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Ironside: Love My Enemy (1969)
Our delegation has been greatly insulted
***SPOILERS*** Obviously inspired by the USS Pueblo Incident the year earlier this Ironside, Raymond Burr, episode has Chief Robert T. Ironside and his aid and personal valet Mark Sanger, Don Mitchell, travel to this unnamed Scandinavian country to negotiate the release of some dozen American oceanographers who were captured by the navel forces of the Democratic Peoples Republic or better yet Peoples Republic of North Korea. Right away things don't look that good for Ironside and his fellow American negotiators in that the head of the Democratic Peoples Republic's top negotiator Nam Feng, Phlip Ahn, isn't just up to the job but slowly dying from this hepatitis like illness known as Acute Yellow Atrophy.
It soon turns out that one of maids, Ottola Nesmith, who was cleaning up Feng's room is found dead of the same illness, Acute Yellow Atrophy, that he's suffering from. It becomes apparent that someone is trying to sabotage the negotiations in order to make the Amerian delegation not only look bad but be blamed in covering up the oceanographers real intent of surveying the waters off the North Korean coast. That's not for fish but for military reasons in case a war with the Korth Koreans, which the US is accused of planning, breaks out! Feng himself soon dies from the mysterious illness and his replacement or second in command II Pak Soong, James Shigeta, goes full blast accusing the US of having him poisoned and made to look that the Democratic Peoples Republic did it!
****SPOILERS**** Jast as II Pak Soong was about to have it his way in framing the Americans of murdering top Democratic Peoples Republic negotiator Feng that his own head of security Hsai Hsu Mak, Khigw Dhiegh, uncovered his plan to murder Feng. That's by II Pak Soong having his room cleaned with a chemical, full strength, that if unhealed causes Acute Yellow Atrophy. Exposed as not only a liar and fraud but murderer as well II Pak Soong is soon to face he music or better yet firing squad back home in the Democratic Peoples Republic. That's unless if he decides to ask for political asylum in the USA the very country he tried to frame in Nam Feng's murder.
Naked City: Sidewalk Fisherman (1958)
No one gets their skull cracked on my beat
***SPOILERS**** Sidewalk fisherman Gio Bartolo, Jay Novello, has been working for a living scooping up or fishing, with a string attached to a wad of bubble gum, on the streets of Manhattan nickels dimes & quarters but things are starting to get real rough for him and his friend and partner Shellshocked, Leonardo Cimino, as of late. It's these Time Square thugs lead by the smirking and brutal Jacko, Terry Green, who've been giving Gio a hard time by taking his business in sidewalk fishing for coins away from him.
One afternoon Jacko and his boys drag Gio into an hotel lobby and brutally work him over only to have the police come to his rescue and arrest the entire bunch of cowards: Five against one and the one, Gio, being old enough to be their grandfather. Besides fishing for coins Gio also wants to adopt 8 year old Paulie, Gary Morgan, out of the Saint Francis Orphanage where's he's been since he was two years old. Paulie is greatly impressed by Gio's tall tales about him once being a fearless fisherman on the high seas and deep rivers all over the globe. The truth is that Gio gets sea sick even when he's taking a bath much less in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean during a September hurricane. Besides that Gio is in no financial position to look after little Paulie as well as having no place to live for himself.
****SPOILERS**** Things come to a head with Jocko & co. holding Gio responsible for a member of their gang, who smashed Gio's skull in, being sent up the river for six months attempt to not only rough up but murder Gio just for fun! That's as he's stark naked and chilling out at the Allen Street Baths only to get themselves caught, after his friend Shellshock telephoned the police, and put behind bars for attempted murder. As for Gio not only has he gotten a new lease in life in getting a job as a custodian at a lower East Side housing development working the night shift but being able to adopt little Paulie if not for good but between the hours of 7Am to 7PM which is the best time to spend with him teaching Paulie how to fish not in the rivers or oceans of the world but on the streets of NYC.
Naked City: Line of Duty (1958)
Every man must live in a cemetery within his own digging. Only he knows what's buried there,
****SPOILERS**** During a robbery on the NY City docks Det. James Halloran, James Franciscus, confronts the armed robber Peter Cretias, Andrew Cevado, face to face and shoots him dead before he can fire his weapon at him. Cleared of all charges in Cretias' death Det Hallornd can't get the tragic fact that he killed a man out of his mind even if it was a justifiable homicide. Wanting to clear his conscious Det. Halloran goes to see the late Peter Cretias' mother Mrs. Cretias and his wife Yancy, Eugenie Leontovich & Diane Ladd, to pay his respects to the man he gunned down. Det. Halloran was almost thrown out the apartment by an outraged Mrs. Cretias but Peter's wife Yancy showed an unusual kindness and understanding towards him.
Going on his own to find out just who was the man that he took his life Det. Halloran finds out that he was a local hood who was easy in lending out cash to his friends or total strangers but a rat towards those who cared for him like his widow Yancy. In fact it was Yancy who asked Det. Halloran to meet her at Penn Station and lend her money, $23.00, to get on a train out of town to her home back in St. Louis. Knowing her husband better then most Yancy knew that what happened to him was inevitable and didn't hold Det. Halloran responsible for it. He was headed for an early grave or life behind bars and if Det. Halloran didn't send him there someone else would have. Very probably one of his criminal friends or associates if not another policeman whom he would have shot it out with.
It took a while for Det. Halloran to get over what he did in gunning down Peter Cretias but in his talk with Peter's wife about what an unfeeling and violent person he was made that a lot easier for him to accept. Most policemen go through and entire 20 year or more career in the police department without not only shooting or killing someone but not even drawing their gun out of their holster. As we saw in this thought provoking "Naked City" episode Det. James Halloran wasn't to be one of them.
Ironside: A Bullet for Mark (1969)
Marked for Death
****SPOILERS*** Mark Sanger, Don Mitchell, while attending with his boss Chief Robert T. Ironside, Raymond Burr, the Annual Awards Luncheon at the Park Claybourne Hotel is gunned down in broad daylight and seriously wounded by an unknown assailant. It's first assumed by everyone that it was in fact Chief Ironside who was the gunman's,Fred Murdoc, intended target. Later it's determined, with a second failed attempt on Sanger's life, that Sanger was in fact the intended victim of Murdoc who was gunned down by the police during his escape attempt. With Sanger recovering from his gunshot wounds he's put under the microscope or third degree in what he can remember in whom he was involved with before he was shot who may have had it in for him.
