Half Shot At Sunrise
(1930)
Thanks are due for the following
reviews which has been provided by noted film historian and accomplished
author
William M. Drew
The following review was published in the December, 1930 issue of "The Theatre." ("The Theatre" was a major magazine that was published from 1900 to 1931 and provides an invaluable record of American show business--both the stage and screen--in the early decades of the 20th century.)
"Half Shot at Sunrise" An RKO-Radio Picture, directed by Paul Sloane, story by James A. Creelman, Jr. Music and lyrics by Harry Tierney and Anne Caldwell; dances staged by Mary Read. Produced by William LeBaron, with this cast: Tommy, Bert Wheeler; Gilbert, Robert Woolsey; M.P. Sergeant, John Rutherford; Annette, Dorothy Lee; Colonel Marshall, George MacFarlane; Olga, Leni Stengel; Mrs. Marshall, Edna May Oliver; Eileen, Roberta Robinson; Lieutenant Jim Reed, Hugh Trevor; Captain Jones, Alan Roscoe; General Hale, E. H. Calvert.
Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey are rapidly becoming one of the screen's dependable comedy pairs--each is a perfect foil for the other, physically and in manner. Given adequate comedy and burlesque lines to deliver, be they ever so insane or preposterous, they can be counted on to make the most of their opportunities, for they have a fine sense of pace and keen perceptions of the ridiculous.
In "Half Shot at Sunrise," we have an extraordinarily impossible story--of two escaped doughboys leading the Paris M.P.'s a merry chase. For the benefit of the younger generation, there ought to be a prologue or long title explaining that from 1914 to 1918 there was a serious war in Europe, in the last third of which the Americans participated; that infantrymen were called doughboys; that A.W.O.L. meant "Absent Without Leave," and that the natural enemies of all honest and decent soldiers below the rank of second lieutenant were the traitorous wretches known as M.P.'s, or Military Police, who were forever ruining the good times of the boys by turning up like the angel of Death at a wedding.
At any rate, the Big Shot in Paris is an American colonel named Marshall, who loves the ladies, and who seems to have passed his amorous proclivities down to his daughter Annette, a boiling hot little spanker of about sixteen, of vast beauty and incredible boldness, who makes feverish love to one of the A.W.O.L.'s. The adventures of the boys are incessantly funny. Finally, Annette, well-played by Dorothy Lee, solves their predicament by forcing them to play the roles of heroes, sending them off to the front line trenches to deliver an important message, for which, by some mistake, a love note of the colonel's to his latest French charmer manages to get substituted. By reading the message en route and bringing it back to headquarters instead of to its destination, they save the colonel's face and restore themselves in his good graces, and the story ends with the appropriate weddings.
It is
superb burlesque. Dorothy Lee is the outstanding performer, apart
from the two comics. The direction is a good slapstick job that never
slows down, and the photography is excellent. Paul Sloane, the director,
deserves a hearty handshake!
From "The New York World" October 11, 1930
"The New
Films"
by Quinn
Martin
"HALF SHOT AT SUNRISE," at the Globe. Paul Sloane's production for Radio Pictures. Story by James A. Creelman Jr., with dialogue by Ralph Spence and Anne Caldwell.
THE CAST
Tommy.
. . . . . . . . . . . . .Bert Wheeler
Gilbert.
. . . . . . . . . . . .Robert Woolsey
M.P.
Sergeant. . . . . . . .John Rutherford
Col.
Marshall. . . . . .George MacFarlane
Eileen.
. . . . . . . . . . . Roberta Robinson
Olga.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Leni Stengel
Annette.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . Dorothy Lee
Lieut.
Jim Reed. . . . . . . . . . Hugh Trevor
Mrs.
Marshall. . . . . . . . .Edna May Oliver
Military
Policeman. . . . . .Eddie De Lange
Gen.
Hale. . . . . . . . . . . . . . E. H. Calvert
Capt.
Jones. . . . . . . . . . . . . Alan Roscoe
__
Two Funny
Little Men
There is simply no escaping the fact that Robert Woolsey and Bert Wheeler are developing themselves in broad and vulgar slapstick comedy to the point where they are becoming more or less an important team. Certainly they have advanced to the place where Broadway crowds are willing to stand for an hour waiting for seats in order to see them in each of their new rowdyisms. This latest one, a familiarly conceived but rather freshly treated piece of silliness about two American privates on the loose in Paris during the war, is, unless I am more utterly mistaken than usual, the best of the series in which they have appeared. In many of its moments uproarious, it attains a pitch of hilarity comparable to that of the Marx brothers. And this being the case, the Radio Pictures may very safely arrive at the decision that in these two clowns they have something.
I think Mr. Creelman, who wrote the frantically preposterous scenario, and Mr. Sloane, the director, ought to be given much credit too. Certainly Half Shot at Sunrise, of its type and manner, is destined to set audiences howling wherever it may find a screen.
I should like to add a word about the prettiness, the grace and the gifts as a young actress of Miss Dorothy Lee, the heroine, who plays the General's daughter. She is a beauty.
