For lovers of B movies this film is a cornucopia of stars - silent stars - Walter Long, stars on the way down - Astrid Allwyn, H. B. Warner, stars on the way up - Gale Storm and stars that never were - Kathryn Crawford. In 1930 Crawford was getting the star treatment. She was thought a good bet by Paramount - enough to snare Buddy Rogers away from the more beautiful Carole Lombard and Virginia Bruce in "Safety in Numbers" (1930) - even though she was the drabbest of all the chorus girls in the movie. The next year she had the lead in "Flying High" which boasted Busby Berkeley choreography. Then musicals went out and so did Miss Crawford. She hung around until 1933 and then no more - until this movie - 8 years later, when she was billed as Katherine Crawford and played, what else, a jaded chorus girl.
A philosophizing D.A. (H. B. Warner) is on a crusade to find out the fate of a group of missing girls, all of whom have attended a local dramatic school. A sleazy night club manager King Peterson (Philip Van Zandt), uses it as a feeder for his nightclub, which could also be a front for a prostitution racket - or that's what the D.A. wants to find out. Nora (Astrid Allwyn) is a newspaper reporter, whose father is a theatrical booking agent. She goes to him for information about the girls and while he pleads ignorance, he knows far more than he lets on. One of the missing girls turns up, showering gifts on her mother but being vague about her new job. It seems that one of the nightclub girls has been recruiting young girls for the drama school and Pauline , along with her pretty friend Mary (Gale Storm) are signed up. Pauline, however knows too much and is talking so she ends up dead in an alley. Nora's father runs the drama school but when he entered into association with Peterson, he didn't realise what was involved - and now he wants out.
This is an OK movie. H.B. Warner had an astounding career - there didn't seem to be a role he wouldn't tackle. In this one he was so debonair - I kept expecting him to be unmasked as the villain. Astrid Allwyn, must have discovered the secret of eternal youth as she always looked young and beautiful.
Recommended.
A philosophizing D.A. (H. B. Warner) is on a crusade to find out the fate of a group of missing girls, all of whom have attended a local dramatic school. A sleazy night club manager King Peterson (Philip Van Zandt), uses it as a feeder for his nightclub, which could also be a front for a prostitution racket - or that's what the D.A. wants to find out. Nora (Astrid Allwyn) is a newspaper reporter, whose father is a theatrical booking agent. She goes to him for information about the girls and while he pleads ignorance, he knows far more than he lets on. One of the missing girls turns up, showering gifts on her mother but being vague about her new job. It seems that one of the nightclub girls has been recruiting young girls for the drama school and Pauline , along with her pretty friend Mary (Gale Storm) are signed up. Pauline, however knows too much and is talking so she ends up dead in an alley. Nora's father runs the drama school but when he entered into association with Peterson, he didn't realise what was involved - and now he wants out.
This is an OK movie. H.B. Warner had an astounding career - there didn't seem to be a role he wouldn't tackle. In this one he was so debonair - I kept expecting him to be unmasked as the villain. Astrid Allwyn, must have discovered the secret of eternal youth as she always looked young and beautiful.
Recommended.