It soon comes out that Sanger while filling up Ironside's custom made station wagon unknowingly saw a drug deal or operation in progress from the nearby filling station. With those involved in the drug operation not knowing if Sanger realized what was going on it was decided to whack him in case he did and would inform the police or his boss Ironside about it. The fact that Sanger had no idea of what was going on and was gunned down by those who ordered him shot thinking that he did brought the full weight of the SFPD and Chief Ironside on them.
Despite being greatly disturbed in what happened to his good friend as well as valet & driver Mark Sanger Chief Ironside seemed even more disturbed in that he not Sanger wasn't the gunman's intended victim. The fact that Ironside wasn't made him feel that his popularity among those he put behind bars in being the city of San Francisco's top lawman was waining a bit. It took Ironside a while to compose himself and get the job done in tracking down those who tried to have Sanger murdered by him sadly knowing at least in this case that he wasn't #1 on the hoodlums & mob bosses of San Francisco's hit parade.
Skyjacked (1972)
That kind of radio control is damn sophisticated. Yeah my 12 year old son uses it to fly his toy airplane!
***Major Spoilers*** What should have been called "Airport II" the movie "Skyjacked" is a worthy successor to that mega 1970 blockbuster hit with Charlton "Chuck" Heston as Captain Henry "Hammerin Hank" O'Hara at the controls. Capt. O'Hara is trying to keep his aircraft Flight 502 together in its being skyjacked by a deranged and not that wrapped too tight, the man has serious issues, washed out from the US Army on a mental disability Sgt. Jerome E. Webber, James Brolin. Sgt. Webber feels that he's been given a raw deal by his country and now whats to go to the USSR where he feels his talents, whatever they are, will be well appreciated. Claiming he has a bomb hidden on board that will detonate when he presses the button on what looks like the toy radio that Sgt. Webber has on him. With a hostage crew and passengers of 100 Sgt.Webber orders Capt. O'Hara to fly first to Anchorage Alaska to re-fuel and then go straight to Moscow Airport where he'll get a hero's welcome from the grateful Soviet Government.
During the flight over Soviet territory the plane is intercepted by a number of Soviet MIG fighter planes that Capt. O'Hara convinces to let his plane land by lowering its landing gear to show he has no evil intentions of doing any harm which was by far the most nail biting scene in the movie. It's when the plane finally landed at Moscow Airport that Sgt. Webber suddenly had second thoughts in defecting which made the situation, in him losing it and going ballistic, more dangerous then ever! You always knew that the guy was nuts but now he seemed to have developed a serious case of dementia as well.
***SPOILERS*** You can see that despite his strange and dangerous actions in the film Sgt. Webber was not fully in control of his mental facilities. Something that Capt. O'Hara sensed right from the start. Feeling sorry for the guy Capt. O'Hara went as far as trying to get him to give himself up before he ended up killing himself as well as everyone on board. Capt. O'Hara's heroic actions kept the casualties count to a minimum with the only person getting it being the reality challenged Sgt. Jerome K. Webber. Not from Capt. O'Hara or anyone on board or even members of the US Military but that of the Soviet or Moscow Airport Security Forces whom he was at one time so eager to give himself up to.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Reward to Finder (1957)
She makes a really good cup of coffee
****SPOILERS*** Living in squalor and cheap beyond belief The Kaminsky's Carl & Anna, Oskar Homolka & Jo Van Fleet, never expected to find what they or better yet Carl did lying in the gutter one evening when he was out looking for empty bottles for their two cent deposit and used newspapers to stuff his shoes in order to insulate his feet from the cold: A wallet with 52 $100 dollars bills with no identification in it. It's Anna who want's to spend some of the money on herself and Carl in an attempt to placate his spree spending wife appeals to her morality in telling Anna that the money may belong to someone who in fact needs it and to return the cash to its rightful owners.
Later claiming that he found an article in the newspapers about someone losing $5,200.00 in the vicinity where he found it Carl rushes over to the person in question and returns him his money. But the big rub in all this is that he got zilch-zero-in reward money for doing his good deed for the day.
It soon becomes apparent to Anna that Carl did no such thing in returning the lost cash but in fact kept it all to himself. Finding the money hidden in the floorboard of their apartment Anna went on a spending spree without her husband's knowledge spending almost half of the money that she found. Now comes the showdown between the two with both planning to do each other in without realizing the consequences of their actions: Life or the electric chair if caught which, in how ridicules they are, is a given.
****SPOILERS**** In the end both Carl and Anna never got a chance to enjoy the fruits of their labors in spending the pot of gold that they had between them. But they did in fact get second prize in trying to do each other in. That's with Carl losing his cool and bashing Anna's skull in and Anna in return serving up for Carl a cup of her deliciously brewed coffee that's so good that her husband Carl would gladly die in him having just a sip of it.
Ironside: Eye of the Hurricane (1969)
Your an animal! That's right but this animal is getting out of his cage.
****SPOILERS**** Chief Robert T. Ironside, Raymond Burr, get's his new custom built station wagon carjacked with him in it as three dangerous convicts make their escape from prison lead by the convicted multiple murderer Mr. Sims played by Johnny "7" Seven. It was the usual on the ball Chief Ironside who was tricked into showing up at Warden Leydon's, Arthur Space, office in order to have him the warden and his wife Mrs. Leydon, Virginia Gregg, among others kidnapped by Sims and his two fellow convicts Toby, Dana Elcar, and Terry Wilson, Jackie Coogan Jr.
With Sims holding Ironside hostage as he together with Wilson & Toby make their escape in Ironside's station wagon their being tracked by Det. Sgt. Ed Brown, Don Galloway, in the air on a helicopter with Ironisde secretly having a tracking device in his pack of smokes on the ground. With Toby having shot and seriously wounded Warden Leydon the three escapees now face far bigger charges then breaking out of prison which makes them even more dangerous then they already were.
***SPOILERS*** It's at the docks where the three together with Sims' girlfriend Joy,Claire Brennen,were to make their escape on a speed boat with the 500G's they have stashed from a previous armored car robbery that their luck finally ran out. Not just in their escape route being blocked by the SFPD and US Coast Guard but with the wheelchair bound Ironsiode disarming Sims with a couple of karate chops. Which kept Sims from murdering all the hostages, Ironside included, as he promised if there was any police interference.
