Cinevent Past notes MYSTERY SHIP

SOUND MOVIE MAIN is the spot to discuss non-comedy SOUND films. Go figure.
Richard M Roberts
Godfather
Posts: 2895
Joined: Sun May 31, 2009 6:30 pm

Cinevent Past notes MYSTERY SHIP

Postby Richard M Roberts » Fri Jun 21, 2013 8:01 pm

Todays note is for the 1941 Columbia programmer MYSTERY SHIP, directed by Lew Landers and starring Paul Kelly and Lola Lane:

MYSTERY SHIP


Yeah, on the surface MYSTERY SHIP don’t look like much, Paul Kelly and Lola Lane in the leads, and a young, pre-JOLSON STORY Larry Parks as the best friend. Lane’s a Girl Reporter causing her Government Agent/Fiance’ Kelly grief when he’s called away from the altar for the umpteenth time by “special orders” from headquarters. So Lola trails Kelly to the “special assignment” at four in the morning dockside where he boards a “mystery ship” with a special cargo in the hold and that’s where this film gets interesting.

The Special Cargo is a group of malevolent malcontents: convicts, spies, and general no-goodnicks stamped for deportation by Uncle Sam, and here is where Columbia pulls out most of their resident meanies; Trevor Burdette, Cy Kendall, Dick Curtis, Dwight Frye, Kenneth MacDonald ( yeah, I know he was a frequent judge on PERRY MASON and he played a lot of sheriffs too, but he was a terrific baddie as well), even Byron Foulger gets to play a Nazi! It must have been a slow week for the Lone Wolf and Boston Blackie, `cause all of Harry Cohn’s stable of slime are stuck in the cargo hold of MYSTERY SHIP this time around and they don’t plan on staying there long.

And that’s what keeps MYSTERY SHIP afloat, along with Director Lew Landers usual slick and speedy pacing. It’s an easy 65 minutes that was one of those pleasant suprises on the Late Late Show when there was a Late Late Show. All those great scene-stealing villains having a great old time stealing the scene from each other, Paul Kelly happy at getting to be a good–guy for a change rather than being stuck in the hold with the rest of his usual lot. Lola Lane probably wished that her character was less annoyingly written, but she does her best with what she’s handed.

MYSTERY SHIP’s villain quota is so large that a couple of baddies were even borrowed from the Columbia Shorts Department. Long-time Three Stooges stooge Eddie Laughton and later posthumous Shemp impersonator Joe Palma are rounded up as well. Somehow former silent film comic and later long-running western-weasel Ernie Adams manages a neutral bit-part as a cabbie, and former Selig and elsewhere leading man Herbert Rawlinson makes another of his many-mucho sound supporting roles as Kelly’s boss. MYSTERY SHIP was never meant as anything more than a goodly hour’s entertainment, and it fits those expectations fully with dotted I’s and crossed T’s.



RICHARD M ROBERTS

Gary Johnson
Cugine
Posts: 656
Joined: Tue Jun 09, 2009 4:15 am
Location: Sonoma, CA
Contact:

Re: Cinevent Past notes MYSTERY SHIP

Postby Gary Johnson » Sat Jun 22, 2013 3:01 pm

I have a hard time accepting Kelly in any role where he is not one of the "slime stuck in the cargo hold of MYSTERY SHIP"

He was made for the screen to be rotten to the core.


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 22 guests