GetPapa Far from Perfect, Far from Terrible

Siflutter It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Joanna Mccarty Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

Staci Frederick Blistering performances.

mark.waltz Starting down south where they grow oranges but ending up on the way there to the other coast where they also grow oranges. So while Florida is the initial destination, Californy is the place that Boston Blackie ends up, involved again with sidekicks Lloyd Corrigan and George E. Stone, as usual followed around by his friendly foil, lieutenant Richard Lane and his increasingly dumber sidekick Walter Sande. All it takes is putting Morris to outwit these two idiots, and there's no game even to begin other than against the bad guys, lead by William Wright. This entry has Morris and Stone heading out to California to deliver money to Corrigan to get him out of a jam, only to find more trouble. Corrigan's got involved with slick con-artists, a plot line that could take place in any city, let alone the L.A. district of Hollywood. A beautiful con artist (Constance Worth) gets Corrigan involved in a scam he's too naive to get out of on his own, and all he needs is Blackie, not sidekick Stone or the annoying Lane, outlasting his usefulness. Forrest Ticker is pretty unrecognizable as one of the racketeers out to fleece Corrigan. While the dialog is pretty smart and the film moves fast, the plot on this one is mostly just ludicrous.

kapelusznik18 ***SPOILERS*** Boston Blackie, Chester Morris, and his pint-size partner "The Runt", George E. Stone, get themselves involved in the case of the stolen $60,000.00 Monteray Diamond that got Blackie's good friend millionaire Arthur Manleder, Lloyd Corrigan, in deep trouble. This involves some kind of cockamamie scam by gangster Slick Barton, William Wright, to blackmail Manleder into making it look like he stole it in order to have it cut into a dozen pieces! And from what I can make out appreciate its value even though it's Slick who'll end up getting rich off it.All throughout the movie Blackie's nemesis the bumbling Inspector Farraday, Richard Lane, ends up falling on his face as well as being attacked a thousands of army ants in him trying to get the goods on Blackie in framing him for the stealing of the Monteray Diamond which he in fact recovered, by safe cracking, for its owner Arthur Manleder. There's also pretty blond Gloria Lane, Constance "Worth a Look" Worth, and hoodlum and Slick's strongman "Whipper, Forrest Tucker, who just loves to "Whip" it out to round out the cast.***SPOILERS*** Heart drooping elevator scene with Blackie slugging it out with Slick who ends up being knocked unconscious by him not once but twice-Within five minutes- by a fired up Blackie before the movie ends. It's the up and down sequence in the movie that makes those of us watching sea sick in following g it but as we saw it was Slick who ended up getting the far worst of it. Chester Morris seems to be really getting into his Boston Blackie character with his on target cracking jokes as well as not as much as getting his hair or clothes mussed up during the entire movie. He also does a good imitation of an head shrink-er or Austrian Sigmund Freud like psycho analyst, together with an Austrian accent, as well.

Michael_Elliott Boston Blackie Goes Hollywood (1942) *** (out of 4) Forth film in Columbia's series finds Blackie (Chester Morris) trying to get $60,000 to California so that a friend can pay off a mob holding him hostage. As usual, Inspector Farraday (Richard Lane) thinks Blackie has stolen a priceless diamond and is hot on his trail. Unlike the previous film, this one here thankfully gets the laughs back on target and delivers a pretty good entry that fans of detective films should really enjoy. Once again Morris is very comfortable in his role and by now it seems like he could play it with his eyes closed. The supporting players are all good but again, the main highlight are all the laughs that this entry has. There's a wonderful segment at the end with Blackie and the bad guy fighting in an elevator shaft that has a dash of slapstick, which is really funny. There isn't much of a mystery going on but the 68-minute running time flies by. Forrest Tucker has a small role and if you look fast you can see Lloyd Bridges. Also of note, the word Hollywood is never even mentioned in the film.

tedg What makes a series last?Here's a film that is in the middle of a remarkably successful franchise. One wonders what in the formula worked so well.I think in this case it was the focus on sidekicks. Our two main characters are a "reformed" master thief, the Blackie, and a senior police chief who always chases him and whom reluctantly ends collaboratively up solving some crime. Ho hum so far.Each of these guys has a sidekick. Each sidekick is incompetent, in fact utterly dependent on his alpha dog. Overall, Blackie's team is suave and the police team gets the worst of pranks. But its the dynamics of the pairs that I think gave this formula its success. There's something about defining a loyal admirer and placing him on screen. Its a funny sort of narrative shift where some small element of ourselves are placed on screen. As they admire the character, we do too, a bit more intensely. To make it more admirable (pun here) we have to have a sidekick who we knowingly do not identify with, someone at the far end of competence.In other films of this era, the comic main at the bottom of the stack would be a black man. But that wouldn't work for this recipe, because the audience is presumed to be white and the mechanism based on subliminal identification. You'll still see this in cop buddy movies and many teen movies.Other than this minor thrill, of seeing a perfect and inexpensive formula at work, this is a waste of time.Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.