Saturday, April 19, 2025

Film Albums: Theme from King of Kings and Other Film Spectaculars


Tomorrow is Easter Sunday and what better way to get into the Easter spirit then to listen to some soul-stirring religious music. This album - Theme from King of Kings and Other Film Spectaculars - could not be classified as religious music strictly speaking, but it features lovely songs from some of the best religious films ever made...including Ben-Hur and The Robe

My sister and I picked up this album at a second-hand store when we were teenagers and loved it instantly. It's been played countless times in our house and it was this album that introduced us to films such as The High and the Mighty, The Sundowners and Francis of Assisi

The music is arranged and performed by Frank Chacksfield and his Orchestra and he does a "spectacular" job as usual. Chacksfield was the Mantovani of Great Britain and released a large number of albums throughout the 1950s-1970s. His film theme albums are the best and the sound on these London Records LPs are marvelous. This one is "LL3275" and it was issued in several variations in 1962 and 1963. 

Chacksfield and his orchestra implemented instruments that brought the ancient eras alive in this album, such as timpanis, tambourines, piccolos, and French horns. Not to miss themes include the scrumptious Song of Delilah from Cecil B. DeMille's epic "Samson and Delilah" (1949), the melancholy love song to "The Robe", the lovely "Francis of Assisi" theme played with piano and strings, and of course, the love theme to "Ben-Hur". 

Click here to listen to the full album on Youtube. 

Track Listing:

Side One

Theme from "King of Kings"

The Song of Delilah from "Samson and Delilah"

Love Theme from "The Robe"

Love Theme from "Quo Vadis"

The Green Leaves of Summer ("The Alamo")

Theme from "Exodus"

Side Two

Parade of the Charioteers ("Ben-Hur")

Theme from "Francis of Assisi"

Love Theme from "Ben-Hur"

The High and the Mighty

Love Theme from "The Prodigal"

Theme from "The Sundowners"

Top Picks: King of Kings, The Song of Delilah, Love Theme from The Robe, Theme from Francis of Assisi, Love Theme from Ben-Hur

Friday, April 18, 2025

From the Archives: The Happy Road (1957)

 

These two wide-eyed youngsters are runaways from a Swiss boarding school, both of whom are trying to get to Paris to reunite with their father and mother in the delightful comedy "The Happy Road". Bobby Clark, the little brown-haired boy, plays the son of Gene Kelly while Brigitte Fossey plays the daughter of Barbara Laage. 

From the Archives is our latest series of posts where we share photos from the Silverbanks Pictures collection. Some of these may have been sold in the past, and others may still be available for purchase at our eBay store: http://stores.ebay.com/Silverbanks-Pictures

Saturday, April 12, 2025

Mardi Gras (1958)

Mardi Gras occurred a few weeks ago and if you are like most people, you probably didn't realize that there were a handful of classic films set during the Mardi Gras in New Orleans (as well as a bucketload of television episodes). 

Mardi Gras, released in 1958, is a Cinderella story aimed at a teenage audience. It is a little-seen color romance-musical starring Pat Boone and, honestly, it is not half-bad. It doesn't quite rank up there with April Love, but it has its moments. Pat stars as a Virginia Military Institute cadet who gets roped into participating in a raffle to win a date with a movie star - Michelle Marton (played by French import Christine Carere). Being the clean-cut country boy that he is, he never even heard of her before the raffle but ends up winning. After a few failed attempts to see her at her hotel, he gives up and instead asks a pretty young woman in the lobby for a date. Surprise! This happens to be Michelle herself.... she decided to don a Mardi Gras mask and enjoy a few hours vacation from the press. Naturally, they fall in love but then her publicity agent (Fred Clark) gets in the way and sees their romance as "great publicity" which causes a number of complications for both of them. 

Mardi Gras was a surprising hit upon its release and stayed at the top of the box-office charts for a number of weeks where it easily recouped its initial investment. Robert Wagner, Jeffrey Hunter and Tony Randall were initially set to star as the three cadets from VMI with Mitzi Gaynor playing the Hollywood actress. Later, Boone was cast with Shirley Jones as his co-star but then Shirley had to drop out due to being pregnant with her first son, Shaun Cassidy. Christine Carere had recently made a splash with her first American picture - A Certain Smile - so she was then cast and did a good job. She is like a French edition of Sonja Henie and is quite charming. 

Jerry Wald produced the film, which was directed by Edmund Goulding (Dark Victory, The Razor's Edge). The bare stone walls of the Virginia Military Institute didn't make the most colorful setting so the New Orleans shots had to make up for it...and those didn't seem all too good either. Nevertheless, Pat Boone's handsome looks and charisma and Carere's cuteness made up for the lack of scenery. The musical numbers throughout the film are quite good but, unfortunately, there were one or two too many and they stretch the picture to nearly two hours. The best of the songs was "I'll Remember Tonight" which became a hit for Pat Boone in 1958. 

