Billy Franey

Reformed jewel thief Simon Templar lands in hot water when a look-alike smuggles stolen goods out of Egypt.

6.1/10

53rd episode of RKO's "Mr. Average Man" Series starring Edgar Kennedy.

5.8/10

Brad Henderson arrives in Star City just in time to witness three men rob a bank of $30,000 and kill a teller. Charged for the crime and jailed, Brad realizes he must escape and track down the real killers since the only one who can prove his innocence is his friend, Sheriff Bill Gregory, who has been shot and will not soon regain consciousness. Chasing down the robbers one by one, he eventually discovers the identity of the gang's ringleader.

6.2/10

Edgar starts a trailer vacation with his wife Vivien and father-in-law, but doesn't get far before they are overtaken by two men from the finance company, who repossess the trailer for non-payment. Edgar discovers that Pop had failed to mail the money order he had given him for the payment. He also finds some other items Pop failed to take care of.

6/10

The Fargo Kid is mistaken for a killer and is hired to kill another man...

6.2/10

Protecting himself in an attack by rustlers, Rancher Steve Holden believes he has killed one of the attackers, young Bud Mathews, who in reality has warned Holden of the rustlers' approach. Unaware that Mathews was actually killed by rustler boss Cass Barton, Holden heads out to Mathews' home town where he plans to tell the boy's family of his death but instead uncovers a plan by a local businessman to force Mathews' father out of his ranch.

5.6/10

Edgar is a census taker, but is primarily interested in finding a rich widow for his father-in-law (Billy Franey), so he won't have to continue to support him. All Pop wants to make him happy is a cow. When Edgar comes home with both a cow and a phony rich widow, the results are not what Edgar planned for.

6.1/10

A retired lawman gets back into action to fight political corruption.

6.4/10

Edgar starts out in a non-unfamiliar grumpy mood and tells some people off obnoxiously, then becomes overcome with joy and kindheartedness when he discovers that his wife is about to have a baby.

6.5/10

A short film about a family man who realizes he's a bore at social gatherings so he purchases a trunk full of magic tricks hoping to soon be the life of the party.

5.7/10

In 1911, minor stage comic, Vernon Castle meets the stage-struck Irene Foote. A few misadventures later, they marry and then abandon comedy to attempt a dancing career together. While they're performing in Paris, an agent sees them rehearse and starts them on their brilliant career as the world's foremost ballroom dancers. However, at the height of their fame, World War I begins.

6.9/10
7.5%

Father-in-law Billy Franey discovers the letter that Edgar has written a matrimonial agency to marry him off and slips Edgar's picture in it. When Minerva Urecal (sporting an Italian accent) shows up, wife Vivien Oakland resists attempts to get her out of the house so she can confront the interloper and her husband.

A weary dance-hall girl in a Panama saloon is given the choice of jail or going with a rough-and-tumble oil driller's jungle oil-field in order to pay him back for being slipped a mickey and robbed.

6/10

Pop's noisy mechanical clock is driving Edgar crazy.

6.5/10

In a misguided effort to get a raise and promotion from his boss, Edgar Kennedy's wife and her father talk him into leasing a swank house and putting on the ritz. A valet comes with the house and he spends a lot of time trying to soften Kennedy;s rough edges, but when he becomes to insistent about giving his master a bath, the always-irritable Kennedy throws the valet in the hot tub, clothes and all. Meanwhile, his father-in-law has been putting the squeeze on Edgar's boss, telling him that Edsgar has fallen heir to so much money he is going to buy out the business and fire his boss. So the boss comes to Edgars's home and fires him.

5.5/10

Edgar lost his job at the bank three months ago, but hasn't told his wife, and they have been living off their savings, while Edgar pretends to go to work everyday. He answers a want-ad for a job selling vacuum cleaners door-to-door. He makes no sales, especially after he fills an apartment hallway with trash to demonstrate his cleaner and then finds there is no electricity to run the machine. He comes to a house where a bridal shower is being held, with his wife in attendance, and she thinks Edgar has brought the cleaner as gift for her friend. Edgar has to take the last of their money out of the bank to pay for the demo model he had. The bank manager shows up at Edgar's house to offer him his bank job back, but Edgar's wife won't let him go back, as she has found the prefect job for Edgar... selling vacuum cleaners.

