Rookie

 

 (youtube)

POLICE ROOKIE-1940-Criminal "The Dutch Man" gets off again. Veteran cop Mike Hannigan (Richard Homans) goes undercover to find "the big boss" who's running things. He finds some evidence in a warehouse and is shot but chases off the gunmen. Back home, with his wife (Mary Gordon; Mrs. Hudson in the Universal Sherlock Holmes series), and their son Stevie (Gordon Jones), they have a fight over Stevie not wanting to go to the police academy. Stevie's friend Joe Kelly (Craig Reynolds) stops by and Mike is killed when a bomb blows up his car. Stevie and Joe decide to join the police department and catch Mike's killer. Mike passes the exam but Joe fails. 

Mike gets into hot water with his boss later on while investigating on his own. Following a lead to a nightclub, he meets a talkative floozy (Veda Ann Borg) while Joe kind of romances Mike's girl (Joyce Compton). Mike eventually discovers his dad's killer but almost makes a big mistake. It ends kind of tragically. 

This low budget crime drama was directed with speed by the super-fast Sam Newfield. One of 14 movies he directed in 1940! PRC (Newfield's brother Sigmund Neufeld produced most of their films) originally released POLICE ROOKIE as I TAKE THIS OATH. The title was changed upon a re-release. Of course, star Gordon Jones later played “Mike the cop” on the Abbott & Costello TV show. A few well-known character actors appear: Keene Duncan, Arthur O'Connell and Harry Harvey.

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Giant Mollusk

 

 (imdb)

THE MONSTER THAT CHALLENGED THE WORLD-1957-At an Air Force facility near The Salton Sea, 3 men are mysteriously killed. Lt. Commander Twillinger (Tim Holt) investigates with the help of a local sheriff (Gordon Jones) and an atomic scientist (Hans Conried!). After several more deaths, it's discovered giant mollusks are breeding underwater. Twillinger also has time to sort of romance a secretary (Audrey Dalton), a widow with a young daughter (Mimi Gibson) who causes a lot of trouble! 

This is a pretty good low budget horror/sci-fi story with a weird monster and a good climax. Director Arthur Laven spent most of his career in TV, only occasionally stepping out to make a feature length film (THE RACK (1956), GERONIMO (1962)). Too bad he didn't do more movies with monsters in them.

 For years MONSTER was always listed as star Tim Holt's final movie but he made the regional film THE YESTERDAY MACHINE in 1965 and HG Lewis' THIS STUFF'LL KILL YA! (1971). Audrey Dalton was later in William Castle's MR. SARDONICUS and lots of TV. Hans Conreid, usually an over-the-top comedian (THE TWONKY; THE 5,000 FINGERS OF DR. T.; both 1953) isvery sedate and serious here. Gordon Jones of course had been Mike the Cop on The Abbott & Costello Show in the early '50's. There are also several character actors squeezed in: Milton Parsons, Ralph Moody, Dale Van Sickel.

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Night Waitress

NIGHT WAITRESS-1936-Helen Roberts (English actress Margot Grahame) is a waitress on probation. She gets involved with schooner operator Martin Rhodes (Gordon Jones, the future Green Hornet) after he gets mixed up with some “secret cargo”. After some misunderstandings and a quick chase and fight (the whole thing is less than an hour!) Rhodes discovers the “cargo” is an armored car filled with money lying underwater. 

Marc Lawrence and (un-billed) Anthony Quinn are two gangsters after both of them. Western star Don “Red” Barry is a murder victim. Comedian Billy Gilbert is a bar owner. 

Director Lew Landers had previously directed the Boris Karloff/Bela Lugosi horror story THE RAVEN under his real name Louis Friedlander. He went on to direct (as Landers) many B-movies including THE BOOGIE MAN WILL GET YOU (with Karloff) and THE RETURN OF THE VAMPIRE (with Lugosi).

Star Margot Grahame was England's highest paid actress before she came to America to co-star in THE INFORMER and THE THREE MUSKETEERS (1935 version).  

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No, It's Not!

EVERYTHING'S DUCKY-1961-Two dumb sailors (Mickey Rooney and Buddy Hackett) who are stationed in the desert are assigned the task of freeing the former pet duck of a deceased scientist. It turns out the duck can talk so they try to find a way to make money off it but this only leads to trouble when the duck (named Scuttlebutt) gets drunk! Scuttlebutt might also hold the secret to the dead doctor's missile experiments. The Navy wants to remove the duck's brain and the two spend the rest of the movie protecting him.

It's all pretty silly and a romantic sub-plot really slows things down. Perhaps Columbia Pictures thought they were creating a new Abbott & Costello but we don't even get Brown & Carney. Speaking of A & C, Gordon Jones (Mike The Cop on their TV show) has a supporting role as a superior officer. Roland Winters is their captain and Jackie Cooper has one scene as a psychiatrist. Also with Richard Deacon, singer Joanie Sommers (whose voice seems to be dubbed...??), Elizabeth Macrae and Alvy Moore.

It was the first full length feature for director Don Taylor after a lot of TV shows. Hackett and Rooney were teamed a year later in IT'S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD. Of course years later Hackett portrayed Lou Costello in the terrible TV movie BUD AND LOU...

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