Chester Morris

Looks at the stereotype-breaking films of the period from 1929, when movies entered the sound era, until 1934 when the Hays Code virtually neutered film content. No longer portrayed as virgins or vamps, the liberated female of the pre-code films had dimensions. Good girls had lovers and babies and held down jobs, while the bad girls were cast in a sympathetic light. And they did it all without apology.

A black champion boxer and his white female companion struggle to survive while the white boxing establishment looks for ways to knock him down.

A documentary about the glorious history of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios and its decline leading to the sale of its back lot and props. By extension this provides a general history of Hollywood's Golden Age and the legendary studio system.

Film clips highlight the funniest scenes and brightest comic stars in MGM's history.

An ordinary girl's life is radically changed by the mistaken receipt of a $60,000 strand of pearls.

A mysterious hypnotist reverts his beautiful assistant back into the form of a prehistoric sea monster that she was in a past life.

This fact-based prison drama tells the tale of a band of prisoners living in the innovative 2,600-acre prison at Chino, California. The place takes a humanistic approach to reform and there are no armed guards, no lockups and no uniforms. The underlying philosophy is that if these things are not there, the prisoners will not want to escape, and will instead accept their punishment. A new inmate arrives and soon accustoms himself to the new idea. The story includes the Oscar nominated song Unchained Melody.

A struggling writer becomes the prime suspect in a murder investigation when his publisher is found dead in a manner mirroring one of the writer's proposed mystery storylines.

Blackie receives a call from a friend who asks him to retrieve some money from his apartment and deliver it to him in California. Performing this good deed, he is accused of theft, but is allowed to proceed to Hollywood to help the police find a lost diamond.

Blackie runs into a woman he formally loved who now is married with a kid. When her husband gets out of prison he's killed in Blackie's apartment and of course the police thing Blackie pulled the trigger. Blackie must set out to prove his innocence as well as capture the real killers.

A cocky pilot at a Panama Canal bomber station clashes with his trainer over recklessness and a woman. After causing a fatal crash while hungover, he seeks redemption when his rivals crash in the jungle.

Blackie is implicated in a murder when he accidently sells a phony Charles Dickens first edition at an auction.

A murder is committed during the auction of a valuable statue. The prime suspect is Boston Blackie, whose reputation for living on the edge of the law makes him an easy target for the police. When the body disappears, Blackie must find it to prove his innocence.

Boston Blackie, in the 11th film of the Columbia series, indulges in some wit-trading with a squirmy spiritualist who deals in blackmail, murder and the occult. "Blackie" out to help his pal, "Runt," recover some jewels, finds himself involved in the homicides, and also finds himself as the prime suspect, and now has to find the real culprit in order to clear himself. So "Blackie,", a man of many talents and already a proved magician from cases past, shows he knows a little bit about dancing skeletons, walking phantoms and spiritualism himself, and holds a séance to unmask the murderer.

Blackie is the natural suspect when an expensive pearl necklace is stolen while he is supposed to be guarding it.

David Cook and twin brother Tom are poles apart in disposition and traits. When their father dies, Tom goes to New Mexico to live with his Uncle Hardtack while David remains behind to care for their mother. The grown Tom becomes an outlaw while brother David becomes a government lawman. David is charged with apprehending Tom...

A Chicago team of radio scriptwriters must split up when he takes a job with his bride-to-be's father, and the other must write commercial jingles.

Blackie helps the police rescue hostage from an escaped maniac on a killing spree.

After a rare gem is stolen from an exhibition at a posh hotel, Inspector Farraday recruits former thief Boston Blackie to retrieve the stone. Along with his assistant, 'The Runt', Blackie focuses his investigation on the hotel manager, George Daley, and his sister, Eileen. Through disguises and ruses, Blackie and the Runt trick their way to discovering the perpetrators.

Blackie performs in a magic show at a women's prison, which gives an inmate an opportunity to escape.

Blackie is seen leaving a Chinese laundry where the proprietor has been murdered, and must track down the real killer in Chinatown.

A cocky radio reporter sets out to prove an ex-convict is innocent in the murder of a mob boss.

