“Never a help—always a hindrance!”

Facebook veterans know that there’s a group on there for every person, place or thing currently in existence (and if it hasn’t been created yet...give it a few seconds) and as a member in good standing since 2009 (my dues are paid up), I know there are some really outstanding Facebook aggregations dedicated to a…

It’s not E.G. Marshall and Robert Reed…but beggars can’t be choosers

Many apologies, cartooners, for allowing the blog to go dark for the past few weeks; there has been much outside activity here at Rancho Yesteryear—notably some extracurricular projects plus preparations for an event that looks like it’s shaping up to become what I have decided to label The Great DVD Purge of 2019.  This one won’t…

“Tusch!”

In the small principality of Rutania, young Karl Heinrich (Francis Carpenter) leads a miserable life.  He’s a prince and the heir apparent to the Rutanian throne (occupied by his father, who spends so much of the movie in conference with his cabinet his death in battle sneaks by you)...but Karl spends most of his time…

“The Movie Man/The Movie Man can…”

Back in October 2016, I reviewed a Grapevine Video collection of Lupino Lane shorts that brought a great deal of pleasure into my occasionally dismal existence.  Lane was an acrobatic film comedian (whose antics could rival those of Buster Keaton) who made a most entertaining series of two-reel comedies for Educational Pictures beginning in 1924; he…

Absolutely Sweet Marie

Fickle Gertie Darling (Marie Prevost) is returning from a French vacay and, as a title card tells us, “wherever she went she brought back something.”  That “something” is a fiancé, Algernon “Algy” Brooks (Franklin Pangborn), who is completely clueless about a hint of scandal in Gertie’s past.  His best bud, lawyer Ken Walrick (Charles Ray), was once engaged…

Money in the Bank(s)

You may recall in April of this past year that Thrilling Days of Yesteryear beat the drums for a Kickstarter project instigated by the good people at Grapevine Video.  The mom-and-pop label responsible for bringing so many outstanding silent and sound features—with some serials and classic TV thrown into the mix for variety—to Blu-ray/DVD passed around a…

“Possessed of an instinct keener than man, Wolfheart suspects evil doings…”

Last month, as I was entertaining myself with the two-reel comedies on The Sprocket Vault set Thelma Todd & ZaSu Pitts: The Hal Roach Collection 1931-33, I spotted one of the blog’s favorite character actors, Guinn “Big Boy” Williams, in two of the Thel-Zase entries.  In Catch-As-Catch-Can (1931), Guinn is the lovable lug of a…

Get Bent

Fragile young Daisy White (Mae Murray), a destitute child of the slums (plus she’s got a heart condition), pleads with a bartender for a little medicinal whiskey for her ailing mother.  Alas, Daisy has no credit with the proprietor, and she is shooed away—but not before her situation attracts the notice of confidence man John…

My old Kentucky home

Ah. Kentucky...home of bluegrass and mint juleps.  It’s also the location of two stables that house the finest of horseflesh—one belongs to Major Peter Wingate (William H. Turner) and the other to Colonel Jefferson Girard (Josef Swickard).  The offspring of these two fine Southern gentlemen—daughter Betty Girard (Marilyn Mills) and son Larry Wingate (Ralph Emerson—billed…

Slow burn-ing memory

Alpha Video released another volume in their “Rediscovered Comedies of Edgar Kennedy” series about two weeks ago (July 24)—though again, for those of us dues-paying members in The Order of the Slow Burn (check out the Facebook page here) we’ve been aware of their existence for quite some time—and for a mere bag of shells,…