4.1/10

Heiress Nancy Crocker Fleming will only receive her inheritance if she marries a "plain American." Her late father was afraid a foreign gigolo would steal her heart and money. So Nancy pays Tony Anthony, working on a WPA road project, to marry, then divorce her. When Nancy inadvertently drives off with Tony's dog, Tony seemingly kidnaps her to retrieve the pooch, which leads to a cross-country race between the two to reach Reno and the divorce court since neither one wants to be the second to file papers.

6.2/10

To make Edgar do something about his physical condition, his wife has invited her old boy friend, in tip-top shape, to spend the weekend with them. In addition to getting worn out playing golf, Edgar overhears a phone call that makes him think Vivien is arranging to run off with his hated rival.

6.1/10

Leon's boss buys a racehorse, but doesn't want word to get out that he is the owner, so he has the papers filled out showing Leon as the owner of record. At first, Leon is excited, but the arrangement soon creates difficulty for him. First, he knows nothing about horses except how to bet on them, and second, when his wife finds out, she is furious.

5.5/10

Edgar impulsively invites his boss, Mr. Markham, to his home for dinner when his boss compliments him for giving coffee money to a down and out man. At the train station Edgar intervenes, keeping another man from beating a young man named Frankie, and Edgar takes Frankie home with him, even though the stranger warns Edgar that the young man is nothing but trouble.

6/10

Edgar finds some gold in his attic and the guy working on his roof tells him he could go to jail for having it!! This is because President Franklin Roosevelt has actually campaigned Congress to make gold ownership illegal in order to force people off the gold standard as well as to try to get more currency into circulation.

6.5/10

When Mountain City racketeer Charles Gillette is acquitted, he arrives at the Mountain City World newsroom and vows revenge on the Better Government Committee who put him behind bars. Members of the committee include Colonel Bogardus, owner of the World , Horace Mitchell, a candidate for mayor, and Mr. Franklin, a department store owner. First Gillette buys a rival newspaper, the Sentinel , and offers a pricey editorship to World newsman Ralph Houston, who refuses the offer on principle. That evening, Ralph and his partner, Tod Swain, are greeted at home by a creditor, and Vina Swain, Ralph's fiancée, is furious to find out he turned down Gillette's offer. When she learns Ralph went into debt to put her through college, she warns Gillette of a police raid and pays back Ralph's debt with Gillette's renumeration. When Ralph orders Vina not to work for Gillette, she breaks their engagement.

7/10

Edgar is offered $150 by a nurseryman for a tree on his property, and he plans to remove it with the tractor he won at the county fair. But his neighbor demands some of the tree money as some leafs are hanging over his property. Edgar, on the tractor, ruins a warehouse, smashes a fire hydrant, wrecks a streetcar and tears up the concrete road pavement. Edgar is hauled to court and has to pay the damages. At home, when he yanks the tree out of the ground, it crashes down upon his car.

6.5/10
4.3%

1936 short film nominated for an Academy Award in the category Best Short Subject, Two Reel.

6.4/10

After being introduced to the world of opera, a fisherman (Jan Kiepura) falls for a woman (Swarthout) whose guardian is a noted composer (Philip Merivale). They met when the fisherman evaded the police by seeking refuge in the village church. While there, they are each captivated by hearing the other singing Mass. The beautiful woman falls in love with the fisherman with the wonderful voice.

7/10

Leon Errol buys a bathtub wholesale.

5.2/10

A 12-episode serial in which scholastic sports star Frank Merriwell leaves school to search for his missing father. His adventures involve a mysterious inscription on a ring, buried treasure, kidnaping and Indian raids. He saves his father and returns to school just in time to win a decisive baseball game with his remarkable pitching and hitting.

6.7/10

Canadian Mountie goes undercover to catch his brother's killers.

6.3/10

John Travers and Yak, his faithful Indian sidekick, pick up where a murdered sheriff leaves off, and try to nab the mysterious Shadow.

