The Shadow: International Crime (1938), Mr. Moto's Last Warning (1939), The Jolson Story (1946)

Sequel to The Shadow Strikes, Rod La Rocque is again Lamount Cranston, who having his identity blown in the last movie has gone on to be a radio personality (can you say synergy) and crime columnist. Lamount is minus his faithful old butler from the last movie (to Bulldog Drummond perhaps) but has gained an ethnic-type cabdriver and young female reporter in his stead. Speaking of the female reporter her characters name is Ms. Lane, and given that this film premiered in April of 1938 and Lois Lane made her comics debut in June of 38' I wonder what relation these characters names have to each other? The plot here involves evil Austrians trying to foil some kind of bond deal, it doesn't really matter though because its just the Mcguffin, but then again this movie doesn't matter much either. La Rocque skates nicely through the movie with minimal effort, but like in the first Shadow picture the acting ability of the supporting players is sub par, even for a cheap programmer. Despite this I kind of liked it.

Grade: C

Mr. Moto of 'the International Police' is undercover in Egypt trying to foil a nefarious plot to sink a French fleet and cause a rift in the diplomatic relations of England and France. Mr. Moto is Japanese, which is kind of interesting considering the time this was made, in fact a whole series of Mr. Moto films was quite successful in the late 1930's. Moto is played by Hungarian born actor Peter Lorre, and so you might think the character to be ment as kind of a racial cliche, though in fact its a fairly progressive portrait of an Asian for its time. Moto is smart, he's skilled in jujitsu and can easily take on multiple assailants at the same time, and he's on the side of international justice. Moto does take on attributes of Asian cliche however when he poses in his undercover persona of antiques dealer Mr. Kuroki, but that's to through the bad guys off base so I guess that's okay.

George Sanders is one of the bad guys, as is Ricardo Cortez who posses as a ventriloquist when he's not plotting to depth charge fleets. They are working for an unnamed country, which is wink wink Germany but the picture won't say that presumably because of U.S. neutrality. John Carradine plays an ill fated British secret agent (suffocated in a submarine), Robert Coot plays a grown up tourist whose acts like a gullible eight year old, and an uncredited E.E. Clive plays the Colonel Blimp like Port Commandant General.

Be Sure to Look For: In a scene at the variety show you can see a poster advertising for a movie staring Warner Oland. This is clever because Warner Oland was the Swedish born actor best known for playing Chinese detective Charlie Chan. Oland had died about six months prior to this films release so the reference works as a kind of double homage. I rather liked this.

Grade: B

The George M. Cohan bio-pic Yankee Doodle Dandy had been a big success, so how about we make a movie about the life of pioneering singer Al Jolson? This is what must have been going through the minds of Hollywood producers, but the movie that resulted can only be considered a bio-pic in the loosest sense. It leaves out the fact that Jolson was an immigrant, the existence of his siblings, including his brother Harry who also worked in show business and had been Al's partner, his womanizing, and composites four wives into one, though mostly based on Ruby Keeler.

Mostly the film is an excuse to play through Jolson's biggest hits. The plot is streamlined and simplified until the primary thread is reduced to: 'Jolson really likes to entertain people and keeps getting more and more successful at it'. Hardly enough to hang two plus hours on but somehow it works, you like Al and his singing enough to let it pass. The singing is actually Al by the way, he dubs his own songs for actor Larry Parks. Parks does a good job, he invests the part with a great deal of enthusiasm and spunk, requisites for playing Jolson. I was also rather impressed with his miming to Jolson's music. Parks is an interesting story on his own, a one time member of the communist party he coped to it during the blacklist all but extinguishing his acting career. Parks and his wife actress Betty Garrett did manage to make a good living however, off of the rent from the various apartment buildings they owned throughout Los Angles.

The movie ends on an odd and melancholy note. Jolson has retired from singing to appease his composite wife Evelyn Keyes. Well one night they take his parents (very Jewish, though the movie avoids all reference to the anti-semitism of the time) to a night club, Al's recognized and brought up on stage, and well you know, relapse. His wife while she loves him decides she must leave him so he can per sue his true love, performing. I don't get why they had to break up over this, it just gives a real odd feeling to the last ten minutes of the movie. In addition Jolson's unusual fondness for black face is kind of uncomfortable its self. On the whole though, while nothing much really happens I liked this movie, probably more then it
deserves.

Grade: B+