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Spencer Chan
Spencer Chan (March 28, 1892January 12, 1988) was an American character actor of Chinese descent. He had a long career in numerous films. Biography Chan was born in Los Angeles, California, to Kui Sing Chan (a pastor and court interpreter) and Loy Yau. His parents were Chinese immigrants, and they owned a house in Los Angeles's Boyle Heights neighborhood. Chan graduated college at the University of Southern California. Chan began appearing in Hollywood films in the 1930s, and also worked as an interpreter and casting agent when a script called for Chinese actors. Chan was considered an "atmosphere" player, along with Willie Fung, Frank Chew, Richard Loo and others. Chan died in January 1988 in Los Angeles, California, at the age of 95. He is buried at Evergreen Cemetery.Wilson, Scott. ''Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons'', 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Locations 25047-25048). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition. Selected filmography ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Woman On The Run
''Woman on the Run'' is a 1950 American crime film noir directed by Norman Foster and starring Ann Sheridan and Dennis O'Keefe. The film was based on the April 1948 short story "Man on the Run" by Sylvia Tate and filmed on location in San Francisco. The film, which lies in the public domain, was restored and preserved by the UCLA Film & Television Archive. Plot Frank Johnson is an unsuccessful painter who is out walking his dog one night when a car stops nearby. Unbeknown to Frank, the passenger in the car, a middle-aged man with an Irish accent, is trying to blackmail the driver. The passenger is about to testify before the grand jury against a criminal named Smiley Freeman. The passenger promises that he will not divulge the driver's ties to Freeman in return for a cash payment. The passenger does all the talking, addressing the driver, whose face is not shown, as "Danny Boy". Frank hears a shot as the would-be blackmailer is pushed out the passenger door. The stricken man begs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Man Who Came To Dinner (1942 Film)
''The Man Who Came to Dinner'' is a 1942 American screwball comedy film directed by William Keighley, and starring Bette Davis, Ann Sheridan and, as the title character, Monty Woolley. The screenplay by Julius and Philip G. Epstein is based on the 1939 play ''The Man Who Came to Dinner'' by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman. The supporting cast features Jimmy Durante and Billie Burke. Plot While passing through small-town Ohio during a cross-country lecture tour, notoriously acerbic New York radio personality Sheridan Whiteside breaks his hip after slipping and falling on the icy steps of the house of the Stanleys, a prominent Ohio family with whom he's supposed to dine as a publicity stunt. He insists on recuperating in their home during the Christmas holidays. The overbearing, self-centered celebrity soon comes to dominate the lives of the residents and everyone else who enters the household. He encourages young adults Richard and June Stanley to pursue their dreams, much to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
First Yank Into Tokyo
''First Yank into Tokyo'' is a 1945 American war film directed by Gordon Douglas for RKO Radio Pictures, starring Tom Neal, Keye Luke, Barbara Hale, and Richard Loo. It was one of the last American films to be produced during World War II, released only a little over a month after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the official surrender of Japan. Notably, it's also the first-ever film to feature or reference the atomic bombings. Plot After staging a successful bombing raid on Tokyo, Air Force pilot Steve Ross returns to San Francisco, where he reminisces about his lost love, army nurse Abby Drake, who he believes perished while on duty in Bataan. Steve's leave is curtailed when he is ordered to report to Washington and asked to volunteer for a special mission. Because Steve was reared in Japan and is fluent in the language, the army proposes that he undergo plastic surgery to become a "Japanese" so that he can infiltrate the army and contact scientist Lewis Jardine, a p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Back To Bataan
