Tailspin Tommy – Gets the Monogram Treatment in Sky Patrol and Danger Flight (1939)

Mankind has always been fascinated by the possibility of flight. When the Wright Bros got off the ground in 1903, even though it was only for a few seconds, they ignited an air race that eventually put a man on the moon.

The early days of flight saw multiple individuals and companies competing with novel, sometimes outlandish plane designs that captured the public’s imagination. When Charles Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic in 1927, America’s fascination with all things aviation caught fire. Tailspin Tommy was the first of the newspaper comic strips launched to cash in on the crazy and was soon followed by Skyroads, Scorchy Smith, Smilin’ Jack and  my personal favourite, Flying’ Jenny. During the war, strips like Terry and The Pirates and Capt. Easy that had not started out as aviation strips soon joined Johnny Hazard in putting their heroes into the cockpit.

From Pioneers of Aviation blog

The Tailspin Tommy newspaper strip is all but forgotten in the 21st century, but was immensely popular in its day. Written by Glenn Chaffin and illustrated by Hal Forest, it ran from 1928 to 1942. Notably, the legendary movie poster artist, Reynold Brown inked the strip from 1936 to 1942. Tailspin made his move onto film with two 12-part serials in 1934 and 1935.

 Artwork by Reynold Brown

John Trent took over the roll for four low-budget Tailspin adventures for Monogram that were all released in 1939. He was a seemingly good choice for the character, having gone into acting after a career in commercial aviation. However, despite having the physical cut of a leading man (he co-starred with Ann Dvorak in the comedy, She’s No Lady, 1937), his acting skills were modest at best, and he eventually returned to aviation as a test pilot.

Jason Robards, Milburn Stone, John Trent, and Marjorie Reynolds

Trent was backed up in the series by three actors who went on to much more substantial careers. Milburn Stone played Tailspin’s goofy pal, Skeeter Milligan, and Jason Robards was his boss/partner, Paul Smith, at Three Points Airline. The underutilized Marjorie Reynolds got second-billing as his girlfriend, Betty Lou Barnes, but she usually was only given a few lines per movie worrying about her hero, Tommy.

Tailspin Tommy in Sky Patrol (1939) predates the US entry into WW II, but has Tommy ‘drafted’ by the military into organizing a sky patrol to hunt for smugglers (read Nazi collaborators) on the west coast. Tommy is training the new recruits, but is having trouble with medical student, Carter Meade, who – surprise! - does not want to have to kill anyone. Unfortunately, he’s also the son of the commanding officer who sees his son’s aversion to killing as an ‘irrational phobia’ to be overcome. Tommy covers for Carter’s ‘weakness’ and gets him into the Sky Patrol, only to have him become the seemingly first causality of the team. However, it all turns out well when Carter is found alive, captured by the smugglers who are running guns in international waters. Carter saves Tommy by killing one of the bad guys, thus proving that he is really a man and not a peace-loving commie, or worse. Carter is played by a mid-career Jackie Coogan who does as much as he can with his brief, sketched-out part. Fans of his role as Uncle Fester in the 1960’s Addams Family TV show will only recognize the svelte Coogan here by his voice.

Jackie Coogan

The film has above average production values and script for a Monogram film, and even the ‘toy-boats-in-a-bathtub’ special effects are used sparingly and are not too distracting. Just don’t look too closely at the many holes in the story.

Tailspin Tommy in Danger Flight (1939) was the last in the series. It has a crackling good first half where Tommy becomes lost in a raging storm while trying to deliver medicine to a dam construction site that has suffered multiple injuries in an avalanche. Cutting between Tommy flying blind in the storm to Betty Lou and Skeeter desperately trying to help him from their radio room, the tension ramps up as Tommy’s fuel runs down with no place to land. Probably inspired by the flying sequences from the same year’s Only Angels Have Wings, with a healthy dollop of Clark Gable’s doomed flight to oblivion in Night Flight (1933), the first half of Danger Flight is as good as you’re going to get from any respectable B picture, and way above the norm for a Monogram film. However, the second half of the film pancakes back to earth as Tommy battles gangsters trying to steal the construction company’s payroll in what seems like a completely different film.

