war goods, such as rockets, rubber rafts, and many other gadgets, which Skelton explodes and inflates as he tries to hinder the villain and his cohorts who were bent on capturing him. The whole sequence is slapstick in its broadest form and, in crowded theatres, will be greeted with howls of laughter. The story is not without its occasional dull moments, but these are not serious enough to impair one's overall enjoyment of the film. The producer has evidently tried to avoid inserting into the story anything that might smack of commercial propaganda; nevertheless, the picture cannot help being one big advertisement for the Fuller Brush Company: — Skelton, a street cleaner, proposes to Janet Blair, but she refuses to marry him until he is a success like Dan McGuire, a brush salesman, who had been courting her. Fired when he unwittingly damages the car of Nicholas Joy, the sanitation commissioner, Skelton sets out to prove his mettle as a brush salesman. After a discouraging day, he finally succeeds in selling ten brushes to Hillary Brooke, the commissioner's wife, but forgets to collect for them in the excitement. He returns to the house that night to collect the money. There, besides the commissioner and his wife, he finds their nephew, Ross Ford; his fiancee, Trudy Marshall; and the commissioner's partner, Donald Curtis. The lights go out suddenly, during which the commissioner is murdered. Although the murder weapon cannot be found, Skelton, because of his falling out with the dead man, becomes the major suspect. He sets out to clear himself and, after finding reason to suspect each of the others present at the murder, centers his attention on Curtis. In the course of events, Skelton and Janet are lured to a warehouse by Curtis, who reveals himself as the murderer and plans to kill them. The couple lead Curtis and his hechmen a wild chase through the maze of war surplus equipment until finally saved by the police and the fire departments. Skelton seals the case against Curtis by proving that the murder weapon was a plastic brush handle, which took the form of a dagger when placed in boiling water and which resumed it original shape when cool. S. Sylvan Simon produced and directed it from a screen play by Frank Tashlin and Devery Freeman, based a story by Roy Huggins. Unobjectionable morally.