Forgotten Noir and Crime: Collection Set 4

MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

COUNTERSPY MEETS SCOTLAND YARD: When enemy agents obtain leaked secrets about a guided missile reservation, the chief of America's counterspy division (Howard St. John) and Scotland Yard's top sleuth (Ron Randell) get on an investigative trail which quickly leads to a reservation secretary (Gunsmoke's Miss Kitty, Amanda Blake). "Suspense and excitement"--Harrison's Reports. RADAR SECRET SERVICE: It's science versus crime when agents of a foreign power working with local gangsters (including Tom Neal) steal a truck loaded with secret atomic materials, and the members of the Secret Service's new "radar unit" (including John Howard and Ralph "Dick Tracy" Byrd) use the "latest technology" to run down the lawbreakers. MOTOR PATROL: Roaring down America's highways in the pursuit of justice, motorcycle policemen put the heat on a car theft ringleader who uses a legitimate garage as a front. When Officer Bill Henry is killed in the line of duty, rookie Don Castle, the fianc+ of Henry's sister, gets him assigned to the case and infiltrates the gang. MR. DISTRICT ATTORNEY (1941): When Harvard Law School graduate P. Cadwallader Jones (Dennis O'Keefe) bungles his first assignment in the D.A.'s office, he is next assigned the make-work job of reviewing the closed case of a crooked city official (Peter Lorre) who vanished with a stolen $100,000. The cold case suddenly gets hot when the money begins to reappear, and a series of brutal murders ensues! There's plenty of fast-moving action in this crime melodrama laced with humor. WESTERN PACIFIC AGENT: A "modern Western," set in the year it was released (1951). The railroad assigns its top agent Kent Taylor to investigate a payroll robbery and the murder of a paymaster. Meanwhile, the felon's father (Morris Carnovsky) is also desperately trying to convince the wayward boy (Mickey Knox) to forsake his life of crime. HIGHWAY 13: It's murder on wheels when a trucking company loses several vehicles in a series of mysterious crashes--and a company honcho dies in a road accident that is equally inexplicable. Truck driver Robert Lowery soon finds himself enmeshed in the whodunit, which involves a caf+ truck stop, an ex-gangster mechanic and indications of sabotage. TREASURE OF MONTE CRISTO: A web of death, intrigue and daring love entwines merchant seaman Glenn Langan, a descendent of the Count of Monte Cristo, as he searches modern-day San Francisco for the fortune in long-missing jewels to which he is the rightful heir. Crooked lawyers, a murder and a frame-up are among the obstacles thrown in his path. Great location photography. ROARING CITY: Private eye Dennis O'Brien (Hugh Beaumont) will do anything for a dame or a dollar, tackling two more assignments filled with pistol-point suspense. The first involves a "fixed" fight, double-crosses and, of course, murder. Later, his reward for hiring out to pose as a young beauty's husband is a knockout blow to the head and a false murder charge! SKY LINER: Attention, Homeland Security! It's GRAND HOTEL in the air as the usual wild assortment of travelers (movie actress, eloping couple, child singer, spinsters, crooks, more) board a LaGuardia Airport flight, unaware that other passengers might be spies and counter-spies, complete with secret documents, poison and elaborate plans to engage in international espionage! ALL ARE FIRST TIME ON VIDEO OR DVD.

DVD FEATURES:

• Region: All
• Number of Discs: 3
• Screen: Black and White
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 (Pre-1954 Standard)
• Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

• Cast:

  
       Dennis O'Keefe - P. Cadwallader Jones
       Adele Jergens - Jean Turner
       Kent Taylor
       Dan Seymour - Kelleher
       Clem Bevans - Pops
       Charles Arnt - Herman Winkle
       Frank Richards
       Anna May Slaughter - Mary Ann
       Alan Edwards - Grew
       Brian O'Hara - Jailer
       Bob Carson - Tom
       Douglas Evans - Col. Kilgore
       Herbert Evans - Sir Harry Finneston
       Don Brodie - Jimmy
       Bob Woodward - 1st Henchman
       Bess Flowers - Mother
       John Doucette - Larry
       John Power - Norris
       Bill Hammond - Michael's 2nd Henchman
       George Meeker - Financier
       William Lester - Pilot
       Jean Sorel - 2nd Stewardess
       Burt Wenland - Co-Pilot
       Abner Biberman

• Director:

  Seymour Friedman, Sam Newfield, William Morgan, William A. Berke

• Producer:

  Wallace MacDonald, Barney A. Sarecky, Leonard Fields, Sigmund Neufeld, William Stephens, Leonard S. Picker, William A. Berke

• Screenwriter:

  Harold R. Greene, Beryl Sachs, Orville H. Hampton, Maurice Tombragel, Malcolm Stuart Boylan, Karl Brown, Fred K. Myton

• Screen Story:

  Milton Raison

• Screenwriter:

  Jack Pollexfen, Aubrey Wisberg

• Screen Story:

  Lou Morheim

• Screenwriter:

  Victor West, Julian Harmon

• Screen Story:

  Herbert Margolis

• Cinematographer:

  Philip Tannura, Ernest W. Miller, Reggie Lanning, Carl Berger, Ben Kline, John H. Greenhalgh, Jr.

• Musical Direction/Supervision:

  Mischa Bakaleinikoff

• Composer (Music Score):

  Russell Garcia, Richard Hazard

• Musical Direction/Supervision:

  Ozzie Caswell

• Composer (Music Score):

  Cy Feuer, Albert Glasser, David Chudnow

• Musical Direction/Supervision:

  Albert Glasser

• Composer (Music Score):

  Bert Shefter, Raoul Kraushaar

• Musical Direction/Supervision:

  Raoul Kraushaar

• Editor:

  Aaron Stell, Carl Pierson, Stanley Frazen, Edward Mann, Harry Reynolds

• Art Director:

  Fred Preble, F. Paul Sylos, John Victor Mackay, Martin Obzina

• Set Designer:

  Harry Reif

• Sound/Sound Designer:

  George Cooper

• Makeup:

  George Lane, Earl Young

• Special Effects:

  Ray Mercer, Howard Weeks

• Short Story Author:

  John Wilste

REVIEW:

• In the same year that he played "Joel Cairo" in Warner Bros.' The Maltese Falcon, Peter Lorre found himself third-billed behind Dennis O'Keefe and Florence Rice in Republic's Mr. District Attorney. Not that Lorre is the main ingredient in this comedy-whodunit but he still didn't deserve to be sidelined by mere utility players. As it stands, despite the presence of Lorre's red herring and the exhaustive mugging of O'Keefe, Mr. District Attorney's most memorable moments come courtesy of character actress Helen Brown as Lorre's duplicitous wife. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi