Author Archive: Retro

Gangster is framed by a crooked D.A., and his wife goes to any lengths to clear his name, including going to work at the attorney’s office to get information on him. Produced by William A. Berke. Dir. William A. Berke

Such were the ways of Hollywood that the dignified H.B. Warner, who played Jesus in 1927’s King of Kings, found himself in such low-budget fare as Cross-Examination a scant five years later. Warner makes the best of the situation in the role of Gerald Waring, defense attorney in a sensational murder trial. Depsite the badgering of prosecutor Dwight Simpson (Edmund Breese), Waring is determined to clear his client David Wells (Donald Dillaway) of the charge that David murdered his millionaire father. The case comes to a head when the Wells family’s housekeeper makes a startling statement from her deathbed. Cross-Examination would seem to have been inspired by the 1925 legal drama The Goose Woman, itself based on the notorious Hall-Mills murder case.

Lt. Dick Stacey is dismissed from the Fleet Air Arm for poor discipline. He joins the Aircraft Carrier “HMS Ark Royal” (The Ship with Wings). When they go into battle in the Mediterranean he acts heroically and redeems himself.

Young girl comes into money and gets involved with a gigolo and a washing machine salesman. Dir. King Vidor.

A professional assassin has a vendetta against his former employer for their betrayal and his subsequent imprisonment.

While recuperating from injuries, an Air Force pilot thinks back to his recruitment before the war, and to the mission that landed him in the hospital. Dir. William H. Pine

A tomboy finds transition to womanhood a rough one, as she attempts to play matchmaker for her father. Color.

FBI agents pose as shipwrecked sailors and locate a hidden japanese wireless radio set.

Totally cute, albeit little known film, about fun-loving sailors in the British Royal Navy who try to ‘smuggle’ aboard ship a collection of pretty girls to spice up the sailors’ drab life at sea.