71% (1) Life Begins at 40 85 min, Approved, [Comedy] [George Marshall] [22 Mar 1935]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 71%, External Reviews
Actors: George Barbier, Richard Cromwell, Rochelle Hudson, Will Rogers
Writer: Walter B. Pitkin (book), Robert Quillen (additional dialogue), Lamar Trotti (screenplay)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: In small-town America the easy-going publisher of the local paper finds himself in opposition to the local banker on the return to town of a lad jailed possibly wrongly for a theft from the bank.
Rotten Tomatoes: A best-selling nonfictional book of the 1920s provided the title for this Will Rogers vehicle. Rogers plays a small town newspaper editor who prints all the news that fits his own homespun view of the world. Against the wishes of the town higher-ups, Rogers tries to clear the name of Richard Cromwell, a young man accused of a long-ago bank robbery. Along the way, the genial editor smooths the path of romance between Cromwell and sweet Rochelle Hudson. Life Begins at 40 contains some great bits of dialogue, notably Rogers' comment after unloading a box of canned goods that the American emblem should be changed from an eagle to a can opener.
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69% (1) The Cat's-Paw 102 min, [Comedy] [Sam Taylor, Harold Lloyd] [07 Aug 1934]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 69%, External Reviews
Actors: George Barbier, Harold Lloyd, Nat Pendleton, Una Merkel
Writer: Clarence Budington Kelland (story), Sam Taylor (screen play)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English, Cantonese, German Country: USA
Plot: A naive missionary brought up in China returns to America to seek a wife. Corrupt politicians enlist him to run for mayor as a dummy candidate with no chance of winning.
Rotten Tomatoes: Harold Lloyd plays Ezekial Cobb, a missionary's son who has spent his entire life in China. Cobb is sent to his father's home church in California, where it is hoped he will find a wife. A true babe in the woods, Cobb is befriended by politician Jake Mayo (George Barbier). Mayo is a cog in a crooked political machine whose bosses plan to set up a "reform" candidate for mayor, so that they can continue their underhanded activities unmolested. The candidate drops dead, so Mayo sets up the innocent Cobb as the mayor-to-be--a "cat's paw" to deflect attention from the system's corruption. But once elected, Cobb takes his duties quite seriously and begins to clean up the town. The machine frames Cobb with planted evidence of wrongdoing, destroying the lad's political career. Undaunted, Cobb remembers the story of an ancient Chinese leader, who, similarly disgraced, took the law in his own hands and executed all known criminals in his last days of power. Cobb orders that every crook in town be rounded up and brought to a dark cellar. He insists that they confess their crimes or face instant death--and backs up his words by "beheading" two of the crooks on the spot! Actually, these executions are cleverly designed magical illusions, and no one is really killed; but the terrified criminals are so hoodwinked by Cobb's apparent cold-bloodedness that they literally climb over one another to confess. Cobb is exonerated, and honesty is restored to his administration. While not Harold Lloyd's best feature film, The Cat's Paw is definitely his most unorthodox.
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68% (1) Turn Back the Clock 79 min, [Comedy, Drama] [Edgar Selwyn] [25 Aug 1933]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 68%, External Reviews
Actors: George Barbier, Lee Tracy, Mae Clarke, Otto Kruger
Writer: Edgar Selwyn (screen play), Ben Hecht (screen play)
External Links: Wikipedia IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: Joe and Mary run a tobacco store and are just scraping by. When old friend Ted comes into the store, they renew their friendship, even though Ted is now wealthy and married to Elvira, whom Joe could have married himself, and become the rich one. After a domestic squabble Joe is hit by a car, and when he wakes up he is 20 years younger and can rectify his error and marry Elvina and her money. He does, relives his life as a wealthy man who still remembers his 'other' life, and what happened during those years. In the end he realizes that he isn't as happy as he was formerly, and things come to a head when his 'new' life catches up with his old one.
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61% (1) The Big Pond 72 min, [Comedy, Music, Romance] [Hobart Henley] [03 May 1930]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 61%, External Reviews
Actors: Claudette Colbert, George Barbier, Marion Ballou, Maurice Chevalier
Writer: Garrett Fort (story), George Middleton (play), Robert Presnell Sr. (story), Preston Sturges (dialogue), A.E. Thomas (play)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English, French Country: USA
Plot: A tour guide in Venice romances a visiting American tourist whose father owns a chewing-gum factory back in the U.S. She sets out to convince her skeptical father to bring the tour guide to America and give him a job in the plant.
Rotten Tomatoes: In this tuneful romance, a chewing gum heiress falls for a handsome young Frenchman and brings him back to America where he begins working in her father's gum factory. At first the father suspects the true intentions of his daughter's beau. But then he accidentally invents a new kind of gum--rum flavored. To promote the fabulous new confection, the Frenchman uses the love song he wrote for the heiress as a jingle. The heiress is outraged and vows to marry another. Fortunately, the suave Frenchman is not about to let that happen. The film's Oscar-nominated star, Maurice Chevalier sings four songs including one of his favorites "You Brought a New Kind of Love to Me."
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57% (1) The Adventures of Marco Polo 104 min, PASSED, [Adventure, Biography, Romance] [Archie Mayo, John Cromwell] [15 Apr 1938]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 57%, External Reviews
Actors: Basil Rathbone, Gary Cooper, George Barbier, Sigrid Gurie
Writer: Robert E. Sherwood (screen play), N.A. Pogson (based on a story by)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: Marco Polo travels from Venice to Peking, where he quickly discovers spaghetti and gunpowder and falls in love with the Emperor's daughter. The Emperor Kublai Khan is a kindly fellow, but his evil aide Ahmed wants to get rid of Kublai Khan so he can be emperor, and to get rid of Marco Polo so he can marry the princess. Ahmed sends Marco Polo to the West to fight barbarians, but he returns just in time to save the day.
Rotten Tomatoes: This epic adventure chronicles the many exploits of the great 13th-century explorer. Along with his men and his cowardly sidekick, brave Polo endures shipwrecks, terrible sandstorms, and other natural disasters as they wend their way East. Once there, he is taken to the exotic court of Kublai Khan where the explorer falls in love with the beautiful princess, who an evil conspirator with eyes on the throne wants for himself. The power-mad, avaricious usurper will do anything to have that throne and many people die painfully at his cruel hands. He tries to get rid of handsome Polo by banishing him to the outlands where the Venetian meets a spirited bandit ruler. Polo talks the fun-loving thief into helping him invade Pekin to save Khan from the traitor. An enormous cavalry attack is launched against the great walled city. They are not stopped by the many arrows of the villain's warriors. Polo vanquishes them when he uses his new invention --gun powder-, and blows the evil doers to kingdom come, freeing the captured Khan. He engages in a thrilling sword fight with the villain and kills him. Polo then gathers the lovely princess into his arms and romance ensues. A young Lana Turner played one of the princess' handmaidens.
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