The Honor of the Press (1932)

Young reporter Daniel (Edward Nugent) starts work at a newspaper while the town is rocking from a series of bank robberies. The newspaper is of course the usual 1930s cliche, full of tough talking and chain smoking newspaper men including the city editor Dan Perkins (Russell Simpson) and publisher Mr Sampson (Franklyn Farnum). Rita La Roy plays Daisy a rather over the top glamourous reporter on the paper.

Star reporter Larry Grayson (Reginald Simpson) seems to have the inside story on the robberies but shuts the door on Daniel when he tries to help out. The paper blames the police for failing in their job in catching the crooks but the police chief Drake (John Ince) seems suspicious about how the paper seems to find out about the robberies so quickly...

Daniel discovers that someone on the newspaper seems to be closer to the crime than seems normal. Well its a decent enough crime and reporting film. Nothing too out of the ordinary. There is a romantic sub-plot with Daniel and his squeeze June (Dorothy Gulliver) which pads out the somewhat flimsy plot a bit.

Heart into Hearts (1990)

Heart Into Hearts was the second in the popular "Hearts" series of HK films following on from 1988's "Heart to Heart" and like the first film starred George Lam as some sort of vague creative type (which seems one of the most common jobs in HK according to movies).

George is due to marry Dodo Cheng (who has a daughter played by Vivian Chow) but then he meets an advert director played by Maggie Cheung. Maggie he first hates as an emotionless professional but then they have to go to Paris together and begin to flirt...

It's a light hearted HK comedy with unfortunately two cute kids in it (which is two too many). The film is enjoyable enough with quite a few funny moments but it lacks some bite. You can probably guess most of the jokes before they actually arrive and the film is a little formulaic. It is maybe worth watching for the massive brick mobile phones alone though...

One problem with the film is that Dodo comes across as very annoying in the film without the chemistry with George of the first film. Thus when George is flirting with Maggie you can't really see why he should stay with Dodo. George is his usual jolly and jovial (and often hilarious) self though.

Fury Below (1936)

A troubled coal mine is taken over by Jim Cole (Russell Gleason), all fresh faced and just out of college. Yet another mining accident and a hospital full of casualties spurs Cole into action to find out just what is wrong with the mine. This puts general manager Fred Johnson's (LeRoy Mason) nose out of joint as he is behind a plot to wreck the mine so he can buy Cole out...

Fred is a deliciously evil character by the way, he basically whores out his sister Claire (Sheila Terry) to try and keep Cole out of the way...

Cole, assisted by his secretary Mary (Maxine Doyle) and her brother Joe (Rex Lease) the superintendent work to try and save the mine from low production, accidents and worker unrest led by Johnson's agent Dorsky (Matthew Betz). The film isn't very exciting until the final plot below ground but is interesting enough as a drama especially with respect to labour relations and health and safety pre-war. 

The Good Die Young (1954)

A superb British Noir about four men and the women who support them. The men are all without previous criminal records, but become desperate enough to rob a post office with deadly consequences...

Told in flashback we find out how the four men got into the situation seen at the start of the film where they prepare to commit crime. Mike (Stanley Baker) is an ageing boxer who leaves the ring but after losing a hand finds it impossible to get a new job. Joe (Richard Basehart) is a former US serviceman who is desperate to take his wife (Joan Collins) over to the US to escape her manipulative mother.

Eddie (John Ireland) is a US airman married to an actress (Gloria Grahame) who is openly unfaithful to him. Finally we have Miles (Laurence Harvey) who is a bit of a cad, he sponges off his rich wife (Margaret Leighton) but unfortunately it isn't enough to pay off his gambling debts. He forms a friendship with the others and concocts a scheme to use crime to solve all of their problems. However when the guns start going off then things really do start going wrong...

The clever use of overlapping flashbacks elevates this film above the normal heist film. Maybe a bit melodramatic but the intense final act makes up for any shortcomings earlier on.

The Beast of Borneo (1934)

A rather mediocre jungle and animal exploitation film. The film is slow and stilted and it's never a good sign when some of the animals can act better than the humans...

Dr Borodoff (Eugene Siglaoff) has some strange theories about human evolution from apes and needs a live orangutan to complete his experiments. As animal hunter Bob Ward (John Preston) has failed to provide a specimen so far from the jungles of Borneo Dr Borodoff - who is billed as an Anglo-Russian scientist though sounds like he is from Brooklyn - heads to Borneo with his beautiful assistant Alma (Mae Thorne). There they persuade Bob Ward, who is hesitant to provide animals for vivisection though is ok to put them in zoos, to take them into the jungle to find the orangutan Borodoff needs...

Despite being set in the jungle, and thus potentially full of life, the film is oddly lifeless. It proceeds at a glacial pace. The acting is frequently odd too, though in Mae Thorne's case it looks like she knew the film was complete nonsense and was doing it for a laugh.