Clarence Wilson
Film clips highlight the funniest scenes and brightest comic stars in MGM's history.
Rich playboy Drogo Gaines is in imminent danger of marrying a gold digger, and escapes by feigning insanity. The joke's on him when he wakes up in an asylum full of comical lunatics. There he befriends Colonel Carraway, and together they escape, catching a ride with a beautiful blonde who proves to be Penguin Moore, carnival owner.
Jo March and her husband Professor Bhaer operate the Plumfield School for poor boys. When Dan, a tough street kid, comes to the school, he wins Jo's heart despite his hard edge, and she defends him when he is falsely accused. Dan's foster father, Major Burdle, is a swindler in cahoots with another crook called Willie the Fox. When the Plumfield School becomes in danger of foreclosure, the two con men cook up a scheme to save the home.
His Arizona hometown of Torpedo invites Gene back to be the honorary sheriff of the Frontier Days Celebration.
The Weaver Brothers hit the road and taste the hobo's life in this, the sixth, entry in the eleven-film "Weaver Brothers and Elviry" comedy-drama series. The singing hayseed family's journey begins when a drought destroys their farm. The young travelers soon hook up with a band of tramps and end up in a small town that has been nearly destroyed by the floods that occasionally roar through it. The Weavers' are moved by the townsfolk's plight and so decide to stay a spell and help out.
Inventor Robert Fulton (Richard Greene) receives support from a tavern owner (Alice Faye) and a shipyard worker (Fred MacMurray) to help realize his dream of a high-powered steamboat.
A man finds himself the father, by proxy, of a ten-month-old baby and becomes involved in the turbulent lives of the child's family.
In Springdale, a small town near New York, taxi driver Brick Tennant and his friend Joe Linden are unjustly accused of a hideous crime and blindly convicted by those who are only interested in feeding the voracious machinery of an inhumane justice system.
Nicky Nelson is a fast-talking sideshow barker with a wax-and-alive concession on Atlantic City's boardwalk. Even with the band of his friend, struggling musician Gene Krupa, playing on the sidewalk to attract the customers, "The Living Corpse" and other low-rent acts aren't enough to lure the seen-it-all boardwalk strollers, and the landlord closes the show in lieu of never-paid rent. Nicky, always promoting, goes to Stephen Hanratty, head of the pier's Dance Pavilion, to plug Krupa's band as an attraction, but Hanratty won't even listen to them. But, while there, he meets singer Lily Racquel, who knows he is a phoney but might have the ability to to talk a radio-station manager into giving her an audition. She gives him a ring to help finance the project; he promptly loses it in a crap-game.
Albany, New York, 1776. After marrying, Gil and Lana travel north to settle on a small farm in the Mohawk River Valley, but soon their growing prosperity and happiness are threatened by the sinister sound of drums that announce dark times of revolution and war.
One of the sons of Frankenstein finds his father's monster in a coma and revives him, only to find out he is controlled by Ygor who is bent on revenge.
The O'Leary brothers -- honest Jack and roguish Dion -- become powerful figures, and eventually rivals, in Chicago on the eve of its Great Fire.
Rebecca's Uncle Harry leaves her with Aunt Miranda who forbids her to associate with show people. But neighbor Anthony Kent is a talent scout who secretly set it up for her to broadcast.
The Ritz Brothers pretend to be Kentucky hillbillies in order to get a booking on a radio show.
When the murdered body discovered by beautiful, vivacious socialite Melsa Manton disappears, police and press label her a prankster until she proves them wrong.
Teddy, an overworked New York office girl, seeks 2 weeks of rest and relaxation at a camp in the Catskills. She is definitely not a happy camper because of the crowded and noisy conditions. She tries her best to fit in and, after an initial dislike, falls for college educated Chick, a waiter at the camp. Teddy becomes suspicious of his motives, however, and he becomes alarmed when she spends an innocent night in the cabin of a rival suitor. All ends happily, however, as their love proves true enough and trust triumphs over suspicions.
Alice, the only relatively normal member of the eccentric Sycamore family, falls in love with Tony Kirby, but his wealthy banker father and snobbish mother strongly disapprove of the match. When the Kirbys are invited to dinner to become better acquainted with their future in-laws, things don't turn out the way Alice had hoped.
Warning of the dangers of sexually transmitted diseases, specifically syphilis.
Esther Blodgett is just another starry-eyed farm kid trying to break into the movies. Waitressing at a Hollywood party, she catches the eye of her idol Norman Maine, is sent for a screen test, and before long attains stardom as newly minted Vicki Lester. She and Norman marry, though his career soon dwindles to nothing due to his chronic alcoholism.