5.2/10

The Blondes and Redheads series: To prove his sophistication, a brutish gangster enlists the girls' help in winning a dancing competition

4.7/10

A re-edited, digitally colourised and re-scored version of vintage black and white Western 'The Star Packer', complete with contemporary, pulse pounding music. The re-edit brings 'The Star Packer' down to a 22 minute short version. John Travers and Yak, his faithful Indian sidekick, pick up where a murdered sheriff leaves off, and try to nab the mysterious Shadow.

5.1/10

John Bishop discovers a plot to rob a silver mine belonging to his girlfriend Mary's father and, to foil the evildoers, he joins them.

5.6/10

The circus arrives in Great Shows. Rainey Big Ben and Kit Denton, the star of the show, are informed that no representation will be allowed in the city, and that their presence is not desired by the local potentate. This incomprehensible hatred is equaled only by the Kit 's father's contempt for women. Kit, who criticized his father's contemptuous attitude towards Alicia, his girlfriend, Kit's father tells him of the drama he lived in Big Ben many years earlier.

5.8/10

Government man Fiddlin' has joined Wolf's gang and Banty has become his friend. When Fiddlin' objects to Wolf's kidnapping of Ann, he is left in a burning building. Rescued by his horse Tarzan, he convinces Banty to help bring in the gang.

Elna Curry, once a concert pianist, develops an unfounded jealousy of neighbor, Trudie Morrow. Elna who suffers from neurasthenia, believes that Trudie is having an affair with her husband, John, and vows revenge on Trudie. John explains to Trudie Elna's condition and plan. Trudie, being good-hearted tells John that she'll move. One evening, John returns late from work to discover Elna dead. John burns Elna's suicide note to protect Trudie. This results in John being charged for murder and put on trial.

7.1/10

Two incompetent private detectives pose as swamis in order to infiltrate a gang of bank robbers.

4.1/10

Ken Maynard's exceptionally intelligent horse, Tarzan the Wonder Horse, is the star of this western about evil cowboy Steve Frazer (Welch) who gathers horses for slaughter, whose meat is sold to pet food manufacturers. The wild horse Tarzan frees the doomed horses from their corrals, and Frazer convinces the Sheriff that Tarzan is a threat and can be shot on sight. Local cowboy Ken Benson (Maynard) and rancher Pat Riley (Kennedy) work together to clear Tarzan's good name and put Frazier behind bars for his evil deeds.

6.8/10

A rancher is arrested for murdering his young partner's grandfather, but he escapes to try to prove his innocence.

4.6/10

Benny Rubin is a New York City vaudeville performer who inherits a hotel in California, and takes all of his ham-actor friends there, as chefs, bellhops, maids and waiters, to help him run it. BUsiness is bad so Benny plants a story that his late uncle hid his fortune in the hotel. The place is soon filled with guests who tear down the hotel looking for the non-existent fortune.

5.2/10

Goss, Mason, and Kelly force Joaquin Murieta to watch as they hang his brother Juan for a crime he did not commit. To exact his revenge on the three, Joaquin becomes the notorious Black Shadow.

5.7/10

Acting on a tip from former stage actress Fern Madden, who is now working as a movie extra, Jimmy Burke, a Hollywood reporter, publishes an article revealing an independent film producer to have mob connections. As a result of the story, Jimmy becomes city editor.

5.7/10

A young man seeks vengeance on the outlaws who killed his father.

5.8/10

A young waitress falls for the son of a railroad tycoon, and finds herself hobnobbing with the rich when he invites her to spend some time with he and his family in Palm Springs.

6.2/10

A grandmother's will leaves her fortune to a few, mostly to her great-niece Ann. Ann will only receive her inheritance once she marries, with the approval of three of her stuffed-shirt relatives and without scandal. Otherwise the estate goes to the cat and dog hospital. Ann, not needing the money, rebels by seeking scandal with a gigolo.

6.1/10

Shirley Mason plays the title-role, a glamorous musical star having a hard time escaping the clutches of her lecherous producer (Tom Curran). The producer, however, refuses to leave well enough alone, and Anne is tempted to return to her glamorous life.

Cal Roberts can ride anything with four legs. He enters the contests held at big rodeo. He wins all honors and meets a girl who races horses to help her father clear pressing debts. Complications follow, but Cal wins the girl.

Parents pretend they are in show business and their kids are ventriloquist dummies.

