The Charlie Chan Chanthology (The Secret Service / The Chinese Cat / The Jade Mask / Meeting at Midnight / The Scarlet Clue / The Shanghai Cobra)

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Though the Charlie Chan film franchise has earned brickbats for its casting of Caucasian actors as the Asian sleuth, the movies have retained popularity among aficionados of '40s-era B-crime pictures, and the six-disc Charlie Chan Chanthology, all featuring Sidney Toler as Chan, should please that crowd. The Missouri-born Toler starred in 11 Chan pictures for Fox before purchasing the rights to the character from creator Earl Derr Biggers's widow and bringing it to budget studio Monogram, where he starred in 11 more Chans before his death in 1947 (Roland Winters replaced him in six more features until 1949). At Monogram, Chan became a Secret Service Agent (a move calculated to cut down on exotic locations and sets), and comedy was integrated into the plots via Mantan Moreland's chauffeur Birmingham Brown; Benson Fong also joined the cast as Number Three Son Tommy, with occasional appearances by daughter Frances (Frances Chan) and son Eddie (Edwin Luke, brother of Keye Luke, who played Number One Son Lee in the Fox Chans).

Other than that, the six films collected here (the first six Chans for Monogram, and all but five directed by Phil Rosen) are largely indistinguishable from one another save for the murder victims and their demises. In The Secret Service, Chan investigates the death of a wartime inventor; a San Francisco socialite expires in The Chinese Cat; daughter Frances is involved in the murder of a psychic in Meeting at Midnight (a.k.a. Black Magic); another government scientist is killed in The Jade Mask, and death by remote control is the focus of The Scarlet Clue. Director Phil Karlson (Kansas City Confidential) adds some noirish atmosphere to The Shanghai Cobra, which has bank employees dying from apparent snakebites. Dated and controversial as they may be, the Chan films are engaging diversions for vintage mystery fans. No extras are featured in the set. --Paul Gaita

Description

Disc 1: CHARLIE CHAN IN THE SECRET SERVICE Disc 2: THE CHINESE CAT Disc 3: THE JADE MASK Disc 4: MEETING AT MIDNIGHT Disc 5: THE SCARLET CLUE Disc 6: THE SHANGHAI COBRA

Customer Reviews:

Marketing over Matter.......2007-08-15

I've seen this boxed set many times, prominently featured in a chain bookstore. Thank goodness I bought it used: it's expensive at half the price.

MGM has given us six Charlie Chans from Monogram, three from 1944, three from 1945, each running slightly more than an hour. Each is on a separate disk, with scene selection and subtitles, but nothing more.

All six feature the reliable Sidney Toler and the consistently entertaining Mantan Moreland. Benson Fong appears in three as No. 3 Son Tommy Chan. The rest of the actors are mostly tried-and-true, long-lived career bit and character actors like Al Bridge (perennial cowboy), Gene Roth (perennial heavy), Cyril Delevanti (perennial butler), and George Chandler (perennial comic working stiff).

All six films are written by George Callahan, an inept, "Swiss cheese" writer: plots full of holes. Five of the six are directed by Phil Rosen, who started out as a cameraman for Edison and never did progress beyond the "filmed stage play" phase of cinema history.

The prints are all good quality visually, though a couple of them do not always track steadily. Monogram is responsible for dark scenes being consistently underlit. (One film, "Black Magic," is marketed under its TV title "Meeting at Midnight," which, an imposed subtitle tells us, was the "original title.")

The best film in the set is "The Shanghai Cobra." The director is Phil Karlson, best known for Kansas City Confidential (1952), the Phenix City Story (1955), and Walking Tall (1973). He brings a noir sensibility to the visualization, and he uses locations often and effectively (the other films are almost entirely studio-bound).

I get the strong feeling that writer Callahan needed and took strong guidance from those around him. Thus, the McGuffin in "Shanghai Cobra" is a cache of radium, not the usual jewels or war plans; the film has, uniquely, a romantic duo and a flashback. In "The Jade Mask" Al Bridge delivers more country corn than Toler ever did Confucius. The weakest of the six films, "The Scarlet Clue," is redeemed only by Mantan Moreland's "mindreading act" with fellow vaudevillian Ben Carter.

(In my library I have an old playscript entitled "The Haunted House: An Ethiopian Entertainment." Be aware that much of Moreland's comedy is of that ilk. Be aware also that he was a talented entertainer, well worth watching for that--often the only entertainment on the screen at all.)

Let me close by admitting that, having seen most of these films in the distant past, I didn't watch any of them continuously, but kept stopping and starting the show. The only way I could find them interesting was by referring constantly to the Internet Movie Data Base, reading cast lists and actors' credits. These films are typical Poverty Row product.

Not great--just very entertaining.......2007-07-05

These Sidney Toler Charlie Chans move well-- good dialogue-humor is well done--Sometimes a bit too stereotypical--but it's easy to see why these movies were so popular in their day. All in all they hold up better than I would have expected. Most enjoyable.

charlie chan chanthology.......2007-07-04

Wonderful! Just what I remember it being when I was young....If you remember the Chan mystery series then this is the one, Charlie Chan's children are in these series. The Dvd's came on time and couldn't wait to watch them..my teenage son came home and started watching with me, he was entranced and we had a marathon and watched all of them. Great product!

