MOONFLEET (1955)

A moody opening (reminiscent of GREAT EXPECTATIONS) is the best thing about this routine pirate melodrama which plays out like a cross between JAMAICA INN and a Disney kid's adventure. Young orphan Jon Whiteley is sent to the town of Moonfleet, a British coast town, to be taken care of by town squire Stewart Granger who, despite his respectable trappings, is also the head of a local smuggling ring. Most of the story is seen through the boy's eyes as Granger's men (including Melville Cooper and Sean McClory) become figures of menace when Whiteley finds a code that leads to the discovery of a missing valuable jewel. Viveca Lindfors is underused as Granger's lover; also underused are George Sanders and Joan Greenwood as a scheming couple. Dancer Liliane Montevecchi has a sexy (if totally out of the blue) dance number. Scenes set in graveyards and secret passages are properly atmospheric but the film, like many 50's movies, is too bloated to be fun, or to be taken seriously. Directed by Fritz Lang using a widescreen process (which he was on record as despising).

TWO IN THE DARK (1936)

Nifty B-mystery which begins quite effectively with a close-up of the face of Walter Abel--he is stumbling through a foggy park at night, disoriented and with a small head wound. He has amnesia and becomes convinced that he was involved in the murder earlier that night of a theaterical producer. With the help of an out-of-work actress (Margot Grahame) whom he meets in the park, Abel tries to figure out who he is and how he's tied to the murder. Some circumstantial evidence suggests that he is the dead man's chauffeur but after hooking up with a cop (Alan Hale) and a reporter (Wallace Ford) by pretending to be a reporter himself, Abel and Grahame begin to solve the puzzle. The solution involves the manuscript of a play and a writer who was being cheated out of money and credit. The strong supporting cast includes Eric Blore, Erik Rhodes, Leslie Fenton, and Ward Bond. I've always liked Abel, who usually played supporting roles (HOLIDAY INN, AN AMERICAN ROMANCE) and he makes a good B-lead here in one of his earliest movies.