Year: 1929-30
Cast: Ronald Colman, Claude Allister, Lawrence Grant, Montagu Love, Wilson Benge, Joan Bennett, Lilyan Tashman, Charles Sellon, Tetsu Komai, Gertrude Short, Donald Novis
Director: F. Richard Jones
Nominations: Best Actor (Colman), Best Art Direction
Apparently light-hearted romps were big with the Academy this early in its existence.
While The Big Pond was a light-hearted comedy, this one is a light-hearted adventure drama, and a fun one at that.
Ronald Colman stars in his first talkie, in the title role of Captain Hugh "Bulldog" Drummond, a demobilized soldier bored with civilian life who advertises his services for danger and intrigue, and wouldn't you know it, people answer.
This film, the first in a series, is based on a series of penny thrillers by author HC "Sapper" McNeille, all starring Hugh Drummond, and I've never read any of them. Drummond is unique in that he's literally just attracted to the danger, and diversion from his humdrum life post-war life, and I'm not sure there's another hero like him.
His first "case" is that of a Phyllis Benton(Joan Bennett) whose uncle, John Travers, is allegedly being kept in a senior's care facility, but she's certain that all is not what it seems, and believes her every move is being watched. She hires Drummond to investigate the doctor who's caring for her, against the advice of his friend Algy (Claude Allister) and valet Danny (Wilson Benge), who think she's an escaped mental patient herself. That is until the good doctor himself shows up...
I have to say, this movie contained a twist ending I genuinely didn't see coming. It didn't exactly change my opinion of this movie (that it's a fine way to fill some time but not much else) but it did put a smile on my face.
This movie is an old-fashioned (now, anyway) fun thriller with some suitably hammy performances, and I was suitably entertained, even if I don't think it's really anything to go seek out yourself. I got a real kick out of Allister in the role of foppish, doltish Algy. And there's a movie connection here I was unaware of; Claude Allister voices Rat in Disney's The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, an animated classic I have grown up with.
This was, technically, Ronald Colman's first Academy Award nomination, and I say technically because his nomination this year was also for Condemned, but this was first released, so I think of this as his first nomination. It wouldn't be his last, but this one isn't really the sort of performance the Academy would continue to go for. It would be like nominating someone for playing Sherlock Holmes or James Bond. Today we know how much more Colman is capable of.
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