Broadway dancing star Adele Dorey who, overworked and exhausted, suddenly ups and leaves New York in favor of a country village. But when promoter Bobby Lewis (Egan) of the barnstorming Gay Girlies Burlesque Company arrives in town, he picks an incognito Adele among all the pretty village girls to star in his new show. On a lark, Adele introduces her maid Jane (Louise Fazenda) as her mother and accepts a contract. When Adele's identity is finally revealed, the slumming star apologizes for her deception by offering Bobby a Broadway job.

6.4/10

Steven Bancroft, a young officer in the U. S. Calvary, is given the assignment of ensuring that dirty-work by agents of Spain, Mexico or Russian aren't going to keep statehood-for-California from becoming a reality. Bancroft uses his guns to settle any debates regarding international laws.

4.3/10

After a work crew stringing telegraph wires across the Great Plains is slaughtered by Indians, Pat O'Leary, the company superintendent, must take out another supply train to make the dangerous trip across open country. The Indians attack and are driven off. On the day the wires are finally strung, the settlers gather to hear the first message from the East.

Story of a young shanghaied sailor. Forced to work as a deckhand on a rough-and-tumble transport vessel, the sailor ends up in South America, where his brutish captain intends to sell guns and ammo to a band of revolutionaries. Besting the villains, Jack gets into the thick of things himself, ultimately rescuing the heroine -- likewise "shanghaied" by the captain -- from Certain Doom.

A black man walks into a bar. Or at least a white man with blackface on, and hilarity occurs.

The daughter of a desert chief kidnaps a member of the French Foreign Legion in the hopes of wooing him.

5.8/10

An old prospector, is found murdered and Sonora Slim is accused of the crime. The real killer is actually Silver Sam McGee.

When the Indians attack, a doctor is separated from his wife. The reunion is set against the heroism of the foremost Indian scout of the day...Kit Carson!

6/10

S.O.S. Perils of the Sea is a 1925 American silent film featuring Elaine Hammerstein, directed by James P. Hogan and released through Columbia Pictures.

6.1/10

Slapstick comedians doing what they can with various uniforms on.

Jack Ruby (William Fairbanks), the son of a wealthy family, pretends to be a chauffeur and goes to work for Peggy Howell (Pauline Garon), a beautiful flapper.

Australian star Rex "Snowy" Baker stars in this military melodrama. This was the first of a series of four films Baker made for producer Phil Goldstone, and they were offered on a States' Rights basis. Irene Falliday (Gertrude McConnell) is the daughter of the British governor (William Bainbridge) who rules over an Indian province. She finds Yasmini (Lois Scott) wearing the shawl she believes she has lost and asks Tommy Farrell (Phil Burke) to get it back. Farrell is in love with Irene, but Yasmini loves him, and when he finally gets the shawl from her, the circumstances shame her in the eyes of her father Shere Ali, Sirdar of the Afghans (Frank Whitson), and his subjects.

Quincy Adams Sawyer is a young attorney who one day meets a girl in the park and is immediately smitten with her.

George Bunny's career as a screen comedian was an attempt to cash in on his brother, John's reputation, but George is no comedian. Here he plays a young man -- he is supposed to have been in his mid-fifties when this movie was made, but if so, he could have passed for 30 -- who heads over to a sanitarium filled with the usual crazy types, falls in love and runs off with the leading lady, all without doing anything that might be called in the least funny.

Billy Franey does home brew. "The Janitor" was made during Prohibition, when ANY gags about alcohol (especially the home-brewed variety) would get loud laughs from American cinema audiences.

Billy Franey comedy

6.1/10

A delivery man is mistaken for a plumber; violence ensues!

4/10

Billy and his pal are bank robbers who decide to lay low by taking jobs in a diner as a chef and waiter.

Billy is on the bum. He sees a copper writing a ticket to a driver parked in front of a fire hydrant. The driver slips the cop some money to tear up the ticket. Billy acquires a fake fire plug and a policeman's badge, and sets out to make some money.

5/10

A slapstick comedy about a hobo and his moonshine.

Billy is hired by the local newspaper as a cameraman. Billy gets involved in many messes and despite his efforts he cannot escape the presence of the Whitling Man.