A student nurse falls in love with a young intern in 1910 Baltimore, but tragedy ensues when he contracts a fatal disease.

A wise-cracking private detective's honeymoon is interrupted by a kidnapping case.

Old rivals are pitted against each other in basic training and fight for the same woman.

Sam Gallagher returns home to Los Angeles as an undercover spy for the Navy, getting a job at the shipyards where his brother, Jeff, is a foreman. Jeff still resents Sam for abandoning the family years ago and fears he may steal away Lea Damaron, his current girlfriend -- who is Sam's old flame. While Sam tries to sniff out Nazi saboteurs in the plant, he grows closer to Jill McGann, the agent tasked with pretending to be his wife.

A mad scramble for stolen loot ensues after Boston Blackie has prisoners released for work in a wartime defence plant.

Lil works for the Legendre Company and causes Bill to divorce Irene and marry her. She has an affair with businessman Gaerste and uses him to force society to pay attention to her.

In a town called New Jerusalem, three bandits hold up a bank. After a gun battle with the townspeople, the three robbers retreat into the scorching Arizona desert. There, they happen upon an ill woman stranded with her child. As the mother dies, she begs the men to take care of her infant. The fugitives want to save the baby -- but to do so, they'll have to travel back to New Jerusalem, where they are wanted men. Remade as 3 Godfathers (1949).

This pre-Code comedy-thriller centers on Robert Holden, a broke and discouraged veteran, who meets fellow American Elinor Green at a cafe in Paris. After their first encounter, Holden's attempt to return Green's thought-to-be stolen purse ends up rendering him a stowaway on board a ship bound for America. Also aboard is a collection of characters, including Green's banker fiancé, a famed scientist, and an opera singer. Romance begins to blossom between Holden and Green, just as a radiogram claims that an “infernal machine,” or bomb, is aboard the ship. Quickly each passenger accuses the others of planting the bomb until eventually Holden, jealous of Green's attention to her undeserving fiancé, falsely admits to being the culprit. In his role as assumed perpetrator, Holden tests the group further.

Convicted of manslaughter for a drunken driving accident, Kent Marlowe is sent to prison, where he meets vicious incarcerated figures who are planning an escape from the brutal conditions.

An escaped lunatic, a mysterious swami, and various lovers all have designs on a famous opera singer.

A gangster takes a doctor and his family hostage.

A Depression-downtrodden waif uses her brains instead of her body to rise from tyro con artist to crime boss.

Twelve people are aboard Coast Airline's flagship the Silver Queen enroute to South America when the airplane encounters a storm and is blown off course. Crashing into jungles known to be inhabited by head hunters, pilots Bill and Joe race against time to fix the engines and attempt a take off. The situation brings out the best and worst in the stranded dozen as they create a makeshift runway and prepare to escape before the natives attack. But damage to the plane and low fuel reserves means that only 5 people can be carried to safety.

A cocky prizefighter on his way to the bigtime in New York comes crashing down when his sister is involved in a murder and he takes the blame.

Two surgeons in love with a nurse end their rivalry in the operating room.

Mary wants to marry a gangster because that is where the money is. Unfortunately, the life expectancy and finances of a gangster are unstable.

Conceited radio announcer irritates everyone else at the station.

Jerry Randolph is an inveterate and obnoxious practical joker. Things take a serious turn when it looks as though Jerry's latest prank has resulted in the death of his best friend.

A cab driver takes in a young woman who claims to be a reluctant bride, and becomes involved in the search for a stolen necklace.

Director Lew Landers' 1937 B-film, about a crew of misfit pilots working for an Argentinian air service, stars Chester Morris, Van Heflin, Whitney Bourne, Onslow Stevens, Richard Lane, Douglas Walton, Paul Guilfoyle, Solly Ward, Walter Miller and Rita LaRoy.

A respected citizen with secret ties to the local mob is faced with revealing his criminal connections to save two innocent people from execution

A stock market broker plans to liven up his boring life by taking up piracy on the high seas.

A New York fashion model finds herself being pursued by a poor but honest garage mechanic and a rich philanderer.

A gang of crooks evade the police by moving their operations to a small town. There the gang's leader, John Madison, encounters a faith healer and uses him to scam the gullible public of funds for a supposed chapel. But when a real healing takes place, a change comes over the gang.

