David Harding, Counterspy (1950)

A tasty wartime counter-espionage tale.

The head of counter-espionage Harding (Howard St John) recounts to a radio commentator how a key operation went down during the war. Information is leaking out of a facility where the US Navy is developing it's torpedoes. 

Naval officer Baldwin (Willard Parker) is sent in to try and uncover the agent. Unbeknownst to Baldwin, one of the agents (Audrey Long) is very close to his heart...

This is a fine procedural, giving us a view of early counter-espionage efforts and the careful uncovering of a group of spies, but also how the spies themselves operate. 

A tough film with Noir touches but the spy game is one of the hardest games of all.

Black Angel (1946)

A dark murder mystery with some seedy characters but a big twist.

After singer Mavis Marlowe (Constance Dowling) is found dead, Kirk Bennett (John Phillips) - who was spotted at the scene - is arrested for the crime and later convicted. Kirk's wife Catherine (June Vincent) believes he is innocent and enlists the help of Marlowe's ex-husband and songwriter Martin Blair (Dan Durylea) for help. Unfortunately Blair has a drinking problem but he manages to pull things together and help. 

Night club owner (and suspected gangster) Marko (Peter Lorre) was also seen nearby while the crime took place and he is the prime suspect of Catherine and Martin. They pretend to be a singing duo and get a job in his bar so they can try and get evidence of his crime. However, things do not turn out as they hope...

A well put together film that moves at a good pace and has an interesting plot. The mains all give good performances especially Lorre's sinister Marko.

Jack-O (1995)

A rather awful slash gore horror film involving a pumpkin man.

Many years ago a wizard (John Carradine) was put to death, now he has come back to life as Jack the Pumpkin Man and seeks vengeance on the modern day towns folk and especially the Kelly family. Young Sean Kelly (Ryan Latshaw) is having a number of terrible dreams involving slash gore murder while his parents (Gary Doles and Maddison K Krown) set up a rather disturbing looking Halloween display...

A terrible film with ropey acting, awkward pacing and badly executed gore. The fact Carradine - who had been dead for years when this film was made - is probably one of the best actors in it probably says a lot. There is plenty of cheesy and unintentionally hilarious nonsense though. 

So bad it's good? Oh yeah...

Hands of Steel (1986)

Cyborg killer nonsense that somehow works.

It is the near future (well as far as the film was concerned, in fact it is 1997). The environment has collapsed and society isn't far behind. Moseley (Franco Fantasia) is the last hope for mankind but he is almost killed by a mysterious assailant, a hard bodied maniac called Paco (Daniel Greene) who is now on the run. It seems though that Paco is a cyborg sent by the evil Turner (John Saxon) but Paco failed to carry out his mission due to his latent humanity breaking out. Turner now sends his minions to dispose of Paco...

Paco is hiding out at a remote bar run by Linda (Janet Agren) where he spends his time defeating various trucker hoodlums at arm wrestling...

This film is rather low budget, this means a lot of dreary storyline with little happening is used to pad the film out, however when we do finally get to the final battle action set piece it is pretty spectacular and well worth waiting for. A great film overall, though doesn't make a lot of sense.

Smart Blonde (1937)

The first in the Torchy Blane series of films starring the perky young reporter.

Torchy (Glenda Farrell) is after a scoop as usual, and indeed gets one when she witnesses the shooting of an investor who has arrived from Boston to buy a popular night club from Mularky (Addison Richards). Mularky wanted out of the seedy business so he could do a bit of social climbing with Marcia (Charlotte Wynters). Mularky's old right hand man Chuck (Max Wagner) is a suspect because he will lose his job though he later becomes a victim too...

Torchy unravels a complicated plot involving plenty of swindling with the help of her beau (and detective) McBride (Baron MacLane). While in later films Torchy could often be more of a hinderance than a help to the police, in this film she really is on the case and this is a fine crime B-movie.