Four Hours to Kill! | |
---|---|
Directed by | Mitchell Leisen |
Written by | Norman Krasna |
Based on | Small Miracle (play) by Norman Krasna |
Produced by | Arthur Hornblow Jr. |
Starring | Richard Barthelmess |
Cinematography | Theodor Sparkuhl |
Edited by | Doane Harrison |
Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 70 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Four Hours to Kill! is a 1935 American drama film directed by Mitchell Leisen and starring Richard Barthelmess. [1] [2]
Taft, a policeman, has fugitive murderer Tony Mako in custody and in handcuffs, two thousand miles from the prison from which Mako escaped. With four hours to kill, Taft takes his prisoner to a theater where an unfaithful schemer named Mae is a hostess.
Mae is the wife of Anderson, the man who informed on Mako. She is trying to extort $200 from coat-check kid Eddie, insinuating she is pregnant. Eddie doesn't want his fiancée Helen to hear this, true or otherwise, so he tries to raise the money to pay Mae's blackmail. Eddie is also suspected of stealing an expensive piece of jewellery from an adulterous couple.
Mako made the journey this far in the hope of gaining revenge against Anderson. After telling Taft he would prefer a quick death to a painful execution, Mako breaks free and shoots Anderson before being shot by Taft, dying the kind of death he wanted. Eddie is cleared and now free to marry Helen, while Mae is taken away to jail.
Paramount bought the film rights to the stage play in December 1934. [3]
The New York Times called it "a gripping, although extremely theatrical, melodrama with a neatly dovetailed plot, a uniformly excellent cast and well paceed direction". [4]
In 1944 Paramount Pictures announced it would create a new film adaptation of Small Miracle, the play that was the basis of Four Hours to Kill. Leisen was to direct the new version; Alan Ladd in the lead. The project was not realized. [5]
In 1947 Jack LaRue presented a stage version. [6]
Richard Semler Barthelmess was an American film actor, principally of the Hollywood silent era. He starred opposite Lillian Gish in D. W. Griffith's Broken Blossoms (1919) and Way Down East (1920) and was among the founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1927. The following year, he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for two films: The Patent Leather Kid and The Noose.
Fredric March was an American actor, regarded as one of Hollywood's most celebrated stars of the 1930s and 1940s. As a performer he was known for his protean versatility. He received numerous accolades including two Academy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, and two Tony Awards as well as nominations for three BAFTA Awards and three Emmy Awards.
The Blue Dahlia is a 1946 American crime film and film noir with an original screenplay by Raymond Chandler directed by George Marshall and starring Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake and William Bendix. It was Chandler's first original screenplay.
Dame Frances Margaret Anderson,, known professionally as Judith Anderson, was an Australian actress who had a successful career in stage, film and television. A pre-eminent stage actress in her era, she won two Emmy Awards and a Tony Award and was also nominated for a Grammy Award and an Academy Award. She is considered one of the 20th century's greatest classical stage actors.
Edward Macdonald Carey was an American actor, best known for his role as the patriarch Dr. Tom Horton on NBC's soap opera Days of Our Lives. For almost three decades, he was the show's central cast member.
George Raft was an American film actor and dancer identified with portrayals of gangsters in crime melodramas of the 1930s and 1940s. A stylish leading man in dozens of movies, Raft is remembered for his gangster roles in Quick Millions (1931) with Spencer Tracy, Scarface (1932) with Paul Muni, Each Dawn I Die (1939) with James Cagney, Invisible Stripes (1939) with Humphrey Bogart, and Billy Wilder's comedy Some Like It Hot (1959) with Marilyn Monroe and Jack Lemmon; and as a dancer in Bolero (1934) with Carole Lombard and a truck driver in They Drive by Night (1940) with Ann Sheridan, Ida Lupino and Bogart.
Mae Questel was an American actress. She was best known for providing the voices for the animated characters Betty Boop, Olive Oyl and numerous others.
Norman Krasna was an American screenwriter, playwright, producer, and film director who penned screwball comedies centered on a case of mistaken identity. Krasna directed three films during a forty-year career in Hollywood. He garnered four Academy Award screenwriting nominations, winning once for 1943's Princess O'Rourke, which he also directed.
Helen Haye was a British stage and film actress.
No Man of Her Own is a 1950 American film noir drama directed by Mitchell Leisen and featuring Barbara Stanwyck, John Lund, Phyllis Thaxter, Jane Cowl and Lyle Bettger. The production is the second film Stanwyck made with director Mitchell Leisen. Its screenplay was adapted from Cornell Woolrich's 1948 novel I Married a Dead Man. Woolrich is cited in the film's opening credits by one of his commonly used pseudonyms, "William Irish".
Olive Tell was a stage and screen actress from New York City.
Practically Yours is a 1944 comedic film made by Paramount Pictures, directed by Mitchell Leisen, written by Norman Krasna and starring Claudette Colbert and Fred MacMurray.
The musical short can be traced back to the earliest days of sound films.
The Old Maid is a 1934 play by American playwright Zoë Akins, adapted from Edith Wharton's 1924 novella of the same name. The play as published has six "episodes", covering twenty-one years of time. It has a large cast, and three settings; one is used for the last four episodes (scenes). The story concerns two women, cousins, who allow rancor over a lost love to become a struggle for the illegitimate daughter of one.
Lillian Gertrude Michael was an American film, stage and television actress.
Noel Madison was an American character actor in the 1930s and 1940s and appeared in 75 films, often as a gangster.
Bride of Vengeance is a 1949 American historical drama film directed by Mitchell Leisen and starring Paulette Goddard, John Lund and Macdonald Carey. Produced and distributed by Paramount Pictures, it is set in the Italian Renaissance era. Ray Milland was originally cast in the film but refused the assignment, leading the studio to suspend him for ten weeks.
Almira Sessions was an American character actress of stage, screen and television. Born in Washington, D.C., her career took her through all the acting mediums of the 20th century. She appeared in over 500 films and television shows. She worked into her 80s, finally retiring shortly before her death in 1974 in Los Angeles.
One Hour Late is a 1934 American comedy film directed by Ralph Murphy and written by Kathryn Scola and Paul Gerard Smith. The film stars Joe Morrison, Helen Twelvetrees, Conrad Nagel, and Arline Judge. One Hour Late was released on December 14, 1934, by Paramount Pictures. The film was intended as a vehicle to help Morrison become a new Paramount star.
Small Miracle is a 1934 play by Norman Krasna, presented on Broadway with Joseph Calleia in the featured role. Directed by George Abbott with a single setting designed by Boris Aronson, the three-act melodrama opened September 26, 1934, at the John Golden Theatre, New York. It continued at the 48th Street Theatre November 11, 1934 – January 5, 1935. On February 7, 1935, the play began a run at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood, with Calleia, Joseph King and Robert Middlemass reprising their Broadway roles.