Infamous burglar "The Bat" commits a daring jewelry theft despite heavy police presence. Soon after, a bank theft occurs, which may be the work of the criminal as well. Meanwhile, Cornelia Van Gorder has various people arrive at her old mansion, including her niece, Dale, a bank employee, and police detective Anderson. When guests start turning up dead, Cornelia begins to suspect that The Bat may be lurking around the estate.

When a woman discovers that her husband has been unfaithful, she decides to pay him back in kind.

Vallery Grove is in love with Don Warren but her mother opposes the match because he is poor and has no social standing. Don decides to terminate his engagement to Vallery after attending a party where he meets a spoiled rich girl who is interested in him.

This film earned an Oscar nomination for Sound Recording. It is the only film nominated in this category that is among the lost. No negative or print material is known to have survived. Contemporary reviews were scathing, describing the film as a vastly overlong and boring talk-fest.

A series of vignettes with a loose plot. Featured are Frank Morgan, Groucho Marx, Frank McHugh, Robert Benchley and The Brian Sisters. Not bad, more interesting for the historical significance than for entertainment.

A cop goes undercover to infiltrate and break up a counterfeiting ring.

An MGM short showing how materials are shipped by boat 'From the Ends of the Earth' to Hollywood. Featuring footage from the MGM films being made at the time. Such as The Women, Thunder Afloat, Siren of the Tropics, Ninotchka, Northwest Passage, and At the Circus.

G-Man Jeff Crane poses as a crook to infiltrate the notorious Purple Gang, a band of hoodlums which preys upon other hoodlums. Orchestrating the jailbreak of the gang's leader, Crane joins him in a Dillinger-like flight across the country.

On their wedding night, the newlywed bride confesses to her husband that she does not love him, but is actually in love with another man. This devastating admission drives her husband into a furious, savage heartbreak. Following their immediate separation, both individuals spiral downward into their own emotional depths, grappling with heartbreak, infidelity, and the toxic lifestyle of high society. Eventually, after enduring significant personal despair and a long period apart, they cross paths again to find true peace, forgiveness, and serenity in each other's arms.

Jim 'Socker' Conway, former boxer and FBI hero, is maneuvered for political reasons into a do-nothing job in the district attorney's office. Meanwhile, he meets wild debutante Letty Lane, girlfriend of mob mouthpiece Steve Lawrence; and Letty's much nicer sister Susan. Now the slot machine gang brutally beats Jim's friends Franz and Otto. And Jim finds a way to use his nominal position to go into the racket- busting business. But his success puts Letty in deadly peril...

When King's beloved horse dies, Princess tries to purchase a new nag, and that's how she inadvertently gets her hands on a "stolen" race horse. Our heroine nearly ends up with a lengthy prison term before the story is resolved during the climactic Big Race.

Now hear this. The studio that gave the cinema its voice offered 1929 audiences a chance to see and hear multiple silent-screen favorites for the first time in a gaudy, grandiose music-comedy-novelty revue that also included Talkie stars, Broadway luminaries and of course, Rin-Tin-Tin. Frank Fay hosts a jamboree that, among its 70+ stars, features bicyclers, boxing champ Georges Carpentier, chorines in terpsichore kickery, sister acts, Myrna Loy in two-strip Technicolor as an exotic Far East beauty, John Barrymore in a Shakespearean soliloquy (adding an on-screen voice to his legendary profile for the first time) and Winnie Lightner famously warbling the joys of Singing in the Bathtub. Watch, rinse, repeat!

Chick Williams, a prohibition gangster, rejoins his mob soon after being released from prison. When a policeman is murdered during a robbery, he falls under suspicion. The gangster took Joan, a policeman's daughter, to the theater, sneaked out during the intermission to commit the crime, then used her to support his alibi. The detective squad employs its most sophisticated and barbaric techniques, including planting an undercover agent in the gang, to bring him to justice.

A man is tried and convicted for the murder of a man who flirted with his wife., and sentenced to death However, it turns out that he is innocent of the murder and that the real killer has close ties to a powerful politician.