''Back to Bataan'' is a 1945 American black-and-white World War II war film drama from RKO Radio Pictures, produced by Robert Fellows, directed by Edward Dmytryk, that stars John Wayne and Anthony Quinn. The film depicts events (some fictionalized and some actual) that took place after the Battle of Bataan (1941–42) on the island of Luzon in the Philippines. The working title of the film was ''The Invisible Army''. Plot In 1945 US Army Rangers raid the Cabanatuan Japanese prisoner-of-war camp, rescuing its POWs. The film flashes back to March, 1942, and the Bataan peninsula in the Philippines. As U.S. Army troops under General MacArthur struggle to hold on at Bataan against the Japanese, Colonel Joseph Madden (John Wayne) orders one of his officers, Captain Andrés Bonifacio (Anthony Quinn), to shape up. Bonifacio has been under a strain because his sweetheart Dalisay Delgado (Fely Franquelli) is apparently collaborating with the Japanese, broadcasting propaganda over the radio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo
''Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo'' is a 1944 American war film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The screenplay by Dalton Trumbo is based on the 1943 book of the same name by Captain Ted W. Lawson. Lawson was a pilot on the historic Doolittle Raid, America's first retaliatory air strike against Japan, four months after the December 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The raid was planned, led by, and named after United States Army Air Forces Lieutenant Colonel James Doolittle, who was promoted two ranks, to Brigadier General, the day after the raid. Sam Zimbalist was the film's producer and Mervyn LeRoy directed. The picture stars Van Johnson as Lawson; Phyllis Thaxter as his wife, Ellen; Robert Walker as Corporal David Thatcher; Robert Mitchum as Lieutenant Bob Gray; and Spencer Tracy as Lieutenant Colonel—and soon General— Jimmy Doolittle. Tracy's appearance in the film is more in the nature of a guest star; he receives special billing rather than his usual top billing a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dragon Seed (film)
''Dragon Seed'' is a 1944 American War film, war Drama (film and television), drama film, about Japan's WWII-era actions in China.The movie directed by Jack Conway (filmmaker), Jack Conway and Harold S. Bucquet, based on the 1942 Dragon Seed (novel), novel of the same name by Pearl S. Buck. The film stars Katharine Hepburn, Walter Huston, Aline MacMahon, Akim Tamiroff, and Turhan Bey. It portrays a peaceful village in China that has been invaded by the Imperial Japanese Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War. The men in the village choose to adopt a peaceful attitude toward their conquerors, but the headstrong Jade (Hepburn) stands up to the Japanese. Aline MacMahon was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Premise A peaceful Chinese village is invaded by the Japanese prior to World War II. The men elect to adopt a peaceful attitude towards their conquerors, and the women are understood to stoically acquiesce as well, but Jade, a headstrong young woman, in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Purple Heart
''The Purple Heart'' is a 1944 American black-and-white war film, produced by Darryl F. Zanuck, directed by Lewis Milestone, and starring Dana Andrews, Richard Conte, Don "Red" Barry, Sam Levene and Trudy Marshall. Eighteen-year-old Farley Granger had a supporting role. The film is a dramatization of the "show trial" of a number of US airmen by the Japanese government during World War II. It is loosely based on the trial of eight US airmen who took part in the April 18, 1942, Doolittle Raid on Japan. Three of the eight were subsequently executed and one later died as a POW.Dower 1987, p. 50. This film was the first to deal directly with the Japanese treatment of POWs and ran into opposition from the US War Department, which was afraid that such films would provoke reprisals from the Japanese government. Plot In April 1942, after a raid on Japan, eight American aircrew made up of the crews from two North American B-25 Mitchell bombers, are captured. Capt. Harvey Ross (Dana ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Behind The Rising Sun (film)
''Behind the Rising Sun'' is a 1943 American war film based on the 1941 book '' Behind the Rising Sun'' written by James R. Young. Later-blacklisted Edward Dmytryk directed the film, and it stars Margo, Tom Neal, J. Carrol Naish, Robert Ryan and Gloria Holden. Plot In 1943, Reo Seki is presented with the ashes of his dead son, Taro Seki. He blames himself for his son's death. Back in 1936, Taro Seki returns to Japan after studying in America, with plans to work for an American engineer, Clancy O'Hara. Taro falls in love with Clancy's secretary, Tama Shimamura and they plan to marry. His father does not accept their marriage because Tama is not from a respectable family. Taro is then drafted to the war in China. Tama and Taro write frequent letters to each other and Tama attempts to show Reo Seki all the letters Taro has sent but he refuses to see them or have anything to do with his son. Meanwhile, in China, Taro experiences the brutality of war and witnesses the cruelty ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lady Of Burlesque