Naked City: Nickel Ride (1958)
Guns aren't made to be safe it they were they wouldn't make them
****SPOILERS**** Feeling that he outlived his usefulness senior captain of the Staten island ferry the 74 year old Captain Adam Fint played by the distinguish looking Camero Prud'Homme is about to be given his walking or retirement papers. Just when on what was supposed to be his last trip or nickel ride, that's what a ride on the ferry cost then, his boat is high or sea-jacked by this gang of bumbling bank or armored car robbers lead the not playing with a full deck Mr. Biggers, Johnny Seven.
This insanely planned armored car robbery was to and did take place on the Statan Island Ferry when it was some 3 miles out at sea! With no where to go and with Mr. Biggers having shot up the ferry's machinery as well as wounding its 74 year old Captain Flint, the only person who can operate it, the entire NY Police water patrol as well as units of the US Coast Guard had the ferry surrounded; With the by now out of his skull Mr. Biggers & Co. in their gun-sites.
Not much of a job for Lt. Dan Muldoon, John MacIntire, has his partner Det. James Holloran, James Franciscus, to do but wait for the ferry with the robbers on it to be brought to shore and arrested by the awaiting NYPD and coast guard military police. As for the wounded Captain Flint he got a new lease on life by not being forced to retire by the, who seemed to be his boss, police Commissioner Harry Holcombe who hated to do it. Captain Flint proved that in spite of his advanced years he can still do his job better then anyone much younger them himself ever could.
Naked City: Meridian (1958)
Take whatever you want but please don't kill us!
****SPOILERS*** In it's TV debut the highly successful crime series begins much like the movie "The Naked City" that its based on. We have an aerial view of Manhattan Island and the people who both work and live in it. As the camera pans down to the streets we see 15 year old Arturo, Pat DeSimone, mug this old man by bashing his head in and taking off with a gun the man, who's a watch and jewelry repairman, had in his lunch pale. Arturo then teams up with his fellow greaser Lefty, Joseph Walsh, who are both planning to make a big score by knocking off a local jewelry store. The two brainless grease balls, who have enough grease & oil in their hair to fill up the tank of an SUV, then try to pull off a Jewel robbery on crowded West 58th Street in broad daylight with the streets filled with more cops then pedestrians. The two not that on the ball would be robbers end up slugging the what looked like 90 years old store owner and to make matters even worse shoot a cop who just happened to show up at the crime scene.
Going from dumb to dumber the two then takes off with about two dozen policemen on their tail to a gun show at Columbus Circle where their trapped like rats and are, another bright idea on their part, now planning to go out in a blaze of glory. That in order for them to finish off what had turned out to be definitely not their day. It's there where our hero's Lt. Don "Birdman" Muldoon, John MacIntire, and his young whipper snapper partner the just made NYPD Detective James Halloran, James Franciscus, are introduced to the TV audience as they show up at the scene in order to prevent things from getting even more worse and out of hand then they already are.
***SPOILERS***Stopping short from using fire power to catch the two fugitives from the law Det. Holloran has the store sprinkler system turned on to flush the two trapped and cornered rats out. For his part Auturo in seeing the writing on the wall let one of the two hostages go but in his partner Lefty wanting to duke or shoot it out with the police he soon ended up getting completely drenched. Lefty ended up with his full head of glorious hair or proud pompadour, that the girls were crazy about, so badly mussed up and water logged that to him it was far far worse then any punishment, including life behind bars or the death penalty, that the NY court system could have meted out on him.
Ironside: Poole's Paradise (1969)
Everybody dies! I once had a pet raccoon who chocked to death on a chicken.
***SPOILERS*** Going together with his crew of crimes fighter Det. Sgt. Ed Brown, Don Galloway, Officer Eve Whitfield, Barbara Anderson, & Don Stanger, Mark Mitchell, for a quite trip in the country Chief Ironside, Raymond Burr, ends up getting trapped in this little out of the way town in the mountains of Nortern California. It's there where the sheriff Harvey Poole, Steve Forrest,runs the local prison work camp as if he were a Nazi concentration camp or Soviet gulag commander. It's work camp escapee D.W Donnelly, Clu Gulager, who on the run for his life in the Sheriff and his goons that includes his brutal deputy Hogg, William Smith,wanting him dead before he reveals what's been going on in what is known as Poole's Paradise.
It's when Ironside & Co. dropped into the nearly deserted Wanda's Coffee Shop run by Wanda, Louise Latham, an old flame of Sheriff Poole that Det Sgt. Brown checking out the famous Ironside paddy wagon was kidnapped by Donnelly and held hostage. That until the truth is finally reviled of what's been going on in Poole's Paradise that he was an eye whiteness of. It's later when his hostage Det Sgt. Brown ended up freeing himself from Donnelly that he found out that he in fact was right about the Sheriff. In that he together with Donnelly were almost shot and killed by one of Poole's deputies when he tried to give himself up. With the thought that both Det. Sgt Brown and Donnelly were killed when their car the Ironside paddy wagon fell off a cliff while being chased by Pool's men when the two "dead men" suddenly appeared with the evidence of his criminal activities. It was then that he together his Chief Deputy Hogg knew that their gooses were cooked and checked themselves into the town lock-up ready to take their medicine.
***SPOILERS*** The biggest tragedy in all this was Ironside's beloved custom built paddy wagon that was destroyed and burned to a crisp. But in the end the Chief was provided with a newer and far more modern mode of transportation a hopped up station wagon with all the conveniences of home including a bar and color TV. So as things happily turned out the destruction of Chief Ironside's famed paddy wagon, that was ready for the junkyard anyway, ended up being a blessing instead a curse for him.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents: The Hands of Mr. Ottermole (1957)
Your twisting my words
****SPOILERS**** Post WWI 1919 England is being terrorized by this "Jack the Strangler" serial killer with the London Police totally helpless to stop him or possibly, "Jill the Strangler", her. It's Sgt. Ottermole, Theodore Bikel, who's on the hot seat in him being held responsible in not having this homicidal lunatic caught and put behind bars. It's the nagging and pesky reporter Summers, Rhys Williams, who's really getting under Sgt. Ottermole's skin in not being able to solve the string of murders by the "London Srangler". And the besieged sergeant doesn't like it one bit and lets him known his feelings about him in no uncertain terms.