John Trent as Tailspin Tommy

I honestly only watched as many Tailspin adventures as I did just to enjoy the presence of Marjorie Reynolds, a pretty, button-nosed blonde with energy to spare. I suspect that Monogram used her as much as they did to help provide a much needed jolt to many of their otherwise lackluster productions. Playing the reporter Roberta Logan, she was the second best thing in the three of the six Boris Karloff-headlined Mr. Wong films (1939 – 1940) that she co-starred in. She also starred in a number of respectable poverty row crime/noir films before graduating to higher profile pictures at better studios in the early 1940’s (e.g., Ministry of Fear (1944) with Ray Milland). Although she never became a major star, she did help Bing Crosby introduce the classic song, White Christmas, in Holiday Inn (1942).

Ray Millard and Marjorie Reynolds in Ministry of Fear (1944)

What about the rest of the Three Points Airline personal?

Milburn Stone had a long career in show business going back to vaudeville in the 1920s. His film career consisted of mostly minor parts or bigger parts in minor films. Universal Shock Theater fans will recognize him from starring in Captive Wild Women and Jungle Girl (both 1943) and the Inner Sanctum film, The Frozen Ghost (1945) starring Long Chaney, Jr. Later in his career, Stone struck gold playing Doc in the long running Gunsmoke TV show. Appearing in 604 episodes, Doc became one of the most beloved characters in television history. Stone won an Emmy for the role in 1968.

 Milburn Stone in Gunsmoke

Jason Robards went on to be one the greatest stage and film actors of his era. After a decorated Navy career in WWI, his film career started slowly where he marked time in films like the Tailspin Tommy series until his talent was recognized. Amongst his many awards, he won a Tony, an Emmy, and two Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actor (All The Presidents Men, 1976 and Julia, 1977).

 Jason Robards in Once Upon A Time in The West (1969)

Is Tailspin Tommy Worth My Time? Yes, if you’re a fan of the Monogram oeuvre or pulp serials. John Trent in Sky Patrol is about as flat as an actor can be and still be alive, but he is more animated in Danger Flight. The first half of that film is very engaging and would be a great introduction to the series. And, it’s fun to watch future stars, Reynolds, Robards and Stone early in their careers.

Availability: I watched these on YouTube as OK quality prints. The breaks in the films just add to the sensation of being at a Saturday afternoon matinee. Sky Patrol gets a B and Danger Flight a B+, bearing in mind the quality of films we’re dealing with. Both films benefit from their brisk 60 minute running times.

 

Bonus! More Reynold Brown poster art.

Robert Mitchum in Where Danger Lives (1950) and Angel Face (1952)

 

Robert Mitchum made a career out of playing characters that dominated the screen. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him turn his head to look at anything. When Mitchum turns to look at you, his whole body turns. And you’d better be ready for what happens next, because good or bad, you aren’t going to escape it.

And yet for all that implied control, a Mitchum character was often placed in a situation where he knows that no matter what he does, his fate is not his own and things are going to end up with him dead. Or worse - he might actually end up with that crazy women that he’s run off with.

 Faith Domergue (Where Danger Lives) and Jean Simmons (Angel Face)

Where Danger Lives and Angel Face are both about the dangers of falling for crazy women.

In 1948, Mitchum was the victim of a sting operation and busted for possession marijuana (later overturned). The skittish management reintroduced him to movie goers as the good guy in the relatively upbeat Christmas movie, Holiday Affair (1949), playing a war veteran who gets involved with war widow, Janet Leigh. Although Mitchum is never anything but gracious and accommodating in Holiday Affair, such is his presence that you are never quite sure where the film is going to end up. Will he get the girl or will there be a pile of dead bodies under the Christmas tree this year?

Mitchum’s next movie was a move back into film noir with Where Danger Lives (1950) directed by John Farrow and starring Faith Domergue, with small, but critical appearances by Claude Raines and Maureen O’Sullivan. Shot by Nicholas Musuraca, who had photographed Mitchum  in Out of the Past and the best of the Val Lewton RKO productions (i.e., the Jacques Tourneur directed, The Cat People (1942)), the film never looks anything less than gorgeous, with Muscuraca’s compositions and lighting effects driving the movie forward as much as Farrow’s direction.

