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The Lawless Nineties & Sitting on the Moon; September, 1936
Topic Started: May 21 2014, 04:57 AM (253 Views)
Laughing Gravy
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A rare treat of a Republic double-feature last night, courtesy of Mr. Nat Levine, America's Master Showman.

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In our first film, directed by Joseph Kane, who shows up with a megaphone in many, many of these 1930s John Wayne pictures, Mr. Wayne and Lane Chandler are a couple of tough but amiable G-Men (or whatever they called gov'ment agents in the 1890s) who are sent undercover into the Wyoming Territory. Seems a pack of low-down, dirty cuy-oots are driving off homesteaders and fixin' to fix the upcoming election over whether or not Wyoming should become the 44th State or not (they don't want it to, because then the place will be overrun with Federals, and who wants THAT?!?!). Now, as you know, these movies are only 55 or 56 minutes long, so we mustn't tarry, we must get right on with the plot, but thankfully you probably already know it: crusading newspaper publisher (Gabby Hayes), pretty daughter (Ann Rutherford), comic relief (Snowflake, romanced by Etta McDaniel), upstanding head of the Citizens Grand Council for Upstanding Citizens and We're Not Criminals at All, Honestly We're Not who's really the guy behind all the crime, and the usual pack of miscreants, and of course you know that means George Chesebro and Charles King and Al Taylor and guys like that.

Nobody take offense to this, but what surprised me about the film is that these days, the Republican Party would consider the bad guys to be the good guys in this movie - they're preventing the newly-arrived homesteaders from voting ("Hey, they don't have proper IDs!"), they're warring against Federal intrusion into local government, and they don't like Federal agents. Oh, and they all carry guns. Those are all part of the GOP platform these days, and we won't even go into the consideration of the homesteaders being immigrants.

I hope you like politically incorrect humor, because Snowflake has way more screen time in this thing than Lane Chandler does, and probably, if you timed it, as much as John Wayne does. He's an amiable guy, though... Not as funny as Mantan would be, but easier to take than Stepin is.

I saw this back in 1936 thanks to the ITB Wayback machine, but it's available in 78 years on a shiny little Olive Films Blu-ray disc, looking as glowing and bright and beautiful as any film can look.

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I was only gonna stay for the first five or ten minutes of the second feature, which I'd never heard of and which starred people I'd never heard of singing songs I've never heard before, but I got engrossed in it, but not for any reasons you'd normally think a person would get engrossed in a movie for. Mainly, I kept waiting for the stars of the movie to show up - surely Republic couldn't have handed over an entire feature film to THESE people? I mean, we're not even talkin' B-listers here, if Dick Purcell or Mischa Auer starred, I could see it. Who ARE these people, and why don't they look like movie stars?

Grace Bradley is Polly, a washed-up film star on the outs in Hollywood because of her foul temperament and oh YEAH, HERE'S a heroine we're gonna root for. Ms. Has Been meets Mr. Never Was Roger Pryor, a writer of unpopular songs, and the two hit it off just swell, surprising because he looks like Johnny Arthur as the whiny father in one of those Our Gang pictures. Adding to the fun (if you can call it fun), each of them has a comic sidekick; she's got Pert Kelton, he's got William Newell, and yes, did I TELL you that Republic aimed low when casting this thing? What I wouldn't give for Snowflake in THIS one. Anyway, Roger writes Grace a bunch of not very good songs and she becomes a hit over the radio, which gets her another chance in Hollywood, but she won't go a-cause she doesn't want to leave the songwriter, but he insists.

Million dollar dialog: "This is your second chance, Polly! And NOBODY gets a THIRD chance!"

On her farewell radio performance, she sings one of his songs, "Lost in My Dreams" and it instantly becomes a smash and sells a million and two copies, right then and there while she's singing it, so they can run off and get married. There's a subplot about a golddigger who pretends to be married to Roger, but it was boring and stupid so I'm not going to mention it. End of movie, which isn't on Blu-ray in 78 years and I didn't take the time machine into the future to see if there's one on the horizon, so you'll have to look for this on one of those "150 Movie Musicals for $3" DVD sets in the cut-out bin of your hometown in whatever year YOU live in.

P.S. Grace Bradley, before she became an ACTUAL washed-up film star, became Mrs. William Hopalong Cassidy Boyd. Way!




"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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riddlerider
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I liked Sitting on the Moon enough to own a 16mm print of it. But then, I have a weakness for Republic's non-Western "B" pictures from that period. I also like the songs (except, oddly, for the title tune) and I like the cast. Especially Grace Bradley, who specifically asked us to screen it when we invited her to the 1991 Cinecon in Hollywood. She claimed never to have seen it from beginning to end. My favorite photo of the two of us was taken right before the screening, with me holding the first reel in one hand and her in the other. So even if the movie stunk on ice — and it doesn't — I'd still have fond memories of it for that reason. Unfortunately, I haven't seen Moon since I sold all my 16mm prints many years ago.
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The Batman
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Great anecdote, RR. Definitely envious of all the bygone stars you've had the opportunity to meet.



Always be yourself! Unless you can be Batman...then always be Batman!
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Laughing Gravy
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Me too. And it doesn't stink. But it sure is simply a time filler on any theatrical program.
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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