What we and reporter Summers soon get from Sgt. Ottermole's opinions about the killer makes us wonder if he in fact knows far more about him then he's letting on. Sgt. Ottermole's psychological profile of the elusive strangler is so on target that it's a wonder that he couldn't have had him identified and captured before he committed his first murder! As the killings or stranglings kelp going on the sergeant gets more and more weirder as if he knows who the killer is but somehow can't bring himself to have him captured or arrested.
****SPOILERS****It's later when the strangler pops up in the London fog and this time targets reporter Summers not only is his cover blown but he himself captured. And it was Summers who who figured out who he was in what Sgt. Ottermore unknowingly and unconsciously told him about his mental mind-set. Early psychological study of serial murders before the phrase was even coined. And it's right on target about them and how they can operate and murder in plain sight of their victims back then like they do now.
Ironside: Goodbye to Yesterday (1969)
Just a habit of reading between the lines
***SPOILERS*** Chief Ironside, Raymond Burr, gets involved in tracking down those who kidnapped Leslie Richards, Melady Thomas Scott,the 15 year old daughter of an old flame of his former nurses aid Barbara Richards, Vera Miles. It was Barbara while suffering from amnesia who nursed Ironsider back to health three years ago after he was shot by a sniper. Now desperately needing help to get her daughter back Barbara reluctantly call Chief Ironside in San Francisco to help find and rescue her daughter Leslie. That despite her jealous and legally separated from her husband Victor, Philip Carey, who can't stand the sight of the wheel bound ace San Francisco detective for reasons never really explained in the Ironside episode.
With the local Sheriff Medcalf, Slim Pickins, and FBI Agent Torrence, George Murdock, working together with Ironide to find Leslie and her kidnappers ex-convicts Ben Ames, Dean Clark, and Carl Sutter, Eddie Firestone, they don't realize that the two have an inside line to the Richards' Ranch Sutter's whacked out sister Molly, Cloris Leachman. Molly who's not only a religious fanatic who climes to have supernatural powers but has also secretly been living in sin with Ames as well as having a daughter out of wedlock. With the kidnappers wanting $200,000.00 for Leslie's release a trap is set for them with the money stuffed in a suitcase having a hidden transistor to track them. As things soon turn out the local police headed by Sheriff Medcalf and his bumbling nephew deputy David, Michael Larrain, screw up the one chance to catch the kidnappers in a trap that was set up by Ironside and Agent Torrence.
****SPOILERS**** With Part one of the two part Ironside episode coming to an end Ames now concentrates his efforts to get the kidnap money with the help of his partner Carl Sutter from Barbara herself in keeping Ironside and the police and FBI out of the loop. It's a crazy and desperate scheme on Ames' part and will have to wait until next week for Part Two to see how it turns out.
Ironside: Not with a Whimper, But a Bang (1969)
The Big Bang theory
****SPOILERS**** Chief Ironside, Raymond Burr, and his top flight team of crime fighters get on the case of a number of strange bombings that accrued on the Schelling Collage Campus. The bombings were made to look like childish parks in them not being powerful enough to do any damage but Ironside feels that or they were just a warning of things, terrible things,to come. It's the editor of the collage newspaper Neal Morgan, Philip Chapin, who thinks that there the work of left wing "Weathermen" types who are against the collage's support of US the Governments policies both at home and abroad. Something that left-wing radicals have been doing all across the state in protest to America's involvement in the War in Vitnam. It's the US Army bomb disposal team of Warrant Officer Frank Simpson, Edward Asner, and Sgt.Arnie Vernon, Gerald O'Laughlin, who are called in to disarm the phony bombs who seem to be at odds with each other not in their work but social lives.
The focus of the bombing soon shifts from the unknown and shadowy bomber to both Simpson & Vernon who in fact are putting their lives on the line to disarm the phony bombs that can, as Chief Ironside suspects,soon become real & lethal. And sure enough with the latest bomb discovered at the statue of the founder of the collage Albert Schelling this one turns out to be for real and ends up killing Warrant Officer Simpson who was trying to disarm it. It now becomes clear that whoever was behind these bombings was not the person or persons who planted the one that killed Simpson. And thus proved Chief Ironsoide theory that someone used the previous bombings to cover up the one that he planted but who can he or she be?
****SPOILERS**** Well as we soon see the fatal blast had nothing at all to do with the collage's polices but presented the opportunity for the bomber to use them to cover his on tracks. And the tracks in how he skillfully constructed the device lead straight to his front door. Like in the previous Ironside episode Offcer Eve Whitfield, Barbara Anderson, went undercover to track down the mad bomber by posing as a cub reporter at the collage newspaper. And it was in the strange and threatening letter that the bomber sent to the collage about his latest or soon to come blast that put Chief Ironside on his trail.
Naked City: Barefoot on a Bed of Coals (1963)
When I have the uniform on my life has a meaning
***SPOILERS*** The 138th and final "Naked City" episode ends with a bang in a wild shootout in the East Village of Manhattan with wannabe New York City cop Stanley Walenty, Steven Hill, finally getting the recognition that he sought all his adult life. That's by Stanley exposing himself as a target to a mad dog cop killer in order to prevent the real cops on the scene from getting shot. Stanley has been masquerading around the city as a cop for two years after he washed out of the Police Academy on a section eight: Too unstable to be trusted with firearms.
We already saw just how unstable Stanley was at the beginning of this "Naked City" episode when he, shooting and asking questions later, gunned down petty crook Finney, Dustin Hoffman, who was found to have a toy gun on him in his failed attempt of robbing a local diner. With an all points bulletin out to find this phony policeman before he does any more damage Stanley is now back to his real identity as a barber cutting and clipping hair in a mid-town Manhattan barber shop.
Not a bad looking guy with a good and study job Stanley feels that by being or impersonating a cop will get him to meet by giving speeding tickets, and then canceling them, to gorgeous and sexy women who'll be forever indebted to him. What poor Stanley will soon find out about one of those beauties the conceded and manipulative former hat check girl Clara Espuella, Zohra Lampert, is that she's just using him for her own selfish and greedy purposes. In a both sad as well as touching scene when Stanley opens up to Clara and not only professes his love for her but admits that he's just a barber, and proud to be one, not a policeman she at first goes into shock and then hysterics which finally woke Stanley up to just who he was both dealing as well as in love with! To his credit Stanley got in the last lick on Carla by in a fit of anger cutting off one of her gorgeous black locks just before he, as mad as hell, checked out of her apartment.