Robert Mithcum, Claude Raines & Faith Domergue

The plot of Where Danger Lives is simple. Dr. Jeff Cameron (Mitchum) falls for an enigmatic attempted suicide Margo (Domergue) and dumps his faithful girlfriend (O’Sullivan) to pursue her. In a drunken confrontation with her very rich, supposed father (Raines), Mitchum suffers a concussion. Raines dies and with Jeff in a fog from the concussion, Margo grabs him and makes a run for the Mexican border. But just before he died, Raines had tried to warn Jeff of Margo’s dark secret. I wonder what that secret might have been?

Jeff just wants to call the police, but in his dazed condition he is can’t stop Margo’s desperate need to escape. On the run, the pair keeps falling prey to their own suspicions of being discovered when – at least initially  - the authorities are actually unaware of what’s happened to Raines. At one point they are captured and arrested – for not having beards when their car breaks down during a small town celebration! In an effort to talk their way out of their troubles, they’re forced to get married by the intoxicated crowd as the only way to avoid revealing who they are. And so it goes until they end up at the Mexican border. There the truth comes out as a half paralyzed, bullet-ridden Jeff hears Margo proclaim, “nobody ever pities me!” As great an exit scene as any femme fatale has ever made. 

 No way out for Faith Domergue In Where Danger Lives

Mitchum rehashed almost the same exact plot two years later in Angel Face (1952) directed by Otto Preminger and starring Jean Simmons in the femme fatale role. Both films start with an ambulance taking Mitchum to the medical aid of someone (Simmon’s stepmom in Angel Face) only to dump his girlfriend when he falls in lust with the young daughter/wife of a much older rich man. When that man ends up dead, the lovers struggle to avoid murder convictions and in the process end up married. And then things get worse.

Where Dangers Lives is a better film than Angel Face, although the latter has a much higher critical rating. Where Dangers Lives is a more satisfying movie with a polished, tightly written story. Each scene rackets up the tension as Jeff and Margo’s options exponentially diminish into a claustrophobic finale between a half dead Jeff and a mostly insane Margo. It was written by Charles Bennett who also wrote the screenplays for Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps and Foreign Correspondent, and who later joined The Cat People team of Jacques Tourneur and Nick Musuraca to write the classic British horror film, Night of the Demon. Although Domergue is not in Simmons league as an actress, she gives a compelling performance at the film’s climax where she becomes completely unhinged in one extended, single shot sequence.  

 Mitchum falls for Simmons' angel face

Angel Face, by comparison, has a stop/start quality to it that makes its 69 minute running time seem 20 minutes too long. It succeeds on the strength of Mitchum and Simmons’ chemistry, and her riveting face that demands the viewer’s attention as much as Domergue’s playmate figure. In the end, however, Angel Face scores more points where it really counts; it has a once seen, never to be forgotten ending. Having watched Angel Face before Where Danger Lives, my shouted advice to Jeff was to not get in the car with Margo!

Notably, both actresses were involved with legendary billionaire, Howard Hughes, who had gained control of RKO studios in 1948. Hughes hooked up with Faith when she was just 17, buying her parents a house to keep them at arm’s length. But she eventually broke off with him when she discovered that he was also bedding Lana Turner, Ava Gardner and Rita Hayworth at the same time. She went on to star in a number of cult classics including Cult of the Cobra, This Island Earth and The Atomic Man (all 1955). She gives a credible performance as a Doctor of Invertebrate Zoology in Ray Harryhausen’s It Came from Beneath the Sea (also 1955) where at one point she uses a laboratory flask to replicate Veronica Lakes’ code-defying hairbrush scene in Sullivan’s Travels (1942). 

Jean Simmons also had her problems (contractual rather than personal) with Hughes. Apparently Angel Face needed to be made quickly as Simmons RKO contract was set to expire within 18 days of the start of production. Hughes’ instructions to Preminger were to make the shoot as difficult as possible for Simmons. You can see from her short bangs that Simmons had cut off her hair is an effort to dissuade Hughes from using her in a film and was forced to wear a wig during production. 

Character Actors of Note in Angel Face: Watch for Gertrude Astor as the prison matron. She had a long career in silent films, with a large part as Cecily in Paul Leni’s  genre defining The Cat and The Canary (1927). Also, the ubiquitous and wonderful Teresa Harris as a nurse at Simmons jailhouse bed side (above). Don’t blink or you will miss both!

Are Where Danger Lives and Angel Face Worth My Time? Yes to both. Although Where Danger Lives tells its story better, both films are solid B+ efforts. Each film in enlivened by small bits by lots of great character actors.

