Palooka. Benjamin Stoloff. 1934.

Oh, Jimmy Durante. I’m aware of his name but not really much more than that.

This is no great shakes, but it’s pretty amusing. The storyline (it’s basically Rocky except not) works, but there’s large swathes of the movie where they’re just spinning their wheels.

It’s fine: Fun performances, stylish cinematography, and a classic story. But it’s not really worth watching.

The Battle of the River Plate. Michael Powell. 1956.

I got a box set of Powell/Pressburger movies, and… this is one of those movies. I’ve seen a handful of them, and they’re wildly uneven. They’re a Weird Mob has to be seen to be believed (but don’t), but then there’s the big classics.

This film is very them. It’s a grand spectacle with a cast of thousands. Well. Dozens. It’s all about chasing a German war ship around, and as usual, they portray the Germans in a pretty positive light. I mean, for murdering bastards.

But it could definitely have had more like interest. It feels a bit like that Mob movie I mentioned: It’s supposed to appeal to a very specific segment of the public, and beyond that there’s not much here.

It’s pretty, though, even if there’s way too many scenes on sound stages pretending to be at sea.

Glorifying the American Girl. Millard Webb. 1929.

This is yet another public domain movie from that box set I bought. I’m kinda sorta trying to get through them all to make room for other old movies on my schedule.

It makes no sense, I know.

Oh, wow, this is from 1929. It had to be part of the first wave of talkies. I wouldn’t have guessed: It seems to natural, as if they’d make making talkies for years. I would have guessed that this was from at least five years later just based on the audio quality and how natural the actors seem.

That said, this isn’t a very thrilling movie. It’s got some good dance routines and some passable music, but the funny bits aren’t funny enough.

This is based on a Florenz Ziegfeld (he of the Follies) stage production? Hm, no, it just features a lot of his players.

“I’ve got all my relatives out there. And a few gentiles as well.”

That’s a 1929 joke.

The movie goes totally off the rails for the last fifteen minutes when a totally unrelated skit about buying a suit is spliced in. It’s the funniest bit in the movie, but it has nothing to do with anything. Very odd. Was this really in the movie or did the people who put this DVD together just put in a random short?