***SPOILERS*** It was the girl next door or in this case downstairs the pretty and sensitive Ola Martini, Elizabeth Allen, who was in love with Stanley and didn't care what he did for a living, he could be a grave digger for all she cared, who brought not only the very the best out of Stanley but in the end by telling the police where he was headed for, the shootout in the East Village, saved his life. Unlike the first time around in this "Naked City" episode when Stanley used his gun, in shooting Finney, that got him into trouble this time around by not using it and instead taking a bullet he truly became the hero, not only to Ola but the police on the scene, that he alway dreamed about being.
Ironside: A Matter of Love and Death (1969)
For a momentary mistake you shouldn't pay with your life
***SPOILERS*** Cheigf Robert T. Ironside, Raymond Burr,m takes on the subject of illegal abortions here and uses his assistant Officer Eve Whitfield, Barbara Anderson, who's more then happy to get the assignment as an undercover young woman who's looking to get an illegal abortion. It was when the out of town and desperate young lady Arlene Dobbs, Connie Kreski,was found in a local park bleeding to death her condition was discovered to be that of a back alley abortion. With Chief Ironside determined to catch who was responsible for Arlene's death or murder he checks out all the hotel's that women, only single women, stay at feeling that was Arlene's last residence.
It's Officer Whitfied posing as single and pregnant Laura white who checks into the Vermont Hotel for single women who soon discovers that's the place where the victims, four of them, of these illegal abortions last resided at. Meanwhile Chief Ironside & Det.Sgt. Ed Brown, track down the person who got Arlene pregnant real estate agent Stanford Chase,Pat Tovatt, who's now in hot water not just for knocking her up but not trying to get her help in taking care of Arlene and her soon to be born child. Which had a desperate and confused Arlene Dobbs get the back alley abortion that eventually took her life.
****SPOILERS**** It's when the undercover Officer Whitfield was just about to get an abortion, that in fact she didn't need, the truth came out to who was the person who was not just aborting but murdering the young ladies at the Vermont Hotel. And before the abortionist was about to work on her both Chief Ironside and Det. Sgt. Brown by getting the single from Whitfield, in breaking a window, sprung to her rescue together with a squad of San Francisco policemen. It was too late for Arlene Dobbs but in cracking the abortion ring that ended up killing her many future Arlene Dobbs were spared the ordeal and suffering, As well as death, that she went through. And with abortion being made legal, by the landmark Supreme Court decision of Row vs Wade, in all 50 states four years later in 1973 illegal and back alley abortions were to gladly become a thing of the past.
Ironside: The Tormentor (1969)
What could have turned the most beloved player n the league into a raving lunatic?
****SPOILERS**** All that San Francisco Giant manager Marvin Cruse, Bruce Gordon, needed was his star outfielder and league leading hitter Clint Atkins, Garry Collins, to freak out and go haywire at the hight of the NL, National League, pennant race. It's Clint's good friend Chief Iroside, Raymond Burr, assistant Det. Sgt. Ed Brown, Don Galloway, who seems to know what's been bugging him these last few and critical, in the Giant's winning the NL pennant, days where he's been getting threatening phone calls and letters telling him to pay up, a cool $100,000.00, or he and his family will be very sorry. At first Clnit's just fluffed off all these threats as nothing but a bunch of crank calls and letters. But when during a game at Candlestick Park he was shot with a pellet gun while chasing a fly ball he realized that they were dead serious!
At first ready to go along with the blackmail and pay his tormentor off it's Clint's wife Marcy, Mary Ann Mobley, who blows the cover that Chief Ironside had provided to her and her family. That's in Marcy letting out the fact that she knows about what he's up to and what he want's the next time that the unknown caller a former wash out from the SF Giant's spring training camp Earnie Wilson, Noam Pitlik, calls in. Now knowing that the police are on to him he in turn blows his cover by coming right out into the open in the Giant's locker room to finish the job that he started by blowing Clint away! In him doing that with his what looked like a toy be-be gun from a box of Crackerjacks. What he didn't expect was that Det Sgt. Brown was there waiting for him and together with Clint put an end to all his crazy and deranged antics.
P.S This Ironside episode was in some way a reunion of a number of actors and actresses who were also in a bunch of Perry Mason episodes that also stared Raymond Burr. Which included Bruce Gordon Mary Ann Mobley and her real life husband and guest star in "Tormentor" Garry Collins.
The Macomber Affair (1947)
Be my Macomber Coleen Baby
****SPOILERS**** It's in the early dawn hours when an airplane with the body of rich tourist and safari hunter Francis Macomber, Robert Preston, lands at Nairobi Airport that we get the story of what exactly happened to him and how he was killed. Going out hunting cape buffalo with his white hunter guide Robert Wilson, Gregory Peck, and man or macho man hating wife Margaret, Joan Bennett, Francis ended up with a bullet in his back. That while trying to hold off together with Wilson a wounded charging 1,200 pound cape buffalo. In just how Francis ended up that way we go into a long flashback that had to do with his martial problems with Margaret who couldn't stand the very sight of him. Being a coward at heart Francis loved to bully around those who couldn't fight back. But at the same time he looked or sucked up to those who were in positions of power over him.
Right away Margaret started to make eyes at the handsome and courageous Robert Wilson in him being everything that her wimpy husband Francis wasn't. Yet at the same time in being a women she hated Wilson for going out in the bush or savanna and gunning down helpless wild animals not for food or protection but just for the sport, and getting paid to do it, of it. Francis who screwed up the hunt for a 400 pound lion by not putting it down with a kill shot later, in tracking the beast down, wet his pants and panicked when the injured lion, that Wilson put down, charged at him with his disgusted wife Margaret not far from the scene. Now more then ever trying to show both Margaret & Robert Wilson what a real man he is Francis was determined to gun down much bigger game to prove to them and everyone else his worth as a both fearless game hunter and macho man.
