Warner Archive continues to offer rare, long-out-of-circulation movies on its burn-on-demand site (www.wbshop.com, click on "Warner Archive") ranging from the silent era through the 1980s, including some that were once on VHS and many that have never been on home video.
And occasionally a few are offered up for review, as with the six listed below — a fraction of the site's nearly 700 titles, with more being made available several times each month. (If you wish to purchase titles on this site, my advice is to watch for sales, which sometimes significantly reduce the prices).
"A Stolen Life" (1947, b/w, $19.95). Bette Davis plays good/bad twins in this glossy soap opera (which she would repeat 17 years later in the even more sinister "Dead Ringer").
The plot has both sisters in love with Glenn Ford and he eventually marries one. But when she drowns in an accident, the other sister pretends to be the wife, setting all kinds of complications in motion.
What makes this film really work is Davis' remarkable performance, as she delineates each character perfectly, even when she's one sister pretending to be the other. Walter Brennan and Charlie Ruggles offer solid support.
Extras: full frame, trailer
"Jimmy the Gent" (1934, b/w, $24.95). Warner Archive has begun remastering some its rare titles, upgrading the quality quite a bit (which also ups the price), as with this sparkling, fast-paced screwball comedy that makes its home-video debut.
James Cagney stars as a somewhat seedy private eye, a fast-talking con artist using genealogy to find rich women he can scam, which prompts his girlfriend (Bette Davis) to move on. So she takes up with Cagney's rival, little realizing he's just as bad but knows how to cover it up. So Cagney tries to convince her he's changed his ways, hilariously so.
A talented dancer as well as actor, Cagney puts some of that physical grace to work here in a few slapstick moments while reeling off snappy dialogue a mile a minute. And Davis gets her share of one-liners, handling them with aplomb. There are also a number of recognizable faces from the Warner stable of seasoned character actors, all in fine form.
Extras: full frame, trailer
"The Power" (1968, $19.95). This thriller casts George Hamilton as a scientist who tries to uncover which member of his team is killing off the others with telekinetic powers.
Surprisingly entertaining, effectively understated sci-fi yarn is a forgotten gem with a terrific cast in support — Suzanne Pleshette, Yvonne De Carlo, Arthur O'Connell, Michael Rennie, etc.
Extras: full frame
"The Judge Steps Out" (1949, b/w, $19.95). The ever-bubbly Ann Sothern injects some spice into this standard old-fashioned romantic farce as a small-town judge (Alexander Knox) chucks his miserable life and his disagreeable family and takes a job as a short-order cook at a diner.
While he's pondering the life he's left behind, the judge becomes involved with the diner's sweet-natured owner (Sothern), and he helps her adopt an orphan.
Extras: full frame
"Chubasco" (1968, $19.95). Sothern also shows up here, albeit older and heavier, playing the kind of blowsy character that stereotyped her later career. The film is actually about a misunderstood teen (Christopher Jones), the girl he loves (Susan Strasberg, Jones' real-life wife at the time) and the adults who browbeat them.
Despite its trappings aboard a fishing boat, this is in many ways a typical '60s teen-angst effort, though it boasts good performances and stronger characters than most. Despite Jones doing an obvious James Dean impersonation.
This is also an example of how movies from the late '60s and early '70s often seem more dated than films of the '30s and '40s.
Extras: full frame
"Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold" (1975; R for violence, sex, nudity, language; $19.95). This "blaxploitation" sequel to the PG-rated "Cleopatra Jones" goes farther into camp territory as the title character (Tamara Dobson) heads for Hong Kong to track down a drug dealer known as the Dragon Lady, played by blonde Stella Stevens. Honest.
The film also aggressively pursues its R rating in a way that suggests the filmmakers felt it was necessary to compete with edgier films of this ilk, such as Pam Grier's "Coffy" and "Foxy Brown."
Extras: widescreen
e-mail: hicks@desnews.com