A detective must solve a case where a girl was murdered in a room--and all the doors and windows were locked from the inside.
A millionaire is found murdered in his apartment. Suspicion falls on a variety of suspects, including his fiancé and her parents, the butler, and a professional mentalist known as The Great Gambini.
Henry Armstrong was past being a spring chicken, still believes in Santa Claus and the maxim that "honesty is the best policy", but lack of money keeps him from marrying Molly and buying a little home, and his is threatened with the loss of the petty job he has had for four years with old Curtis French, Molly's uncle, because he can not sell enough insurance policies. And, then, he finds a thousand dollar bill. His honesty makes him advertise the find, but no one claims the money. When he is convinced that the owner will not turn up and that the money is his to keep, he becomes a changed, more aggressive and self-confident person. He begins to make sales as fast as he can make the pitch and he insists that he and Molly be married at once. While getting dressed for the ceremony, he places the $1000 bill in one of his father's old suits, and Pa Armstrong, trying to raise money to buy his son a wedding present, sells the suit to a passing junk man.
The two leading ladies are cast as Prudence and Agatha, a pair of old-fashioned schoolteachers in an old-fashioned small town. Disdaining the wimpy theories of "progressive" education, Prudence and Agatha stick to the reliable "Three R's," often teaching to the tune of a hickory stick. Though ridiculed for their so-called outmoded methods, the heroines manage to turn out quite a few prize students, earning the undying gratitude of the local citizenry.
A henpecked husband tries to help his daughter marry the man she loves and his wife loathes.
Charlie Mason and Rusty Fleming are star reporters on a Chicago tabloid who are romantically involved as well. Although skilled in ferreting out great stories, they often behave in an unprofessional and immature manner. After their shenanigans cause their frustrated city editor to resign, the publisher promotes Charlie to the job, a decision based on the premise that only a slacker would be able crack down on other shirkers and underachievers. His pomposity soon alienates most of his co-workers and causes Rusty to move to New York. Charlie resigns and along with gangster friend Smiles Benson tries to win Rusty back before she marries a stuffy society author.
Charlie tells his co-workers about his event-filled vacation to California, including his run in with two vagabond hitchhikers (Laurel and Hardy in cameo appearances).
Story of the gold strike on an immigrant's property that started the 1849 California Gold Rush.
A wealthy, eccentric collector of stuffed birds (Pinky Tomlin) and a beautiful Russian singer (Rita Hayworth) provide refuge to an orphaned Irish child (Jane Withers) who has arrived illegally in New York. Director Lewis Seiler's 1936 comedy, with numerous songs, also features Jane Darwell, George Givot, Robert Dudley, Vera Lewis, Louise Carter, Francis Ford, Russell Simpson and Clarence Wilson.
Lawyer Perry Mason is summoned to the Laxter mansion in the dead of night to write granddaughter Wilma out of invalid Peter Laxter's will, to keep her from marrying suspected fortune hunter Doug. Peter dies in a mysterious fire and Laxter's two grandsons, Sam Laxter and Frank Oafley, inherit his estate on the condition old caretaker Schuster and his cat Clinker are kept on. When cat-hating Sam threatens Clinker, Perry steps in and learns Laxter's death was suspicious and the family fortune and diamonds are missing. Schuster's found dead in his basement apartment, Laxter's nurse Louise is murdered with Schuster's crutch, and circumstantial evidence brings Doug to trial for Louise's death. Mason's investigation produces a surprise witness who turns the trial around. Written by Sister Grimm
The first musical comedy from the Grand National assembly line, Hats Off stars John Payne and Mae Clarke as rival press agents Jimmy Maxwell and Jo Allen. Both have been assigned to stir up publicity for separate expositions at the 1936 Texas Centennial (newsreel footage of which predominates throughout the film's short running time). To throw Jimmy off the track, Jo pretends to be a schoolteacher, but by the time the ruse has been revealed, the two leading characters have fallen in love.
A runaway orphan is befriended by a kind-hearted pet store owner with a criminal past.
Jones family romp with father trying to convince son to follow him as a druggist, rather than becoming a pilot, until the son's piloting skills come in handy.
A barber tries to find the winning lottery ticket he hid from his moralistic wife.
Roscoe the Rainmaker is invited to California (with sidekick "Billy") to relieve a terrible dry spell and to save the community from an unscrupulous businessman who stands to profit from the drought
Thelma and Patsy find themselves in a spooky house inhabited by a nut who is a mechanical genius and has made a robot who does everything. The inventor manipulates the robot's control board from a hidden room. The girls are soon in a panic. Patsy gets into an argument with the robot and loses the match of wits. Blackie Burke, an escaped convict, is using the house as a hideout, and this adds to the problems the girls already have.