Availability: Both Angel Face and Where Danger Lives are available from Warner Archives, the latter twinned with Tension (1949)

The Addams Family - The Best Film of 2019

As a longtime Addams Family fan – both the original cartoons and the TV show – I was surprized to discover that a new animated feature film about them had been released last Fall. A quick scan of the interweb revealed the reason; it was universally panned and slipped into and out of theaters like a ghost through a locked door.

Steeling myself for disappointment, I watched it the day after I had sat through the turgid Frozen 2 (so many artificial plot twists! so many terrible songs!), only to be completely won over by the 10 minute mark with the introduction of the beloved butler, Lurch.

The CGI animation is the most faithful reproduction on the screen, to date, of Charles Addams’ original drawings: mother Morticia (voiced by Charlize Theron) is the thin and dark version of Luna from Tod Browning’s Mark of the Vampire (1935); father Gomez (voiced by Oscar Issac) is squat and slightly greasy; son Pugsley (voiced by Finn Wolfhard) has his blonde hair finally restored from the cartoon; and daughter Wednesday (voiced by Chloë Grace Moretz, possibly the only weak spot in the film) is the suitably pallid, deadpan, deadshot-with-a-crossbow that Christina Ricci defined in the 1990’s live action films.

The reviews I read criticized the films for not having the ghoulish underpinning of the cartoon or the TV show. Not so! The Addams haunted home and environment is true to the original cartoon – dark, gloomy, and completely captivating. A child of any age would LOVE to live there. I would! I suspect that reviewers are referring to the glaring harsh, artificial town of ‘Assimilation’ that the Addams’ are pitted against in all its pink and lavender artificial ‘beauty’. It’s the too-bright Ying that makes the Addams Family the just-right dark Yang. In truth, since their inception, the Addams Family has always existed to be a counterpoint to the modern world, pointing out its foibles and hypocrisies while producing a morbid chuckle.

I suspect, too, that despite their spooky trappings, the Addams Family are just too darn nice for a cynical 21st century audience. They all genuinely like AND love one another. No one is uncouth, no one swears, no one belittles or hurts anyone else. Sure Wednesday buries her brother alive and fires arrows through Uncle Fester’s head, but in their world they would expect nothing less. And, more importantly, they would never do that to anyone outside their family (or at least never succeed at doing it).

The creators of the film know their Addams Family cartoon and TV lore and fill each scene to the brim with little touches that will delight the knowledgeable fan and simply enrich the viewing experience for the average viewers. Watch out for many of Addams’ original cartoon characters appearing as the Addams’ extended family. And, the addition of a hangman’s noose to the ends of Wednesday’s braids is a touch that I am sure Charles Addams would have approved of!

Other nice touches: name checking Monty Python’s Holy hand grenades; making the lyrics of Harry Nilsson’s Coconut song the basis for Gomez and Morticia’s wedding vows; recreating the ‘It’s Alive!’ scene from Frankenstein (1931) when Wednesday reanimates the frogs in her science class and then sick’s them on the school bully with a Donald Sutherland shriek from Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978); the spiders streaming out from under Morticia’s dress; the appearance of Lurch’s original cartoon incarnation (inspired by Boris Karloff in The Old Dark House (1932)) as the drummer in the band; Morticia’s crystal ball that looks like Jack Kirby’s burning planet of Apokolips as she channels the spirits of her parents (Martin Short and Catherine O’Hara) , amongst many other delightful touches.

Behold! Apokolips!

One scene features an animated cartoon reference so obscure that it actually made my jaw drop. As the Addams family try to introduce themselves to their newly discovered neighbouring town (previously obscured by swamp gas), Uncle Fester sings a short snippet of the song, “I Haven’t Got a Hat”. The only place that I’ve ever heard this song is in the 1935 Warner Bros Merrie Melodie’s cartoon of the same name that introduced a bunch of new characters, all destined for obscurity, except for Porky Pig (read more about it at Trailers From Hell). The song was written by Bob Bernier (lyrics) and Bob Emmerich (music). Emmerich was a pianist and composer for the Tommy Dorsey band and, together with Bernier, he wrote a number of popular jazz songs (now mostly forgotten) in the late 30’s.