''Lady of Burlesque'' (also known as ''The G-String Murders'' and in the UK, ''Striptease Lady'') is a 1943 American musical comedy-mystery film, produced by RKO Pictures and directed by William A. Wellman and starring Barbara Stanwyck and Michael O'Shea. It is a faithful, if sanitized, adaptation of the 1941 novel ''The G-String Murders'' written by strip tease queen Gypsy Rose Lee. Plot A significant portion of the film is taken up with onstage performances, including comic bits and toned-down striptease acts. There is also a lot of backstage action not directly related to the evolving murder mystery but highlighting the characters and lifestyles of the performers and crew. At a New York City burlesque theatre, performer Dixie Daisy (the stage name of Deborah Hoople, played by Barbara Stanwyck) is becoming an audience favorite with her singing and striptease act. Backstage she has mixed interactions with other performers, some of whom are catty and jealous while others are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Adventures Of Smilin' Jack (serial)
''The Adventures of Smilin' Jack'' (1943) is a Universal movie serial based on the popular comic strip ''The Adventures of Smilin' Jack'' by Zack Mosley. It was directed by Lewis D. Collins and Ray Taylor. Plot In 1941, an American aviator, 'Smilin' Jack' Martin wishes to resign as an advisor to the Nationalist Chinese Army in order to return to the United States to enlist as an aviator in America's military buildup prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor. He is delayed when the Chinese discover that the neutral Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ) is a region in East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are some other ethnic groups such as Monpa people, ...an like Mandon "Province" contains a secret road from India to China crucial for the Allied war effort. Determined to obtain the secret for themselves, or equally determined to have the secret destroyed is the Japanes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Casablanca (film)
''Casablanca'' is a 1942 American romantic drama film directed by Michael Curtiz, and starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, and Paul Henreid. Filmed and set during World War II, it focuses on an American expatriate (Bogart) who must choose between his love for a woman (Bergman) or helping her husband (Henreid), a Czech resistance leader, escape from the Vichy-controlled city of Casablanca to continue his fight against the Germans. The screenplay is based on '' Everybody Comes to Rick's'', an unproduced stage play by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison. The supporting cast features Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, and Dooley Wilson. Warner Bros. story editor Irene Diamond convinced producer Hal B. Wallis to purchase the film rights to the play in January 1942. Brothers Julius and Philip G. Epstein were initially assigned to write the script. However, despite studio resistance, they left to work on Frank Capra's ''Why We Fight'' series early ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Destination Unknown (1942 Film)
''Destination Unknown'' is a 1942 American thriller film directed by Ray Taylor and starring William Gargan, Irene Hervey and Sam Levene. It was made as a second feature film by Universal Pictures set in China in World War II. Cast *William Gargan as Briggs Harrison *Irene Hervey as Elena Varnoff *Sam Levene as Victor *Turhan Bey as Muto *Keye Luke as Secretary *Felix Basch as Karl Renner Production Filming started April 1942.Jean Renoir to Direct 'Three Smart Girls Join Up' New York Times 3 Apr 1942: 25. References External links''Destination Unknown''at TCMDB''Destination Unknown''at BFI''Destination Unknown''at IMDb IMDb (an abbreviation of Internet Movie Database) is an online database of information related to films, television series, home videos, video games, and streaming content online – including cast, production crew and personal biographies, ... 1942 films Universal Pictures films Films set in China World War II films made in wartime Pacific War fi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
