On a ship in the Pacific Ocean, Navy pilot Red Furness (William Gargan) reads a telegram to his nervous buddy Tex Jones: Tex is now the father of a baby boy, whom the other pilots all start referring to as the Admiral. The happy Tex can't wait to get home to San Diego, but by the time he gets home, there is sad news: his wife has died from complications and his wealthy sister-in-law Bernice (Claire Dodd) is determined to take custody of the baby. To send this story completely into soap opera territory, Tex himself, dazed and confused over the idea that his son might be taken away from him, stumbles into traffic and is hit by a car. In his dying words to Red, he asks that Red take care of the baby. Before Tex's in-laws can act, Red and his navy pilot buddies (Steve, a womanizer, and Bill, who has no defining character traits other than completing the trio) have spirited the baby away to their bachelor rooms, hiding him from both the in-laws and Navy brass. They eventually get Red's Aunt Minnie to take care of the baby and the rest of the plot consists of playing keepaway with the kid while Red does his best to woo Bernice over to the idea of his guardianship—and maybe to the idea of a romance. I saw this B-movie under the title MARINERS OF THE SKY and was very disappointed as there is not much "sky mariner" action here, and what there is isn’t terribly well done. But as a domestic comedy-drama, it’s serviceable. I usually like Gargan and he's the movie’s chief asset, remaining charming throughout. Dodd is fine and Douglas Fowley is a standout as the horndog Steve. Addison Randall makes a good impression in his brief scenes as Tex—the actor would, under the name Jack Randall, make a string of B-westerns before his untimely death in 1945. In order to pad it out to 70 minutes, a strange plot twist involving the baby being kidnapped is thrown in, but it doesn’t really add much. Pictured are Randall and Gargan.[YouTube]
Monday, December 03, 2018
NAVY BORN (1936)
aka MARINERS OF THE SKY
On a ship in the Pacific Ocean, Navy pilot Red Furness (William Gargan) reads a telegram to his nervous buddy Tex Jones: Tex is now the father of a baby boy, whom the other pilots all start referring to as the Admiral. The happy Tex can't wait to get home to San Diego, but by the time he gets home, there is sad news: his wife has died from complications and his wealthy sister-in-law Bernice (Claire Dodd) is determined to take custody of the baby. To send this story completely into soap opera territory, Tex himself, dazed and confused over the idea that his son might be taken away from him, stumbles into traffic and is hit by a car. In his dying words to Red, he asks that Red take care of the baby. Before Tex's in-laws can act, Red and his navy pilot buddies (Steve, a womanizer, and Bill, who has no defining character traits other than completing the trio) have spirited the baby away to their bachelor rooms, hiding him from both the in-laws and Navy brass. They eventually get Red's Aunt Minnie to take care of the baby and the rest of the plot consists of playing keepaway with the kid while Red does his best to woo Bernice over to the idea of his guardianship—and maybe to the idea of a romance. I saw this B-movie under the title MARINERS OF THE SKY and was very disappointed as there is not much "sky mariner" action here, and what there is isn’t terribly well done. But as a domestic comedy-drama, it’s serviceable. I usually like Gargan and he's the movie’s chief asset, remaining charming throughout. Dodd is fine and Douglas Fowley is a standout as the horndog Steve. Addison Randall makes a good impression in his brief scenes as Tex—the actor would, under the name Jack Randall, make a string of B-westerns before his untimely death in 1945. In order to pad it out to 70 minutes, a strange plot twist involving the baby being kidnapped is thrown in, but it doesn’t really add much. Pictured are Randall and Gargan.[YouTube]
On a ship in the Pacific Ocean, Navy pilot Red Furness (William Gargan) reads a telegram to his nervous buddy Tex Jones: Tex is now the father of a baby boy, whom the other pilots all start referring to as the Admiral. The happy Tex can't wait to get home to San Diego, but by the time he gets home, there is sad news: his wife has died from complications and his wealthy sister-in-law Bernice (Claire Dodd) is determined to take custody of the baby. To send this story completely into soap opera territory, Tex himself, dazed and confused over the idea that his son might be taken away from him, stumbles into traffic and is hit by a car. In his dying words to Red, he asks that Red take care of the baby. Before Tex's in-laws can act, Red and his navy pilot buddies (Steve, a womanizer, and Bill, who has no defining character traits other than completing the trio) have spirited the baby away to their bachelor rooms, hiding him from both the in-laws and Navy brass. They eventually get Red's Aunt Minnie to take care of the baby and the rest of the plot consists of playing keepaway with the kid while Red does his best to woo Bernice over to the idea of his guardianship—and maybe to the idea of a romance. I saw this B-movie under the title MARINERS OF THE SKY and was very disappointed as there is not much "sky mariner" action here, and what there is isn’t terribly well done. But as a domestic comedy-drama, it’s serviceable. I usually like Gargan and he's the movie’s chief asset, remaining charming throughout. Dodd is fine and Douglas Fowley is a standout as the horndog Steve. Addison Randall makes a good impression in his brief scenes as Tex—the actor would, under the name Jack Randall, make a string of B-westerns before his untimely death in 1945. In order to pad it out to 70 minutes, a strange plot twist involving the baby being kidnapped is thrown in, but it doesn’t really add much. Pictured are Randall and Gargan.[YouTube]
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