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austin_dern

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The Lone Wolf And His Lady brings the Lone Wolf movies to a conclusion, with another new actor (Ron Randell) playing jewel thief Michael ``The Lone Wolf'' Lanyard, and Eric Blore replaced by Alan Mowbray as gentleman's gentleman Jameson. William Frawley at least is thrown in as Inspector Crane, so he's familiar, though not as Crane. Mowbray looks kind of like Blore, but there's just not the good cheer in his performance.

So now they're on the third Lone Wolf, a second Jameson, and make a stab at breaking out of the genre they started in. What of this could go wrong?  )

Mostly, though, there's not enough of the wit and bounce that made the earliest entries fun. There's a scene near the climax where Lanyard uses his understanding of how jewel cutters work to see through one of those double-crosses which come in scenes near the climax in this sort of film, and if there were more thoughts like that then maybe the movie would be more compelling. As it is, this was the last of the Lone Wolf movies (there was a TV series) and it's not making a case that it should've had more chances.

Trivia: In 1629 investors Sir Fernando Gorges and Captain John Mason divided the region of the Province of Maine which they hoped to colonize between them, using the Piscataqua River as the boundary. Mason named his portion, to the west, New Hampshire; Gorges named his, to the east, New Somersetshire. Source: How The States Got Their Shapes, Mark Stein. (And I just learned from Pomfret's Colonial New Jersey: A History of the connection this makes to the towns along the Raritan!)

Currently Reading: Before The Fallout: From Marie Curie To Hiroshima, Diana Preston.

Also, for those interested in the progress of Project Gemini, fifty years ago saw a big decision about the ejection seats, and the first launch schedule, which got kind of near the actual schedule in that eventually, yes, Gemini did launch.

The Lone Wolf In London is the next of the postwar Lone Wolf movies, again with Gerald Mohr as Lone Wolf Michael Lanyard, and Eric Blore back as Jameson. It opens in London again, only this time it was Jameson who was in Britain throughout the war, contradicting the previous movie and the movies made during the war. Clearly the only explanation is a multiplicity of alternate B-movie timelines to be merged at some future Crisis on Infinite Wolves.

I don't recall encountering Jameson's names before, although that might be my failure to notice things.  )

Lanyard pretty well calls it, ``a series of well-planned miracles by my uncommonly brilliant collaborator, Claudius Augustus Lucius Jameson'', except they left out the planning part.

Trivia: Admiral Sir John Byng, the only British admiral ever executed for cowardice, was shot 14 March 1757 on the quarterdeck of the Monarque, a captured French warship in Portsmouth Harbour. Source: To Rule The Waves: How The British Navy Shaped The Modern World, Arthur Herman.

Currently Reading: In The Country Of Brooklyn: Inspiration To the World, Peter Golenbock.

PS: Introducing a Very Small Number, by which I mean ε, and also a little bit about this fellow Cauchy.

The Notorious Lone Wolf resumes the Lone Wolf series with a four-week-long scene at the airport in which Jameson (Eric Blore), Inspector Crane (William Davison), and supernumeries explain how even though it's been four years absolutely nothing has changed about former jewel thief Michael Lanyard, which should make clear to anyone who missed it that they changed the actor for the Lone Wolf. Up till now he's been played by Warren William; now, it's Gerald Mohr. That name may not mean much to non-old-time-radio fans, but Mohr played about half of all the detectives in the golden days of radio, so he can step into this part and be tolerably convincing. There's also a lot of talk about how Lanyard and Jameson haven't seen one another in four years and he's been out of the country, which seems inconsistent with earlier entries in the series.

Considering how few movies they made it's surprising they seemed to not put much effort into this one.  )

Trivia: The United States vs Forty Barrels and Twenty Kegs of Coca-Cola was the second court case to open under the pure food and drugs laws of 1906. It opened in court 13 March 1911. Source: The World of Caffeine: The Science and Culture of the World's Most Popular Drug, Bennett Alan Weinberg, Bonnie K Bealer.

Currently Reading: In The Country Of Brooklyn: Inspiration To the World, Peter Golenbock.

I'm After You

Mar. 12th, 2012 12:10 pm
austin_dern: Inspired by Krazy Kat, of kourse. (Default)

Passport To Suez is another Michael Lanyard/Lone Wolf picture, and it's another one made during the Second World War, meaning once again the retired jewel thief Lanyard (Warren William) and sidekick Jamison (Eric Blore) are overseas, this time around the Suez Canal.

Again, trimmed for spoilers. I'm getting a little cranky with the series. )

Southern California stands in for Somewhere Around The Suez Canal in a late-film car-and-plane chase, and is less convincing at this than it was as Mongolia in the Ace Drummond serial.

Trivia: In 1883 the British Foreign Office offered Ferdinand de Lesseps £8 million to build a second, all-British, Suez Canal. Source: The Story of P&O, David Howarth, Stephen Howarth.

Currently Reading: In The Country Of Brooklyn: Inspiration To the World, Peter Golenbock.

Counter-Espionage is a curious entry in the Lone Wolf series: it takes Lone Wolf Michael Lanyard and Sidekick Jamison and drops them off in London mid-Blitz. Why? Well, I guess he wanted to hang around with naturally long-lived Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson or something. Look, it's a series of B-movie detective pictures and the Blitz was hot, that's all.

I'm less fond of this movie than I am of the ones before, in part because I think it's trying to slide into a different genre.  )

Trivia: During its five years of life, the National Association (baseball's first major league) had 26 different teams in 17 cities, 11 of which failed to last one season. In 1872 five of the eleven teams folded before playing all their scheduled games. Source: Labor and Capital In 19th Century Baseball, Robert P Gelzheiser.

Currently Reading: The Pine Barrens, John McPhee.

PS: Little Enough Differences ... I plunge, maybe unwisely, into a key piece of analysis, because I want to talk about something different from this, but need this to go ahead.

The Lone Wolf Takes A Chance is another entry in the Lone Wolf series of B-movies that Turner Classic Movies pulled in to fill the serials slot in its pre-noon Saturday schedule.

Trimmed for spoilers, but, just in case.  )

Trivia: Between 1850 and 1860 the United mint issued about $400 million in gold coins, around twice that coined before 1850 all the way back to 1793. Source: History of Money, Glyn Davies.

Currently Reading: The Pine Barrens, John McPhee.

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