Charlie is my hero.......2007-07-03

This vendor responded to my purchase very quickly. Well-packaged, no damage. I'm in Chan heaven. Charlie Chan rocks!

Warner Oland, Why Did You Die?.......2007-06-27

These Chan films are from the Monogram series, long after the series, which had begun so brilliantly with Warner Oland at 20th Century Fox 10 or more years earlier, had fizzled. Fox dropped it after a handful of Sidney Toler films (which aren't available yet on DVD). Supposedly Toler bought the rights to the name Charlie Chan from the widow of author/creator Earl Derr Biggers and then sold himself and the rights to Monogram. The films suffer terribly. Toler is a tired old man in ersatz oriental makeup, and cheap, boring, repetitious "comedy" relief is provided in extremis by Mantan Moreland as a cliché blabbering, superstitious black lackey. The stories are so-so, but whatever values there may be are undermined by those two main stars. Benson Fong, as Number Three Son, is generally good -- charming though not so enthusiastic as Keye Luke -- but most of the time he has to play opposite Moreland or, in one pathetic film, a Chinese actress named Frances Chan as his sister of the same name...and she couldn't act her way out of a wet paper bag.

There are two more Warner Oland Chan movies that have yet to make it to DVD. It would be nice if Fox would release those along with the early Toler films. But forget these Monogram pot boilers.

Average customer rating:

Among the Best of the "Monogram" Chans--But That Isn't Saying Much
Classic Charlie Chan
One of Toler's Best Performances as Charlie Chan
Cobra Venom Is The Weapon
By Far The Best Monogram Chan movie

Charlie Chan in The Shanghai Cobra
Starring: Sidney Toler , Mantan Moreland , Benson Fong , James Cardwell , and Joan Barclay
Director: Phil Karlson
Manufacturer: MGM (Video & DVD)
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00020X870
Release Date: 2004-07-06

Description

From the director of Kansas City Confidential and The Silencers comes this universal Chan mystery. Containing a number of film noir elements unique to the series (such as a weary young detective, stark urban sets and a grown-up romance), The Shanghai Cobra is one of the most striking Chans of all! Charlie Chan (Sidney Toler) is called to investigate a strange and complicated series of mysterious murders by cobra venom. Soon Charlie, Number Three Son Tommy (Benson Fong) and ever-present assistant Birmhingham Brown are on the trail of an escaped con from Shanghai who's out to rob a government vault of its valuable contents: highly toxic radium!

Customer Reviews:

Among the Best of the "Monogram" Chans--But That Isn't Saying Much.......2007-06-21

Loosely based on novels by Earl Derr Biggers, 20th Century Fox's Charlie Chan series proved an audience favorite--but when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor the studio feared audiences would turn against its Asian hero. This was a miscalculation: actor Sidney Toler took the role to "poverty row" Monogram Studios, where he continued to portray the character in eleven more films made between 1944 and his death in 1947.

20th Century Fox had regarded the Chan films as inexpensive "B" movies, but even so the studio took considerable care with them: the plots were often silly, but the pace was sharp, the dialogue witty, and the casts (which featured the likes of Bela Lugosi and Ray Milland) always expert. The result was a kindly charm which has stood the test of time. Monogram was a different matter: Chan films were "B" movies plain and simple. Little care was taken with scripts or cast and resulting films were flat, mediocre at best, virtually unwatchable at worst.

Thanks to an adequate cast and a few interesting plot devices, THE SHANGHAI COBRA is among the best of the Monogram-made Chan films--but even so it barely manages to acheive a consistent mediocrity. In this particularly entry, Chan (Sidney Toler) is called upon to investigate a murderer who kills with what appears to be a cobra-like bite; at the same time, he decides to make certain that a government supply of radium tucked away in a bank vault, of all places, remains secure. Do these two seemingly unrelated plot lines come together? Well... could be!

Sidney Toler is always enjoyable as Chan, but most of his Monogram performances seemed "phoned in"--and that is as true of COBRA as it is of any Monogram Chan film. As usual, the really enjoyable performer is Mantan Mooreland. Changing times have led us to look upon Moreland's brand of comedy as demeaning to African-Americans, but he was an expert actor and comic, and taken within the context of what was possible for a black actor in the 1940s his work has tremendous charm and innocence.

Fans of the 20th Century Fox series are likely to find Monogram's Chan a significant disappointment and newcomers who like the Monogram films will probably consider them third-rate after encountering the Fox films. Like other Monogram Chan films, THE SHANGHAI COBRA is best left to determined collectors. Three stars, and that's being generous.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

Classic Charlie Chan.......2007-01-04

Wonderfully written and acted by Sidney Toler. A great movie for all Charlie Chan fans.