5/10

Even the story is pretty much a retread of something out of a lesser Keystone from 1915. They eat paste. They make a general mess and they get involved with a mad anarchist named D.E. Stroy (get it?) who was to blow up everything -- his motive seems to be to produce more gags for the movie.

The misadventures of a dog catcher

Cook Gale Henry and butler Milton Sims are arguing in the kitchen about who would make the best detective, until the lady of the house comes in to see about the delay in dinner and fires them both. Freed from their domestic duties, they are at liberty to become detectives.

The emperor issues a counterblast against liquor and the "wets" try to kill him. Damon saves Pythias from the headsman's axe and the lives of both are spared.

It was all because John was the image of Frank, the health inspector. John lost his purse and Frank found it. Then he went to the former's house and Matilda thought her hubby was crazy because he did not recognize her. Frank had forgotten his badge, and so could not prove his identity, and was taken to the insane asylum. But Bess discovered that Frank left his badge and went to the first house on his list to give it to him. At the corner she met John looking for the wallet. He liked her and said that he would take her to lunch. When he arrived home he thought that Matilda was crazy, and sent to the asylum for help.

The widow lives in a houseboat near one of the beaches. Charley is her devoted lover, but his bashfulness prevents him from proposing. She has a daughter, Lilly, who is visiting in a nearby town. She accepts Heinie subject to her mother's approval. The mother cannot see it and wires her daughter that she cannot marry the young man unless he shows her $5,000. She orders the girl home. Heinie says that he has a brother living near the widow's houseboat and that he will accompany Lilly home so as to be on the ground. Heinie and Charley are very much alike, in fact, the only difference between the brothers is in the way in which they wear their mustaches.

Gale Henry, at that time famous as big-nosed, lugubrious-faced purveyor of silent screen slapstick. Here as a prominent villager too interested writing a play to be bothered with lovers. When a wandering director arrives in town, learns of her play and agrees to produce it for her, with the author in the leading role, she is delighted. But the play proves a frost.

Having struck it rich, two prospectors return to town, where one of them is to be married while the other will serve as best man. But on the eve of the wedding, the best man turns out to be the worst of the two, and elopes with the bride-to-be. Though heartbroken, the jilted bridegroom shrugs philosophically and returns to gold-mining. Several years later, the wife dies, and her husband becomes a high-rolling gambler.

Gale, the Village Schoolmarm, wants to marry Ezekial Brown, but her Uncle objects to the match.

This is another comedy, in which trick photography plays a large part. It is a travesty on the temperance question, siding with the dry element. On the refusal of the Governor to sign a bill in favor of the liquor interest, the political boss tries to force the executive to his will. The Governor, after a series of thrilling experiences, thwarts the efforts of the politicians. The latter calls on Lady Baffles, who impersonates the Governor's wife and secures the executive's signature to the bill. Detective Duck, however, captures the politicians in a clever manner and beats Lady Baffles at her own game. (Moving Picture World Synopsis)

First episode in the Lady Baffles and Detective Duck one-reel comedy series. The city is being terrorized by a mysterious female Raffles. At last, in desperation, the chief of police sends for his friend, the famous sleuth, Detective Duck. While these two are sitting in conference, Raffles, in her search for loot, enters the home of Mrs. Gotta Millun. Raffles' eyes sparkle as she takes in with delight the rich Oriental knick-knacks and furnishings. Mrs. Millun is a connoisseur. Raffles hides under a table when Mrs. Millun comes in. Mrs. Millun has just received a gift from her brother in far-off India. It is a jewel case containing eight beautiful and rare pearls as large as hen eggs. In a note accompanying them her brother explains that the jewels were part of the loot of the Britishers when they raided Oski Wow Wow, and that they were taken from a famous Indian Princess who had sworn eternal vengeance on all who thereafter possessed them.

Edgar Kennedy is over-joyed when told he has won a $5,000 prize in a "How To Be Happy Though Married" contest. A reporter interviews Edgar and his wife Vivien who tell him about their engagement and elopement. Then Viviens father tells them that according to a law he has found in a law-book, they aren't legally married. After a series of misadventures, they learn that the law is a new one and that the Kennedy marriage is legal.