Costarring with Boone as the cadets are Tommy Sands, Dick Sargeant, and Gary Crosby who was the spitting image of his papa, Der Bingel. Also in the cast is the beautiful Sheree North (sporting brunette hair) in a secondary role that wastes her talent and the dancer Barrie Chase. 

Mardi Gras is currently available on DVD as well as through Youtube

Thursday, April 10, 2025

The Impossibly Difficult Name that Movie Game


"Get your tickets! Get your tickets!"....Tickets for what? That's what you have to try to remember before you have an inkling of what film this screenshot is from. ;-)

As always, if you are not familiar with the rules to the Impossibly Difficult Name that Movie game or the prize, click here!

Monday, March 31, 2025

Rob Roy: The Highland Rogue (1953)

The setting is Scotland in the 18th century. A German has inherited the throne of England and Scotland and will rule as king. The appointment of King George I upsets many of the Scottish people and the highlanders especially who gather their clans together and rise up against the English troops occupying Scotland. The Duke of Argyll has quenched most of these rebel uprisings, except for a small but stubborn band of highlanders of the McGregor clan led by Rob Roy "the Highland rogue".His fight for Scottish independence leads him on a road to the gallows in London... and eventually, face to face with King George I himself. 

Walt Disney made a number of excellent adventure films in the 1950s and Rob Roy ranks as one of the best. It has all of the sweet ingredients for a rousing good adventure: highland rebels, romance, swordplay, beautiful locations, stirring music, and a grrraaand story. Technicolor filming and a cast of seasoned actors bake the cake. 

Richard Todd, who starred as the heroic Rob Roy, had just completed two period costume adventure films for Walt Disney Studios - The Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men and The Sword and the Rose - both of which were popular with UK audiences and Rob Roy proved to be a box-office hit as well. Unfortunately, these films did not do as well stateside and Disney decided not to pursue more costume films. This was also the last picture Disney released through RKO for shortly afterwards all of his productions were released through his own distribution company, Buena Vista.  

Rob Roy gathered together some excellent actors from throughout the United Kingdom including Irish-born (!) Richard Todd, Welsh actress Glynis Johns, James Robertson Justice of Scottish ancestry (who looked especially handsome donning long blonde hair), English character actors Michael Gough and Geoffrey Keen, and one of the most famous Scottish film actors to have ever lived: Finlay Currie. 

Rob Roy is a simple story of a rebel but he is one like Zorro or Robin Hood, where the audience takes sides with him and is pleased to see justice done in the end.The story was, in Disney's words, "based on history and legend" and written by one of his most dependable scriptwriters Lawrence Edward Watkin, who specialized in adapting adventure stories such as Treasure Island and The Story of Robin Hood.  

Location filming took place in Scotland around Corriegrennan and Aberfoyle and this Highland scenery was beautifully shot by legendary cinematographer Guy Green. What scenes they could not film were painted in by matte artist Peter Ellenshaw. Today, one can view Rob Roy and its colorful filming through Disney's subscription streaming service Disney + or by purchasing it on DVD. 

Saturday, March 29, 2025

Streaming Picks for the Month of April

This spring there is a slew of wonderful films available through Tubi, the Roku Channel, and Pluto. We've sifted through them and are sharing with you the best of the bunch. Like usual, these films are only available for a few months at a time so watch them while you can because you never know which day they will disappear! 

Tubi

The Mark of Zorro (1925)

Steamboat Bill Jr. (1928)

The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933) 

The 39 Steps (1935)

The Mark of Zorro (1940)

Dressed to Kill (1946)

A Night in Casablanca (1946)

The Glass Mountain (1949)

The Passionate Friends (1949)

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954)

Bell, Book and Candle (1956)

The Vikings (1958)

Roku

A Canterbury Tale (1943)

Brief Encounter (1945)

The Red Shoes (1947)

Abandon Ship! (1957)

The Key (1959)

Sissi - Forever My Love (1959)

The Onedin Line (1970s TV Series)

The Belstone Fox (1973)

Matilda (1978)

Old Enough (1984)

LadyHawke (1985)


Pluto

Bitter Tea of General Yen (1933) 

I Know Where I'm Going (1945)

The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)

Black Narcissus (1947)

The Quiet Man (1951)

Scared Stiff (1953)

The Kentuckian (1955)

The Vikings (1955)

The Rainmaker (1956)

Another Time, Another Place (1958)

The Buccaneer (1958)

Fear Strikes Out (1959)

Houseboat (1958)

Boeing Boeing (1965)

The Miracle Worker (1965)

Sunday, March 23, 2025

Kirby Grant and Chinook in the Royal Mounted Police Movies

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Kirby Grant starred in a series of Mountie films with "Chinook," a white German shepherd. Each film featured a mixture of adventure and mystery plots set in the wild Northwest territory of Canada. Grant played Corporal Roy Webb, a very personable officer of the Royal Mounted Police who traveled nowhere without his heroic companion Chinook. All of the stories featured Webb being assigned to a district to investigate a murder, robbery, or other crime. Usually when he arrives, he dons the garbs of the local folk and tries to weedle information from the suspects while incognito. 