The Addams Family (2019) was directed by Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernan, and written by Matt Leiberman and Pamela O’Brien, from a story by Vernon, Leiberman and Erica Rivinoja. It’s a delightful film, well worth your time whether or not you’re a fan of animated films. It certainly should make Frozen 2 shrink with embarrassment in comparison!

Is The Addams Family Worth My Time? Yes, it’s a wonderful film that holds up over multiple viewings.

Availability: Out now on DVD, BluRay and streaming from your usual sources.

John Agar Vs.The Mole People (1956)

The Mole People is a 1956 SF film best known from the classic monster photos of the Mole Men that appeared in almost every issue of Famous Monsters of Filmland back in the 60’s. Starring John Agar and Hugh Beaumont, nothing else about the movie can be considered ‘classic’ as it tries to stretch 20 minutes of plot into an 80 minute movie. 

Hugh Beaumont, John Agar and Nestor Paiva

Archaeologists Agar and Beaumont discovery an ancient tablet in what looks a lot like the Gobi desert of Mongolia (a place that I’ve been lucky enough to spend a lot of time in digging up dinosaurs) that leads them to climb a nearby mountain(!) in search of an ancient Sumerian civilization. And find it they do, in all of its terrible matte painting glory after most of their team (including seemingly dozens of their climbing support team) is killed on the trek. 

Agar, Beaumont, and the only other survivor of their ill-fated expedition, Nestor Paiva, discover a lost city of sun-phobic, albino Sumerians ruled over by a weak king and his crafty chancellor, Alan Napier (TV Batman’s Alfred) who want the interlopers dead so as to not disrupt their cozy lifestyle lording over their subjects. Although I’m not sure how cozy it is. They subsist off of mushrooms grown by their slave race of Mole People, with the occasional cave rat and lost goat thrown in to, I guess, provide some much needed vitamins and prevent scurvy.

 Alan Napier (right)

Our heroes keep the Sumerians and their mole people slaves at bay with the help of Agar’s flashlight (sun-phobic, remember?). But, eventually it all goes south and the city collapses on itself (of course). The heroes escape with the help of a plucky slave girl (Cynthia Patrick) and the mole people who rally at the last moment to turn the tables on their oppressors, inspired by Agar’s act of kindness that saved them from a Sumerian whipping.

Other than the Mole People’s imaginative design – attributed to Bud Westmore, but more likely the work of an unnamed studio tech – there is little to recommend this film. The only interesting point for me is speculating on how the underground ecosystem could actually function. I’d like to think that the Sumerians exploited a naturally occuring symbiotic relationship between the Mole People and fungus they cultivated to establish a city-sustaining food source. 

 Dr. Frank Baxter, cashing a paycheck

A few other things of note. The overlong opening by Dr. Frank Baxter explaining the multiple ‘worlds inside the Earth theories’ is painful watch. It’s hard to believe the Baxter was an award-winning TV presenter who appeared as “Dr. Research” (I want that as my new title!) in the Bell System Science Series of television specials that ran from 1956 to 1962, and whose TV show Shakespeare on TV won seven Emmy Awards, according to Wikipedia.

It’s also great to see hard working actor, Nestor Paiva, playing a respected scientist in a substantial role. Paiva is best known to most film buffs as the slightly dodgy Captain Lucas in Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) and its first sequel, Revenge of the Creature (1955), but he also had small parts in Mighty Joe Young (1949) and as the Sherriff in Tarantula (1955). He also had a nice role in one of my favourite Tom Conway RKO ‘Falcon’ movies, The Falcon in Mexico (1944).

I’d like to think that the Mole People race survived the cave-in that seemingly destroyed the Sumerian city. Being a subterranean race that can tunnel anywhere, I can imagine that they eventually popped up in Arizona where they developed a productive relationship with a race of giant ants. Hopefully they are peacefully living in the vast underground colonies, tending to the ants fungus gardens in exchange for protection from the cruel human surface world.

Is The Mole People Worth Time? Only if you must see all of the 1950’s SF films associated with Universal (they only distributed this one). Otherwise, skip it.

Availability: I watched the recently released (2019) BluRay version from Shout Factory available from the usual sources. If you must watch the film, this is the version to see – the print is beautiful.

Does anyone else think that the Mole People may have influenced the design of Futurama's, Dr. Zoidberg?