One of Toler's Best Performances as Charlie Chan.......2005-03-18

Obviously the Chan movies made at Monogram could never compare to those made at Fox with Warner Oland, but of these, The Shanghai Cobra is one of the best. Several employees of a bank have been murdered by a killer dubbed "The Cobra Killer" for his use of cobra venom in dispatching his enemies. Chan is called in to solve the murders.

Director Phil Karlson really gets the most out of the limited budget he had to work with and this film looks much better than most Monogram films with better production values and superior acting. The mystery is also very well done and keeps your interest in trying to figure out who the murderer is. Benson Fong and the always enjoyable Mantan Moreland provide the comic relief as #3 son Tommy Chan and Birmingham Brown respectively. Moreland brings life to every role he is in.

As a kid I would love staying up late and watching these with my dad who was a huge fan. We watched several together when Turner Classic was running them a couple of years ago or so and I was so disappointed when they decided to pull them off the air. These were always very entertaining.

Cobra Venom Is The Weapon.......2002-08-26

The killer uses venom from a cobra to eliminate his victims in this film. Sidney Toler plays Chan and the cast includes Benson Fong as Tommie Chan and Manton Moreland in the role of Birmingham Brown. Fong and Moreland are really quite good as a comic team. George Callahan and George Wallace Sayre handle the screen play. THE SHANGHAI COBRA is one of the better entries in the Chan series.

By Far The Best Monogram Chan movie.......2002-02-11

"The Shanghai Cobra" is my favorite of the Monogram Charlie Chans. It is beautifully atmospheric in the opening scenes, and I think Phil Karlson, the director (his first of two Chan outings, the other being "Dark Alibi" [1946]which is also worth watching)adds alot of these great effects, making it an enjoyable mystery that will keep you guessing. The comedy in this entry is superb with a wordplay gag about "u-turns" running all through the film. The sets and the noticable shadows and darkness make it almost like a "film noir" movie. Some action takes place in the sewers below the bank that they are doing investigations in(more darkness.)I also enjoyed the "flashback" when they showed Charlie Chan in his visit to Shanghai in '36 and '37. A fun film, a good mystery, and atmospheric at the same time, I would recommend this film highly to any Charlie Chan fan. Excuse, Please...

4th Armored Division: Invasion of Normandy: Volume VII

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4th Armored Division: Invasion of Normandy: Volume VII
Director: Tyler Alberts
Manufacturer: Combat Reels Inc
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

World War II | Military & War | Genres | DVD | Video

Original film Footage of World War II
80% of footage never seen before
Only place to see your favorite division's footage
Watch the true breakout of Normandy

ASIN: B000M51R7I

Product Description

THIS IS NOT A DOCUMENTARY The 4th Armored Division had no nickname, its members felt that 4th Armored was name enough. This unit was one of the follow-up American Armored Divisions used in the invasion of France in early July. The division would land in the Utah Beach sector, and quickly move to support the actions of the VIII Corps attack in the capture of Periers and drive south to Avranches. The contents of this video show the action as was recorded by the 165th and 166th Signal Photo Companies, during this historic operation. The footage in this video is intended to be strictly that of the 4th Armored Division and only shows other unit footage when two or more units are intertwined. This video contains footage covering the time from July 11, 1944, as the division off-loads onto Utah Beach, to July 31, 1944 when the 4th Armored takes advantage of the Operation Cobra break through. Images included on this research video are soldiers of the 4th Armored Division as they come ashore in France. The 4th moves through Montebourg as civilians waive. Troops and tanks of the division move through the Normandy hedgerow country. Vehicles move through the destroyed town of Periers on way to Coutances. General George S. Patton, commander of 3rd Army, makes a brief appearance in the thrust to the south. Finally watch the different Combat Commands strike with infantry divisions in the Breakout of Operation Cobra move through villages in their drive south to Avranches. Enjoy these close up shots of equipment, vehicles, weapons, uniforms, helmet markings, and of the faces of the men themselves on these candid reels of history.

Black Cobra + Black Cobra II ~ DVD ~ SHIPPED SAME DAY

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Black Cobra + Black Cobra II ~ DVD ~ SHIPPED SAME DAY

ProductGroup: DVD
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ASIN: B000TQ4W36

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Black Cobra and Black Cobra II ~Starring Fred Williamson ~ Detective Robert Malone (Fred Williamson) is a maverick cop who deals out his own brand of justice in the action packed Black Cobra! When a photographer witnesses a murder, Malone is assigned to her protection, and with a crazed gang of motorcyclist hot on her trail, Malone is just the man for the job! Black Cobra II Robert Malone is back! This time with a partner (Nicholas Hammond.) While Malone is in the Philippines, his wallet is stolen by a pickpocket. However, as he investigates the theft, he and his new partner begin to unravel an increasingly thicker plot beyond just simple theft. A nonstop action romp, Black Cobra II will keep you thrilled until the credits roll!

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Black Cobra II
Starring: Philip Gordon , Nicholas Hammond , Emma Hoagland , Ned Hourani , and Majib Jadali
Director: A.J. Dawson , and Edoardo Margheriti
Manufacturer: Legacy Entertainment
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B0007CILQ6
Release Date: 2005-03-01

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