The 10 films, released by Monogram Pictures, are all less than 70-minutes each and are very entertaining... even though they follow the same formula and tend to be forgotten within a week after watching. This formula included having the crime take place within the first three minutes of the film, Corporal Webb being assigned to the case, another murder to follow shortly after, Webb or Chinook being attacked and later recovering, a chase through the woods and over lots of large boulders, and finally, Webb catching his man... as all good Mounties are told to do. 

All of the Chinook films were based on novels written by James Oliver Curwood who, oddly enough, was not a former Mountie but rather a reporter who was hired by the Canadian government to tour Canada and write about the land to encourage tourism. Whether his stories helped to increase tourism is unknown, but they certainly made Curwood famous! He became one of the most popular adventure writers in the world and the highest paid writer of his era. 

The action in these pictures is better than most B-films and the stories keep you guessing. Sometimes the criminal is obvious and other times it is someone surprising like the kindly shopkeeper, the man who called the police in the first place (a clever way to divert suspicion), or even the sweet young woman whom Corporal Webb was beginning to fall in love with. The action scenes don't hold back on the grisly attacks either.... sometimes Webb gets shot, Chinook gets roughed up by a lone wolf or a mean hunter, or even the hero of the story might get killed suddenly. 


Kirby Grant does a wonderful job of playing the heroic Mountie and Chinook is good in the role, too, although he doesn't have the acting chops of Lassie. The series provided some B-actors with jobs and occasionally featured players who went on to more fame, such as Martha Hyer. 

Here are some short plot summaries to each of the films:

Trail of the Yukon (1949) 

In retaliation for jumping their mining claim, Matt Blaine and his son rob Dawson's Bank. While escaping, the men they hired to help them double-cross them and kill Matt. Corporal McDonald (he later became Webb) is then sent on the case to recover the bank's money and solve the murder. 

The Wolf Hunters (1949)

Four fur trappers have been slain and their furs stolen from them, so Corporal Webb investigates and saves the life of a fifth trapper enroute. Chinook has the only clue to the killer, a torn piece of cloth from the man's coat. Edward Norris and Helen Parrish star. 

Snow Dog (1950)

A fur-trapper and his sister help Corporal Webb track down a killer wolf while searching for their late uncle's treasure which is supposedly hidden in the woods. Elena Verdugo and Milburn Stone star.

Call of the Klondike (1950) 

Men are disappearing near an abandoned gold mine and Colonel Webb is sent to investigate. He finds a disgruntled foreigner causing trouble and the bodies of two of the men who went missing. Tom Neal and Anne Gwynne star. 

Yukon Manhunt (1951)

Payrolls from a mining camp are being stolen enroute to the men, so Corporal Webb is called in to help discover who could be robbing the payroll deliveries. Gail Davis, Margaret Field and Rand Brooks star.

Northwest Territory (1951)

Corporal Webb escorts recently orphaned Billy to his grandfather Pop Kellogg who lives in the woods of the Northwest Territory but finds Pop murdered and his "worthless" stake in land being scouted by a number of suspicious characters. Warren Douglas and Gloria Saunders star. 

Yukon Gold (1952)

The owner of a gambling saloon in the Klondike is tied in with a recent murder and Webb is sent to investigate. Martha Hyer and Frances Charles star. 

Fangs of the Arctic (1953)

A trapper is killed in Blackfoot Crossing territory and illegal beaver pelts are being smuggled out. Webb disguises himself as a trapper and investigates as more bodies pile up...including his new deputy. Warren Douglas and Lorna Hansen star. 

Northern Patrol (1953)

Corporal Webb hunts for the killer of a man who supposedly committed suicide in his cabin and gets tied up in a love triangle in the process. William Phipps, Marian Carr star. 

Yukon Vengeance (1954)

Corporal Webb travels to the wilds of Bear Creek to investigate the murders of three mail carriers, all of whom were mauled by a bear. Webb goes undercover as a mail carrier to see if the "bear" is of the two-footed variety. Monte Hale and Mary Ellen Kay star. 

All of the Kirby Grant and Chinook films have been beautifully restored and released by Warner Archives on DVD in three volumes.