****SPOILERS**** It was at the cape buffalo hunt that Francis did in fact prove to himself as well as Robert Wilson that he's got what it takes but at the same time took a bullet in his back killing him! And that bullet was fired by non other then his now hunting cape buffalo and at the same time macho hating wife Margaret. With Wilson together with the two native guides Kongoni & Abdullah, Earl Smih & Hassan Said, present at the scene of the shooting it was their testimony that would in the end absolve or convict Margaret of her husband Francis' accidental death or cold blooded murder. Margaret, who was already cleared of all charges, who's to tell in what she knows about her husband's tragic death is seen going to testify to an follow up inquiry board but we never get to see or hear what she says. The movie ends abruptly as if the movie projector was shut off and not having the usual "The End" splashed across the screen or even the film's ending credits.
Ironside: Puzzlelock (1969)
the imperfect perfect crime
****SPOILERS**** Assistant D.A Mel Grayson, Simon Oakland, strangles his wife Frida, played by what looked like a clothing store mannequin, and covers his tracks so perfectly that his Innocent nephew Paul Dekes, Dennis Cooney, ends up being arrested for the murder that he in fact committed. Dekes who was at a disco at the time of Frida's murder took some time off to go home and get a sandwich which was around the time that Frida was murdered. It was Robert T. Ironside, Raymond Burr, who was having a couple of drinks with Grayson at the exact time that his wife was supposedly murdered who rightly suspected that it was him in the phony act of both shock & surprise, when he heard the news of Frida's murder, that he put on not Paul Dekes who was the murderer! But with such an elaborate cover up on Grayson's part just how could Ironside prove it?
Were never given a reason why Grayson offed his wife it seemed that he was going through a mid-life crisis and with all the cute and very willing and free love hippie chicks around at the time, San Francisco circa 1967-69, he also wanted to get in on the action. with his wife Frida in the way and Grayson going through a major life change the only way for him to join this new generation of everything and anything goes American youths was by getting rid of her. Now free to do what he always wanted, let it all hang out, he's got his nephew Paul involved in a murder that he in fact committed.
****SPOILERS**** Ironside playing it both smart & cool allows Paul to get arrested for Frida's murder knowing that the evidence he has against him isn't worth a hill of beans in any courtroom in the USA. But in him knowing, which turned out to be right, that by Paul possibly facing the gas chamber if convicted Grayson he'll finally admit his guilt in order to spare Paul's life or life behind bars. Killing his wife was one thing but having someone else pay for his crime was quite another. And by Grayson allowing Paul to take the rap for what he did was a lot worse then him being able to get away with it.
Ironside: A Drug on the Market (1969)
Kaput-Dead-in 4 Days
***SPOILERS*** Spending a quiet evening at his pad in the Depertment of Justice Building in San Francisco with the recently widowed Karin Martin, Betsy Jones Moreland, Chief Inroside,Raymond Burr, senses that there's something very wrong with her. Doing a little bit of probing Ironside soon finds out that Karin is being threatened by some prank caller telling her that she's hasn't that long, four days to be exact, to live! what's more Karin is hearing all kinds of strange sounds coming out of nowhere that's driving her batty. Taking a keen interest in Karin's problems Chief Ironside checks out those close to her and finds out that her brother Avery Corman, Ray Danton, is planning a merger with his or the late Karin's husband Ross' pharmaceutical company Martin Labs with the Swiss likewise company Abrex! And it's Karin who claims to have unearth documents on Martin Labs latest wounder drug Anfedaseton that would prove dangerous to anyone's health who uses it. Information that Avery has been keeping from the FDA in order to get the drug on the market!
Ironside together with Officer Eve Whitfield, Barbara Anderson, check out all those who were tested with the drug and find out that it did wonders for them instead of getting them sick and causing them to kick off or die! What's even more disturbing is that the voices that Karin had been hearing are starting to get more and more active having her feel that she's in fact losing her mind. There's even an incident outside her home when running outside away from the strange and scary voices Karin's attacked by the house gardener, on his off hours, who's later found murdered by the police. Was this a plan to frame Karin for the gardener's murder in order to shut her up about about what she found out about the wonder drug Anfedaseton?
***SPOILERS*** Ironside soon got the drift to what was happening to Karin and who was behind it. Setting a trap with Karin unknowingly used as bait it didn't take long for those who are trying to drive Karin insane or in her grave to come out in the open. And when they did it was Chief Ironside and the SFPD who were right there, with guns and handcuffs in hand, waiting for them.There's was something very strange about this gardener who at first seemed to be working with those trying to get Karen either committed or killed. I can only assume that he was murdered to keep his mouth shut from revealing to the police who was behind this whole insane and crazy scheme.
Ironside: Moonlight Means Money (1969)
Deadly Pick-up
***SPOILERS**** It's when Det Sgt. Ed Brown, Don Galloway, stops his friend and fellow police officer Ray Leonard, Linden Chiles, moonlighting as a San Francisco taxi driver he forces his way into his cab together with Officer Eve Whitfield, Barbara Anderson, for both a ride and friendly chit-chat. Leaving Leonard's intended customer Pat Arnold, Dick O'Shea, out in the cold and on the street it's later found out By Officer Eve Whitfield a package in the cab that was very possibly interned for Arnold containing a load of illegal drugs! With Det. Sgt. Brown having the cab turned around to give the drugs back to as well as arrest what seems like its rightful owner Arnold. It's then that a shooting accrues with Arnold being shot dead by three bullets and cab driver policeman Ray Leonard being the one who did the shooting!
With both Brown & Leonard suspended for in the case of Leonard driving a cab which is against SFPD regulations and Det. Sgt Brown for not reporting him and not reporting Leonard for not only moonlighting driving a taxi but arresting him for being a possible drug courier for the mob as well. And it's Brown's boss Chief Robert T. Ironside, Raymond Burr, who strongly believes that Leonard is involved in illegal drug distribution using his taxi as cover. And even more disturbing Det Sgt. Brown was an innocent dupe who should have known better not to get involved with him that can now cost his his badge. What's even far more shocking is that the cash strapped Officer Ray Leonard had made a $15,000,00, which is more then he earns for an entire year as a San Francisco policemen, deposited into his bank account the other day! Was that drug money or a big hit at the racetrack or jackpot at the casino.
