Sun 4 Mar 2018
Movie Review: MAKE A MILLION (1935).
Posted by Steve under Films: Comedy/Musicals , Reviews[8] Comments
MAKE A MILLION. Monogram, 1935. Charles Starrett (Professor Reginald Q. Jones), Pauline Brooks, George E. Stone, James Burke, Guy Usher, Norman Houston. Director: Lewis D. Collins.
As far as I have been able to discern from Charles Starrett’s credits on IMDb, this was the next to the last film he had the romantic lead in before he became a full-time cowboy star. A movie entitled Along Came Love, made in 1936, was perhaps the last. It was probably a good thing that he could ride a horse, because on the basis of this one, his career in movies would have disappeared under his feet, with no one today knowing he ever existed.
While made as a comedy, Make a Million also attempts to address the economic issues that were plaguing the nation in 1935. Not very deeply, mind you, but just enough to draw audiences in and maybe have them laughing a little about the problems they were having paying their bills and keeping their families fed.
As Professor Reginald Q. Jones, Starrett plays one of those naive and out of touch left wing radical professors who think the little men in the country are paying all too much toward the wealth of the upper class, and when he fails one of his students, the daughter of a banker, for disagreeing with his theories of economics, he is summarily fired.
But with one proviso: If he can use his theories to earn a million dollars within a fixed amount of time, he will be reinstated. Which, without wanted to reveal too much detail in how he goes about it, with the assistance of a band of hoboes, he does. Along the way, the daughter of the banker gets to see how shady a businessmen her father is — and am I telling you too much? — decides to switch sides, but almost too late.
Nobody today, I grant you, would watch this movie other than a relic of the past. It is fun, though, to see Charles Starrett in a suit and tie and at six foot two, towering over everyone else in the movie, especially during a meeting between a band of avaricious bankers and the band of the brotherhood as they are busily discussing financial matters of the day. “What do you think of copper [as an investment]?” “Coppers? I can do without them.”
March 4th, 2018 at 10:24 pm
Starrett did several of these types, watched him in a comedy mystery with Smiley Burnett the other day.
He was no worse than quite a few struggling leading men who ended up in Westerns and or serials in the period, just luckier to have a long running series.
March 4th, 2018 at 11:16 pm
Charles Starrett made two still enjoyable films in 1933, “Our Betters” (George Cukor) and “Murder on the Campus” (Richard Thorpe). “The Silver Streak” is not bad either.
Among his cowboy pictures I especially like “Blazing Six-Shooters” made by Joseph H. Lewis, no less.
March 4th, 2018 at 11:21 pm
To see Starrett at his worst, take a look at George Cukor’s excellent The Royal Family of Broadway (1930) with a cast headed by Henrietta Crossman, Ina Claire and Fredric march.
March 5th, 2018 at 4:29 pm
In hindsight (which is all we have in this case) it’s odd to see him and Gilbert Roland playing lounge lizards in OUR BETTERS (1933).
March 5th, 2018 at 6:36 pm
Barry and Dan
I’ve not seen either of those two. Perhaps I shall someday. And perhaps not.
As for Pauline Brooks, this was her final film. She had five uncredited parts before this one, plus one short.
This wasn’t a very challenging role for her, but she I thought she did all right with it. She was pretty, with no particular hint of glamor about her. I think if she could have ridden a horse, she might have listed longer too.
March 5th, 2018 at 11:36 pm
Starrett’s best non cowboy role and one of his best films is THE MASK OF FU MANCHU with Karloff and Myrna Loy. Luckily there he has plenty of support from Lewis Stone, Karen Morley, and Jean Hersholt aside from Karloff and Loy and his shortcomings as an actor aren’t notable.
March 6th, 2018 at 7:20 pm
Among the later Durango Kid films I liked “The Rough, Tough West” (Ray Nazarro).
Starrett made three B-Westerns with Joseph H. Lewis. The last two are widely available. But the first one “Two-Fisted Rangers” (1939)
hasn’t been seen by anyone in decades, as best I can tell. It might be a “lost” film – or might not. It is the only Lewis feature I’ve never seen. It might be an important film.
It is not to be confused with Starrett’s earlier “Two-Fisted Sheriff” (Leon Barsha, 1937).
February 27th, 2023 at 5:44 am
From what I read online, Starrett had a singular life & career. University graduate football player & heir to family business threw it all over to act (not unlike Lex Barker years later). Began as extra & then onstage, hired as in drawing room comedies because he looked good in a tux & could do dialogue, eventually (but briefly) playing a variety of roles before becoming movie cowboy. Like fellow B-movie
stars & handsome former athletes Buster Crabbe & Kane Richmond, his career was prolific but taken for granted. He starred in 1 of the 1st American studio films to be filmed on location in Canada (which also suffered largest loss of life on a film set due to an explosion) & would make his debut playing romantic lead opposite Mirian Hopkins & Carole Lombard. 1 of the founders of SAG, he would retire after decade as Durango Kid, to travel with his wife, make himself available to fans & be proud of his studio career longevity. These B-movie leads are more entertaining than most of the ’30’s A-listers, only Starrett got stroked, fondled & whipped into sex slavery by father & daughter Boris Karloff & Myrna Loy in Mask of Fu Manchu, though certainly Crabbe & Richmond got their kit off pretty regularly as well! Who needs method acting if you look good on screen? Collectively, their 3 marriages lasted over a century, different times, indeed.