In this comedy of an Englishman stranded in a sea of barbaric Americans, Marmaduke Ruggles, a gentleman's gentleman and butler to an Earl is lost in a poker game to an uncouth American cattle baron. Ruggles's life is turned upside down as he's taken to the USA, is gradually assimilated into American life, accidently becomes a local celebrity, and falls in love along the way.
Crime novelist Roger Blackwood competes with hotel house detective Andy McCabe in solving a murder by poisoning at a medical convention.
A landslide has diverted water from the Baldwin ranch to Cambert's. With their cattle dying, Cambert refuses to let them have any water. Easterner Larry Knight takes a job with the Baldwins and he has a plan to divert the water back to the Baldwin ranch. But Phil, jealous of Kitty's attraction to Larry, lets Cambert know of the scheme.
Adaptation of Ouida's sentimental classic about a poor Flemish boy (Frankie Thomas) whose ambition is to become a painter.
Cautious, frugal Charley is told by his insurance doctor (Billy Gilbert) that he has six months to live, and goes on to live life to the fullest.
An eccentric millionaire, unable to locate his only granddaughter, decides to divide his estate among a group of people less close to him: his niece and nephew, his attorney, his doctor, and his housekeeper. But complications and murder arise when two different women turn up, claiming to be the granddaughter.
If Columbia could make an acceptable movie star out of opera-diva Grace Moore, then RKO Radio could do the same with Lily Pons. At least that was producer Pandro S. Berman's reasoning when he cast Pons in the 1935 musical romance I Dream too Much. The actress plays Annette, a rural French musical student who marries struggling American composer Jonathan (Henry Fonda). Possessed of a splendid singing voice, our heroine rises to fame on the opera stage, while poor Jonathan continues struggling, supporting himself as a tour guide. Annette eventually saves her marriage by transforming her husband's "masterpiece," a rather turgid modernistic opera, into a light-hearted musical comedy. Lucille Ball, who'd later co-star with Henry Fonda in The Big Street and Yours, Mine and Ours, has a funny minor role as a gum-snapping tourist. Though Lily Pons was at least 10 years older than Fonda, they make an attractive and believable screen couple, adding credibility to this somewhat contrived yarn
When a young man is befriended by a gambling ship operator and made a partner in the business, he becomes involved in a police manhunt after he covers up a murder committed by his new partner.
Con men Calvin Churchill and Clip McGurk know how to fix a horse-race or boxing match…but can they get themselves out of their current fix? Calvin wants to go straight and win back his estranged wife, but first the two sharpies must dodge a dogged IRS agent and bilk a bunch of aviation investors out of the backing boodle for a balloon excursion into the stratosphere.
American Civil War, 1862. After the disaster of the Second Battle of Bull Run, Major Allen, chief of the Secret Service of the Union, asks actress Gail Loveless to become one of his operators and infiltrate enemy territory.
A struggling widow and her daughter take in a black housekeeper and her fair-skinned daughter. The two women start a successful business but face familial, identity, and racial issues along the way.
An unprincipled hustler who makes his living getting--or making up--evidence in divorce cases finds that he's framing his own daughter.
A power-broker ward-heeler, Bill Grimes, wields more power than the elected politicians and has no problem in getting matters-of-the-city handled in which ever way is best for his needs. But when he tries to fix his adored kid brother's place on the school football team, he meets his match in school-teacher Anne Barry.
After being fired from his job at the Marriage License Bureau, a clerk turns to matchmaking.
A socialite only realises that her friend is in love with her when she falls for the wrong man.
A two-bit gambler somehow claws his way to the top. His love for riches is only matched by his love for his wife, but he is sometimes confused by which he loves most.
After greedy men have Edmound Dantes unjustly imprisoned for 20 years for innocently delivering a letter entrusted to him, he escapes to revenge himself on them.
The story of a small-time vaudeville trio and their rise to the big time.
A magic lamp lets a young couple become kids again and exposes a mean old man who runs his orphanage like a prison.
The ranchers have given money through Benton to the crooked lawyer Harkness to save the titles to their land. When Harkness gets a better offer, he steals Benton's receipt for the money and Benton is jailed. To fight back, Benton escapes jail at night to become the Phantom.
Rival newspaper reporters Pat Morgan and Ted Kord find themselves unraveling the mystery behind the death of a millionaire philanthropist who fell from his penthouse balcony. When it is discovered that the plunge was not an accident, the building's residents come under suspicion. Soon, the body count begins to mount as three more murders occur by strangulation.