***SPOILERS*** Somewhat confusing Ironside episode with all the interlocking and bizarre sub-plots in it that has to do with a drug gang headed by car junk yard owner Dameron, Skip Homeier, using his soon to be junked or crushed cars to transport illegal drugs into the city of San Francisco. We never really know what exactly Ray Leonard's part in all this is since he seems to be on drugs himself and never made any sense in explaining himself to both Dameron or Chief Ironside. It's in the end that Leonard, after being cleared of all charges, finally decides to quit the police department and drive a taxi full time. The job is far less dangerous even if the pay and benefits aren't that great.
P.S Check out actor Eduardo Ciannelli as former junk yard owner, before he sold it to drug dealer Mr. Dameron, John Danione. Ciannelli made a name for himself in the TV crime series "Johnny Staccato" as Waldo the night club owner where Johnny preformed at. Ciannelli was also considered to play the leading role as Mafia Don Vito Corleone in the block buster movie "The Godfather" but passed away before shooting started; with movie cameras not throw away 9mm's .32's & .38's as well as tommy guns.
Naked City: Golden Lads and Girls (1963)
Golden lads & girls all must as chimney sweeps come to dust
****SPOILERS**** With TV producer Gordon Lanning, Robert Webber, getting himself good and drunk after the news of the latest ratings for his shows going off the cliff he soon goes into a drunken rage. Gordon beats the living hell out of his fashion model old lady or wife Laura, Elizabeth Allen, using her for a punching bag. Things got so bad that the house maid, Jessica Walters, had to call the cops before he put Laura in the hospital on life support with a serious brain concussion. With the police lead by the sweet sensitive and caring for all humanity Det. Adam Flint, Paul Burke, showing up at the scene to stop the bloodshed Laura refuses to press charges against her husband in fear the negative publicity of him being a wife beater would hurt his meteoric career in show business. We also see what happens on the other and poorer side of town away from the rich & famous which the Lannings are part of with laborer Louis Wystemski, Mike Kellin, and his long suffering wife Pearl, Norma Connally. Drunk after losing his latest job Louis took batting practice with Norma's skull and needed a half dozen of policemen to restrain him from finally killing her.
The "Naked City" episode shows us that wife beating and drunkenness are common in all types of societies. From the rich & famous high society types like the Lannings to the uneducated and low or no skilled types like Louis Wystewski and his wife Pearl. And even more the two need the same type of help or treatment to get their act or lives together. Therer's also the need for both Gordon & Louis to realize that they have a serious problem with booze and only they can with the help of a slew of social workers and psychiatrists in the end cure themselves. In the case of the Lannings it's their eight year old daughter Sally, Patty Keefer, who becomes a victim of their constant fighting in suffering from severe mental and emotional depression that lead her to almost burn down the Upper East Side apartment building that she and her parents live in.
***SPOILERS*** With Louis again getting drunk and fired from his job he goes completely bananas where, after working over his wife Pearl, he ends up in the can-prison-at the local police precinct in order to cool himself off. It's then after seeing what happened with Louis that his both fellow drunk and wife beater Gordon Lanning comes to his senses and not only accepts to get psychiatric emergency treatment for his actions but help Louis get it as well. Louis for his part knew what his problem was but needed help from someone like himself, a drunken wife beater, to straighten him out. Gordon who besides suffering from alcoholism and having an uncontrollable anger management problem was in total denial. It was in fact with both the tough love kind of help of Det. Flint as well as the violent actions of Louis Wystemski that finally got Gordon to see the light. Where he not only ended up getting help for himself but for Louis as well.
Ironside: And Be My Love (1969)
Is it love or is it something completely different
****SPOILERS**** Checking out the latest victim of the elusive Bay Area Cat Bugler of San Francisco Officer Eve Whitfield, Barbara "Babs" Anderson, falls heads over heels for the handsome and aqua blue eyed Larry Van Druten, who's home was recently robbed and vandalized. Right away Eve's boss Robert T. Ironside smells a rat in Larry being down on his luck financially who's once millionaire pop left him peanuts in him losing all his money in a number of failed real estate ventures over the years. Also Larry isn't exactly making big bucks in his job as an half a** society columnist for a third rate paper in the city. What Ironside really suspects is that Larry is the one robbing rich people's homes and using the excuse of his own house being robbed as cover for his crimes.
Well with Eve all goo-goo eyed for the handsome hunk of a man Larry Van Druten all Ironside can do is have him be put under surveillance and hopefully get caught in the act. That in order to both put Larry behind bars as well as end his reign of robberies in the city. Still Eve who by now senses that there's something fishy about Larry can't help being smitten by his charm and good looks. So much so that she's seriously planning to quite the SFPD and join Larry in his literary activities if in fact he has any.
**SPOILERS*** With a major stake out for the mysterious Bay Area Burglar he does fall for the trap that Chief Ironside set for him getting caught with his pants down and his head covered with a woman's nylon stocking hopefully for his sake, in preventing him from suffocating from the odor, that's never been used before . The big surprise is that the burglar***MAJOR SPOILER**** isn't whom everybody suspected he would be. But an even bigger surprise is to follow in what Eve's decision, that we were all breathlessly waiting for, would be in either her staying with the SFPD or leaving it.
Poison Ivy: The Secret Society (2008)
Your getting to close to the Graves
***SPOILERS**** The film "Posion Ivy" is a womens or girls version of the super secretive Yale Skull & Bones Club. It's there where only the best brightest and most of of all corruptible of all the students who can cut the mustard pickle or each other throats can become its members. It's when out of town as well as state student Daniel "Daisy" Brooks, Miriam McDonald, arrives at the exclusive New England Beckshire Collage that she catches the eye of the president of the all womens Ivy Club the sexy and witch-like Azalea-the name fits-Burgess played by Shawna Waldron who seems to have the hots for the very naive as well as pretty country girl. After Daisy's parents were killed in a car crash a year ago she have a major life change and decided to leave home as well as her boyfriend farmer Will, Brendon Penny, and get a degree in international politics in order to broaden her horizons and end up getting elected for high office. It didn't take that long for Daisy to realize that her life was going to change not for what she hoped to be the better but for the worst.
