All Talking All Night

 (imdb)

THE UNHOLY NIGHT-1929-Many murders are taking place during the worst fog ever in London. Lord Montague (Roland Young; later the star of the “Topper” series) survives an attack and is help to Scotland Yard where he meets Sir James (Claude Fleming) who's investigating. It seems there were 4 murders earlier and Montague knew and served with them all. The surviving members all agree to meet at the Lord's house. In another part of the house, James disrupts a seance being conducted by Dr. Ballou (Ernest Torrence) and his fiancé Lady Violet (Natalie Moorland), Montague's sister. 

The remaining regiment includes Lionel Belmore, John Loder and John Miljan as the doomed Mallory who was disfigured in the war. After he's killed, everyone comes under suspicion. Then a woman Efra (Dorothy Sebastian) shows up. Almost immediately Hindu lawyer Abdul (uncredited Boris Karloff) shows up and reads a will from Efra's father, a traitor. The will seems to give a motive for killing and also for breaking up the regiment. They slowly unravel. 

Somehow over night the entire regiment save Montague is killed. James decides to have a kind of seance lead by the sinister looking mystic Sojin (Sojin Kamiyama; who turns out to be a good guy).

It's a crazy, confused and kind of convoluted ending with Karloff giving a weird performance with a strange accent. This was one of the handful of films actor Lionel Barrymore directed in his long career. He and Karloff had acted together earlier in THE BELLS (1926). It also suffers slighty from too much stilted talk. A problem that plagued many early sound films. 

Top billed Ernest Terrence later played Prof. Moriarty in SHERLOCK HOLMES (1932) (with Clive Brook in the titular role) but died the next year from complications from surgery. Karloff had made his “talkie” debut earlier in the year (in BEHIND THAT CURTAIN). Japanese actor Sojin Kamiyama was one of only 3 Asian actors to portray Charlie Chan (in THE CHINESE PARROT (1927)). The story for THE UNHOLY NIGHT was provided by playwright Ben Hecht.

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Silent Talkie

 

 (tcm.com)

THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND-1929-Count Dakkar (Lionel Barrymore) is a brilliant scientist who along with his daughter Sonia (Jacqueline Gadsden) and her fiancé Roget (Lloyd Hughes) invents fantastic submarines to go look for a civ-ilization deep in the sea. But he's betrayed by his friend Baron Falon (Montagu Love) who wants to be dictator of nearby Hetvania. 

This silent film has several scenes with characters speaking and their voyage to a strange undersea kingdom populated by fish men is quite eerie as is a giant octopus attack. Some prints featured tinted color scenes. The SFX are great for the time but some of the scenes with dialogue drag a little. Most likely only used simply because the advent of sound interrupted the production. Snitz Edwards and Gibson Gowland also appear. 

It's loosely based on the 1874 Jules Verne novel of the same name which was a sequel to "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea". A more faithful remake was made in 1961. 

This is only one of three movies directed by Lucien Hubbard who went on to become a producer and writer. A few added scenes were directed by Maurice Tourneur and Benjamin Christensen.

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Browning's Second To Last

 

DEVIL DOLL-1936-Two Devil's Island escapees hide out. One guy, Marcel (Henry B. Walthall), a scientist can shrink living things (he's only done it with dogs so far). He seems to think this will provide more food for mankind. The other guy Paul Lavond (Lionel Barrymore) wants revenge on the business partners who put him in jail. When Marcel dies, Lavond helps Marcel's wife experiment on their servant girl ("We can make the whole world small"). He really doesn't want any part of it but then has an idea. He disguises himself as an old woman and plans his vengeance against the three who did him in. Meanwhile he also visits his daughter Lorraine (Maureen O'Sullivan) who hates her father. She lives with her grandmother who knows her son's secret. Lavond sends a shrunk down person to rob and kill his accusers. In the end, he makes one of them confess (Pedro DeCordoba) and Marcel's wife tries to kill Lavond but she accidentally blows herself up. Lavond meets Lorraine but doesn't reveal his identity, pretending to be Marcel. He says her father is dead but he loved her very much. 

Although for some reason he isn't credited this is director Tod Browning's penultimate film (he made his last MIRACLES FOR SALE 3 years later). It makes good use of the miniature people and has good acting. One of the screenwriters was Erich von Stroheim. Guy Endore (MAD LOVE) was also a co-writer. It's based on a novel by A. Merritt.

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Lupin!

ARSENE LUPIN-1932-Dueling Barrymores! Lionel is a French detective trying to catch the master jewel thief Arsene Lupin. John is the Duke of Charmerace who may actually be Lupin. There's some clever dialogue but the story is rather drawn out. Like many early talkies it suffers from being more like a filmed play. Also with Karen Morley, John Miljan, Tully Marshall and in un-credited roles Mischa Auer and Joe Sawyer.

The Lupin character was created by French author Maurice Leblanc (a contemporary of Arthur Conan Doyle)  in 1905. He wrote several Lupin stories that spawned sequels by other authors, films, a TV show and even an Anime series from Japan!


Director Jack Conway had directed many silent films and the "talkie" remake of THE UNHOLY THREE with Lon Chaney. He later made high profile films like A TALE OF TWO CITIES, VIVA VILLA and DRAGON SEED. 


The same year as AL both Barrymore brothers were featured in GRAND HOTEL and with their sister Ethel in RASPUTIN AND THE PRINCESS (the only film to feature all 3 siblings). 


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Calling The Doctor...

THE SECRET OF DR. KILDARE-1939-MGM produced the Dr. Kildare series from 1938-42. They all starred Lew Ayres as the young intern Jimmy Kildare and Lionel Barrymore as his cantankerous but lovable mentor Dr. Gillespie. Laraine Day was the nurse/love interest in most of them and Nat Pendlelton played the dumb but helpful hospitial intern in a few.This was the third entry in the series and considered one of the best.

This time out Kildare is assigned to care for a wealthy young socialite (Helen Gilbert) who suffers from mood swings and temporary blindness. Her father is played by the great Lionel Atwill, who had co-starred with Barrymore (and Lugosi) in the MARK OF THE VAMPIRE remake in '35 and was the one armed inspector in SON OF FRANKENSTEIN the same year this was made.

Meanwhile, Dr. Gillespie is having his own health problems and is sent on a forced vacation. And why have Jimmy's parents come to town with a mysterious note?

Samuel S. Hinds plays his father (he and Barrymore were later in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE). The always recognizable (and great) character actor Byron Foulger has a cameo as well as other "familiar faces" like Martha O'Driscoll, Don "Red" Barry and William Tannen. Dated but painless.

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Not So Grimm

THE RETURN OF PETER GRIMM-1934-Unusual drama with Lionel Barrymore as a dying old man who arranges the wedding of his niece (Helen Mack who was in SON OF KONG the year before) to an unscrupulous nephew (Allen Vincent). He dies and his regretful spirit comes back to make amends. The poignant (and ironic) but uplifting ending is reminiscent of ON BORROWED TIME (filmed 5 years later). Also with Donald Meek (who appeared with Barrymore in YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU). Director George Nichols Jr. was killed in a car crash in 1939. It’s based on a play by David Belasco and is a remake of a 1926 silent film.

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