An ocean liner is found at sea with everyone on board dead. An investigation is begun to find out what happened.
In this brutal prison drama a hen-pecked husband is sentenced to prison after getting caught with his hand in the company till. He is sent to a high-rise facility in LA. It seems the fellow was only following the instructions of his domineering, constantly nagging wife who, as soon as he is put away, takes up with a more successful businessman. This causes her new lover's ex-lover to get insanely jealous and kill the conniving wife.
A hospital surgeon (James Dunn) protects a mystery woman (Gloria Stuart) who knows too much about a card-game murder.
Sarajevo June 28, 1914. Dushan, the Serbian mayor of a Hungarian town, has come to see the parade of Archduke Ferdinand. While there he runs into Geza, an old friend in the Hungarian Army and invites him to come to his house and visit him and his new wife.
Tillie and Augustus Winterbottom are thought to be missionaries when they arrive to find Phineas Pratt trying cheat the Sheridans out of her father's inheritance, including a ferry franchise and a boat. The only way to keep the franchise is to win a race against Pratt's boat.
A private eye specializing in divorce cases falls for the woman he's been hired to frame.
Beleaguered adventurer Carl Denham returns to the island where he found King Kong.
A prizefighter is convicted of a murder that was actually committed by his sister.
Jim Gladden, a construction site foreman, is partially responsible for the accidental death of one of his workers, Fred Smith, and makes good on Fred's deathbed request to go to Scotch Valley and take care of his surviving wife and children. When Jim arrives in the small town, he is told that there are two Fred Smith families in Scotch Valley, the rich Smiths and the poor Smiths. Jim assumes that the Smiths he is looking for are the poor ones, and is directed to a house where four children live in poverty.
Brash hoodlum Tom Connors enters Sing Sing cocksure of himself and disrespectful toward authority, but his tough but compassionate warden changes him.
The story of corrupt, power-hungry, manipulative Grigori Rasputin's influence on members of the Russian Imperial family and others, and what resulted.
A foreword warns against the peril of yellow journalism, and the story illustrates it by following events in the upstate New York town of Cornwall after prominant financier George Ferguson is killed. Two types of New York City journalists descend on Cornwall, one interested in facts, the other in getting sensational "news". Mrs. Ferguson is known to have been friendly with a local banker. The Fergusons quarrel the evening he is killed (by "burglers", his wife tells the police later), and she is arrested, spurred on by the "bad" journalists, who also manage to badger the banker's wife into the hospital. Meanwhile, young Bruce Foster runs the Cornwall Courier, and shows the big city reporters how to dig out real news while they attempt to subvert justice for their own ends.
New York schoolmarm Hildegarde Withers assists a detective when a body of unscrupulous stockbroker Gerald Parker suddenly appears in the penguin tank at the aquarium.
The evils of alcohol before and during prohibition become evident as we see its effects on the rich Chilcote family and the hard working Tarleton family.
Harry is hired by a rich family to stop their daughter from entering a beauty contest.
Nightclub singer Joan Gordon runs away from her gangster boyfriend to become a mail-order bride to a struggling North Dakota farmer. Their relationship has a rocky start, but just as Joan realizes she's developing feelings for her husband, her old boyfriend arrives to win her back.
Five men have to prove their innocence when a blackmailer is murdered.
A gentleman thief charms a Viennese baron's wife and also conducts a daring daylight robbery of a jewellers.
Police Chief Jim Fitzpatrick is after gangster Sam Belmonte. He uses his corrupt brother Ed to watch over Daisy who was associated with Belmonte.
A ranch manager falls in love with a banker's daughter, but after a quarrel with the girl's parents, flee across the border into Mexico.
Overworked boxer Jim goes to a health ranch in New Mexico to recover where he falls in love with Peggy and her sickly son. Once recovered, Jim leaves to return to the ring. Can their romance survive the distance?
Two Dartmouth football players fall in love with the same girl following college graduation. Directed by Dudley Murphy, this 1932 film stars Joel McCrea, William Gargan, Marian Marsh, Walter Catlett and Robert Benchley.
Husband and father Will Rogers tells his spoiled wife and children that they have to economize.
The wealthy von Wellingens are shocked when the father of their son Fred's fiancée Lia juggles desserts at a formal dinner. They encourage Fred to break the engagement. Lia goes to Berlin to marry a Baron von Schwarzdorf, and Fred arrives too late to stop the marriage.
A society gigolo goes after a rich mother and her daughter, but tries to find true happiness with his girlfriend, who is neither rich nor in "society."