It was Blake , Ryan Kennedy,the son of professor Andrew Graves, Greg Euigan, who clued Daisy into what to expect by at first trying to hit in on her. The way to make it big in this place Beckshire Collage Blake hints is for Daisy is join the all womens Ivy League or Club and then all her troubles in making her grades in class as well as romantic endeavors & financial problems will all be over. Being a straight A student Daisy didn't have to worry about her grades but when her bank account, that she's paying her tuition with, mysteriously dried up she decides to join the club that turned out the biggest mistake she made in her entire life.
***SPOILERS*** It in fact was Azalea who started the downfall of the secretive Ivy Club in her greedy attempt to get professor Graves to give her passing marks in his political science class. The club that boasts to have had as it's members the most powerful and influential women in the world which included Margeret Thatcher Hillery Clinton Madonna as well as Oprah Winfrey soon went to pieces. That's when Azalea started to target both Professor Graves and his son Blake in retaliation for her personal failure in him not getting her a passing mark in his class! The by now completely out of control Azalea went so far as embarrassing Daisy who didn't put out for her, in getting the professor to pass her, by secretly video taping her having sex with Blake Graves and putting the entire hot XXX-rated no holds bar and all clothes off sequence on the internet.
It was when Azalea went a bit too far in murdering Professor Graves, for giving her failing grades, and trying to frame Daisy with the crime that her goose was finally cooked or in this case drowned. Getting Azalea , through a hidden tape audio recorder,to admit her crime or crimes in her having another girl murdered for not following orders resulted into a violent cat fight between the two sexy and scantly clothed girls. That after a sword throwing contest ended with Azalea almost going under in the collage swimming pool. But with now the news becoming public about the secretively Ivy Club and even worse then that in exposing it's #1 man or in this case woman being non other then the late professor Graves' wife the Dean of Beckshire Collage Elisabeth Graves, Catherine Hicks, that turned out to be the final nail on its coffin. In not only exposing it's evil and fascist like agenda of degrading and using men to advance it's members rise in the US and well as foreign political and financial systems but going so far as as blackmail and murder in order to do it.
Ironside: A World of Jackals (1969)
Is it worth it! Is this whole rotten thing worth it!
****SPOILERS**** Ghoulish Ironside episode with Chief Robert T. Ironside,, Raymond Burr, trying to get to the bottom of actress Gloria James, Lynn Borden, strange disappearance after her latest movie bombed out in what was her sixth attempted comeback on the big screen. Gloria suffering from severe depression flipped out and ran out of the theater after watching a sneak preview of her disastrous long awaited comeback film and was never seen or heard from since. It's Gloria's good friend and personal secretary Janet Holmes, Ena Hartman, who got in touch with Ironside's live in valet Mark Sanger, Tom Mitchell,to inform him what she knew about Gloria that got her kidnapped, before she could see Sanger by Gloria's ex-mobster and now upstanding citizen Frank Rich's, William Smithers, goons.
Fanatically possessive of his wife Gloria Mr. Rich had her locked away in his mansion from the public spreading a false rumor that she's on a long vacation in far off Switzerland. As the Swiss story started to fall apart Rich in desperation had a woman's corpse stolen from the city morgue and made to look like she was his wife Gloria who was killed, by drowning, in a tragic traffic accident. That was Rich's insane plan to get the police off his back and off the Gloria James' missing person case. Meanwhile while all this was going on Gloria was going around town incognito from one movie house to another watching the movie that made her a star "A World of Jackals" with no one in the audience ever recognizing her! This wired shell game soon came to an end when Gloria getting more and more depressed by the moment decided to play out her role in the movie "A World of Jackals" by doing the famous ending number of the movie "A Star Is Born" by walking into the Pacific Ocean with only her nightgown on and drowning herself!
****SPOILERS**** As we soon found out from Gloria's agent Phil Lewis, Lewis Charles, that all these crazy things done in his wife's Gloria's behalf by her crazed and obsessive husband Frank Rich were all illegal anyway in him not really being married to her at all. It was what everyone thought was Gloria's ex-husband former World Middleweight Champion and now ball room bouncer Marty Rogers, Jonathan Goldsmith, who was still legally married to her! And it was Mister Rogers whom Gloris'a wannabe husband Frank Rich treated like dirt throughout the entire Ironside episode! As for Gloria herself by getting away from that nut-case Frank Rich and receiving the desperate help that she so badly needed her what at the time seemed like derailed film career should now get back on track in no time at all.
Ironside: The Prophecy (1969)
He couldn't tell a finger painting from a Fragnard
***SPOILERS*** At a party at the San Francisco Art Museum for the unavailing of a Di Vince painting loaned to it from the French Government Chief Ironside, Raymond Burr, has his fortune read by his good friend soothsayer Francine Miller, Martha Scott. According to Francine Chief Ironside has a big white Albatross hovering over his head and is destined to go, with his wheelchair, into a dark watery abyss from where he'll never return! Nobody but Chief ironside takes Farncine's prediction seriously. It's from his previous experience or forecasts from her, especially in picking stocks and winners at the racetrack, Chief Ironside knows that Francine is both the real deal as well as being really on to something!
It's not much later when the priceless Di Vince is stolen right under the noses from museum security that Francine's prediction start to become a reality. Not it the stolen painting but in how it would affect the life of Chief Ironside in retrieving it. After his fellow cop Det Sgt. Ed Brown,Don Galloway, is kidnapped by those who stole the painting he's held as hostage in an undisclosed location. That's until the museum is to to pay the $200,000.00 in ransom money to get Det Sgt. Brown back alive and well the painting in perfect condition. And where of all places is Chief Ironside instructed to go to get the painting, in exchange for the $200,000.00, back! This bordered up bar on the San Francisco waterfront named of all things "the White Albatross" with a big white bird or Albatross over its front door!
***SPOILERS*** Ironside sensing, in what Francine predicted for him, the danger that he's facing in him disappearing into a dark abyss or the bottom of San Francisco Bay realizes what dangers are ahead for him. But like a riverboat gambler Ironide takes a chance in bucking the odds that are staked against him. After the museum thieves take off with the $200,000.00 and float him, on his wheelchair, out to sea it's his brave and concerned valet Mark Sanger, don Mitchell, who comes to his rescue. Mark brave actions in pea soup like fog ends up saving his boss from ending up being deep sixth and turned into shark bait! As for the thieves and the $200,000.00 in ransom money they got for returning the Di Vince painting they eventually got caught trying to make their escape on the high seas on an Australian freighter called ironically the SS Boomerang!