Caught in the Fog

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Caught in the Fog
Caught in the Fog 1928 lobby card.jpg
Directed by Howard Bretherton
Written by Charles R. Condon
Joseph Jackson (titles)
Story byJerome Kingston
Starring May McAvoy
Conrad Nagel
Mack Swain
Cinematography Byron Haskin
Edited by Ralph Dawson
Production
company
Distributed byWarner Bros. Pictures
Release date
  • August 25, 1928 (1928-08-25)
Running time
70 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguagesSound (Part-Talkie)
English Intertitles
Budget$92,000 [1]
Box office$416,000 [1]

Caught in the Fog is a 1928 American sound part-talkie thriller film directed by Howard Bretherton and written by Charles R. Condon and Joseph Jackson. In addition to sequences with audible dialogue or talking sequences, the film features a synchronized musical score and sound effects along with English intertitles. According to the film review in Variety, between twenty to twenty-four minutes of the total running time (divided into four separate talking sequences) featured dialogue. [2] The soundtrack was recorded using the Vitaphone sound-on-disc system. The film stars May McAvoy, Conrad Nagel and Mack Swain, and features Hugh Herbert, Charles K. Gerrard and Émile Chautard. The film was released by Warner Bros. on August 25, 1928. [3] [4] [5]

Contents

Plot

Bob Vickers (Conrad Nagel), a young society scion, arrives unexpectedly at his family’s houseboat off the Florida coast to retrieve his mother’s jewelry—only to walk straight into a heist in progress. Inside, he surprises a bobbed-hair bandit (May McAvoy) and her slick gunman accomplice, a self-styled “sheik” (Charles K. Gerrard), as they attempt to crack the safe.

Mistaken for a rival thief, Bob is pulled into a tense standoff. A scuffle breaks out in the dark over the jewels, but it’s suddenly interrupted by the arrival of an elderly couple—an apparently genteel man (Émile Chautard) and woman (Ruth Cherrington)—who claim to be old friends of the Vickers family. In truth, they're seasoned crooks with their own plans to loot the boat.

With a fog rolling in and the mainland cut off, Bob chooses to conceal his true identity. He poses as the houseboat’s butler, watching warily as the bobbed-hair bandit and her partner bluff their way into staying by posing as the maid and cook.

Soon after, two bumbling detectives, Riley (Hugh Herbert) and Ryan (Mack Swain), show up to investigate a tip. Their arrival only heightens the chaos. Hysterical and completely unprepared, the pair are convinced that the houseboat is haunted when “ghostly” figures appear and vanish in the mist. Their antics prove useless in the escalating danger as gunfire erupts in the dark and alliances shift among the thieves, each double-crossing the other to claim the jewels for themselves.

In the midst of the mayhem, Bob manages to rescue the girl from her domineering “sheik” partner, and a bond forms between them. As the long night drags on, harbor police arrive just in time to launch a dramatic roundup, capturing every crook on board—except one.

Hidden away in a quiet corner of the houseboat, Bob gently arrests the bobbed-hair bandit himself. But as he takes her hand, it’s clear that something else has been stolen that night—his heart.

Cast

Box office

According to Warner Bros records the film earned $355,000 domestically and $61,000 internationally. [1]

Preservation

An incomplete 35mm copy of this film survives at the British Film Institute's National Film and Television Archive. [6]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 Warner Bros financial information in The William Schaefer Ledger. See Appendix 1, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, (1995) 15:sup1, 1-31 p 6 DOI: 10.1080/01439689508604551. ISSN   0143-9685.
  2. ↑ Variety 5 Dec 1928 p. 12 https://archive.org/details/variety93-1928-12/page/n11/mode/1up
  3. ↑ Hal Erickson (2016). "Caught-in-the-Fog - Trailer - Cast - Showtimes". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times . Archived from the original on March 7, 2016. Retrieved September 7, 2015.
  4. ↑ "Caught in the Fog (1928) - Overview". Turner Classic Movies. Retrieved September 7, 2015.
  5. ↑ "Caught in the Fog". Afi.com. Retrieved September 7, 2015.
  6. ↑ "Caught In The Fog" at the Library of Congress American Silent Feature Film Survival Database


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