A crooked lawyer trying to cheat a young girl out of her inheritance tries to convince a sea captain to help him. Re-released in 1939 as "Phantom Submarine U-67."
A story of love, humor and drama against the background of America's "Biggest Little City." An (interrupted) indiscretion by John Wyatt with a floozy prompts his wife, June, to make a trip to Reno, Nevada in order to get a quickie six-week-waiting-period divorce. John, penitent over his past actions (since he got caught), follows his wife to Reno and manages a reconciliation after a murder gives him a chance to prove his true devotion.
An inventor (Bert Lahr) and his lanky girlfriend (Charlotte Greenwood) set an altitude record in his winged contraption.
A popular jockey is disbarred from racing after he's accused of throwing a race.
Working girl Margie Evans has decided there are two kinds of opportunities for a slum kid during the Depression: Those you make and those you take. Determined to help her family out of its financial bind, she is ready to do both after she shows up at the penthouse pool bash of a wealthy playboy.
Hildy Johnson is an investigative reporter is looking for a bigger paycheck. When an accused murderer escapes from custody, Hildy sees an opportunity for the story of a lifetime. But when he finds the criminal, he learns that the man may not be guilty. With the help of his editor, Hildy attempts to hide the convict, uncover the conspiracy and write the scoop of his career.
Bill O'Brien is promoted to lieutenant in the police department for his arrest of Mike Patello, gang leader and racketeer, for murder. Ruth Dale, who loves Bill, is concerned when her brother, Johnny, who witnessed the murder, proposes to testify against the racketeer. Meanwhile, Captain Antrim informs Bill that his father has just been released from prison and does not know his son is a policeman. On the way from prison, O'Brien (J. P.) meets Limo, a former cockney pal who recognizes Bill and keeps J. P. from seeing his son; later, J. P. arrives intoxicated and is enraged, forcing Bill to knock him unconscious. J. P. is arrested for robbery but returns the loot to save his son from disgrace; Johnny is killed before testifying against Patello, who is released but confronted by J. P., who proves his guilt and, when he struggles with the police, kills him. Bill plans to resign, but confident of Ruth's love, he decides to remain on the force.
When a shipping clerk is recruited by his employer to help his golf game, his boss insists he conceal his humble identity at the country club.
Heyst, a hermit on his own tropical island, plays unwilling host to red-headed stowaway Alma. Danger looms...
In Woman Trap, Hal Skelly is hard-bitten police sergeant Dan Malone, whose mission in life is to rid his community of gangsters. The revelation that Dan's own brother Ray (Chester Morris) is the secret head of all local criminal activities does not weaken Dan's resolve in the least. The barely relevant title is a reference to "heroine" Kitty Evans (Evelyn Brent), the wife of a minor gang functionary. Screenwriter Joseph L. Mankiewicz, presumably on a dare, makes a brief appearance as a crime reporter.
Two sailors with a rivalry over chasing women become friends. But when one decides to finally settle down, will this mysterious young women come between them?
Joe and Eve are engaged, but Joe cannot help contrasting the drabness of her attire with the dressy clothes of their friends. Eve overhears him talking of this and breaks with him. Then, with the help of her friend, Mazie, she metamorphoses into a ravishing beauty. Joe is remorseful, but the situation is made more complex when he suspects Eve of questionable relations with her boss.
A married farmer falls under the spell of a slatternly woman from the city, who tries to convince him to drown his wife.
Steve Cline (Milton Sills) returns to the U.S. after earning his fortune in South America. He reads in the paper that his brother Tom (Jack Mower) was arrested for safecracking. Tom escapes and runs to the home of Sadie McCall (Carmel Myers), whose father Reever (Alec Francis) heads a forgery ring. Steve rushes to meet his brother, but Tom is killed in a police raid. Reever gets away and Steve falls for Sadie, but Steve takes the blame for the murder and faces death by hanging. Reported by some to be Gary Cooper's first film as an extra. However this is not confirmed in any way.
John Steele (Frank Beal), a rich uncle, threatens to disinherit his nephew, Tom Steele (Tom Mix), unless the latter learns to curb his violent temper. Tom is put on a 30-day trial and must resist all temptation to get mad or fight back no matter how provoked. And he is easily provoked, especially when called a lavender sissy-boy.
Mary Franklin has a drunken father, an invalid mother, and a kid brother and sister to support. To make ends meet she is works as a hostess in a sleazy cafe, where she steals jewelry from her dancing partners.
Blizzard, deranged from a childhood operation in which both his legs were needlessly amputated after an accident, becomes a vicious criminal, and eventually mob leader of the San Francisco underworld.
