John Payne

Kris Kringle, seemingly the embodiment of Santa Claus, is asked to portray the jolly old fellow at Macy's following his performance in the Thanksgiving Day parade. His portrayal is so complete that many begin to question if he truly is Santa Claus, while others question his sanity.

An adventurous young man goes off to find himself and loses his socialite fiancée in the process. But when he returns 10 years later, she will stop at nothing to get him back, even though she is already married.

Kleptomaniac Dorothy Lyons is paroled from prison into the custody of her sister June, secretary to "reform" politician Frank Jansen. Ben Grace, associate of crime boss Sol "Solly" Caspar, sees this as a way to smear Jansen's campaign. Seductive Dorothy will do anything to get what she wants, which includes having a good time with Ben-- whom June is now in love with.

A retired auto manufacturer and his wife take a long-planned European vacation only to find that they want very different things from life.

After staging a mutiny and commandeering his own ship, famed pirate Barbarossa takes hostage a spirited Spanish noblewoman named Alida, intending to trade her to her fiancé, Capt. Jose Salcedo, for a handsome ransom. But Barbarossa falls in love with Alida, who meanwhile discovers that the roguish swashbuckler is more honorable than her erstwhile betrothed.

A war veteran suffering from amnesia, returns to Los Angeles from a San Francisco veterans hospital hoping to learn who he is and discovers his criminal past.

Rick Mason is the no-good lowdown rat who tries to capitalize on postwar patriotism and grief. He finagles a war widow into giving up her savings for a nonexistent memorial. When Mason falls in love with the widow he has pangs of conscience, but he reckons without his con-artist boss, who tends to bolster his arguments with muscle and bullets.

An alcoholic film star attempts a comeback. Director Walter Lang's 1940 comedy stars John Barrymore, Mary Beth Hughes, Anne Baxter, John Payne, Lionel Atwill and Edward Brophy.

An ex-convict sets out to uncover who framed him for an armored car robbery.

A man returns to his home -- a post Civil-War village -- and finds the law is in the hands of a few scrupulous people.

A disgraced Indian scout and his partner are hired to escort a wagonload of guns through Indian territory.

A former boxer turned taxi driver earns the scorn of his nagging wife and gets mixed up with jewel thieves.

When Phil Corey's band arrives at the Idaho ski resort its pianist Ted Scott is smitten with a Norwegian refugee he has sponsored, Karen Benson. When soloist Vivian Dawn quits, Karen stages an ice show as a substitute.

An Air Force major feels a volatile mixture of relief and anger when he is excused from performing a dangerous test in a new aircraft.

A government team researching cures for plague find their results put on the Official Secrets list. One of their number is so incensed by this that he lets the maimed and jealous companion of a female colleague draw him into what, technically, could be a treasonable act.

Elderly schoolteacher Nora Trinell, waiting to meet presidential nominee Dewey Roberts, recalls him as her student back in 1916 and his relation to Dan Hopkins, the man she married and lost.

The Mayhew brothers flee from one Texas town to another as older brother Bill repeatedly attempts to keep younger brother Sam out of jail. Bill finally gives up on his younger brother and heads for Colorado. He gets a job and all is well until his brother shows up and takes a job that puts them on opposite sides of the law.

An actress becomes taken with Hitty, a young orphan prone to dreaming. Julie soon finds out that she is ill and has only a short time to live. She decides to adopt the child so that her husband Bill will not be alone when she dies. Unfortunately, Bill is not charmed by Hitty.

Outdoor drama about a newly-hired lumberjack discovering that his former girlfriend is now his new boss's wife.

Jerry tries to out compete his older brother Cass, a lieutenant Naval aviator. Cass is both tough on and protective of his brother, but Jerry can give it right back.

In order to get his way, New York producer Matt Saxon manipulates and controls everyone around him but his latest protégé, novelist Eric Busch, finally stands-up to him.

Dan Ballard, a respected citizen in the western town of Silver Lode, has his wedding interrupted by four men led by Ned McCarty, an old acquaintance who, as a US Marshal, arrests Ballard for the murder of his brother and the theft of $20,000. Ballard seeks to stall McCarty while tracking down evidence that will prove his innocence.

Francis Barclay, a former member of the British Admiralty, who was captured in the early 1700s, and sold into slavery, by Andrew McAllister, and forced into piracy, enlists the aid of Dick Lindsay, to help him invade MacAllister's fortified island. The latter falls in love with MacAllister's daughter,Christine.

Texas Ranger Todd Crayden is assigned a suicide mission South of the Border, to smuggle a government agent into Mexico...

A federal agent arrives in Laramie to try to find out who is behind the efforts to stop the construction of a new railroad track.

A Marine officer goes through Korea with the bottle of Scotch that his wife gave him in the last war.

Don Vincente is determined to make a success of himself and his band. He gets his break by performing at the Garden of the Moon, which is broadcast over the radio. The problem is that John Quinn is the club's ruthless, scheming manager who will do anything to keep Vincente under his thumb. John's assistant, Toni Blake, falls for Vincente, complicating the escalating war.

Broadway partners Vicky Lane and Dan Christy have a tiff over Christy's womanizing. Jealous Vicky takes up with her old flame and former dance partner, Victor Price, and Dan's career takes a nosedive. In hopes of rekindling their romance and getting Vicky back on the boards with him, Dan follows her to a ritzy resort in the Canadian Rockies, where she and Victor are about to open their new act. But things get complicated when Dan wakes after a bender to find that he's hired an outlandish Latin secretary, Rosita Murphy, which makes Vicky think he's just up to his old tricks again.

Marine James Murfin, is unaware of Icelandic customs. When he flirts with Katina her Icelandic family take his actions as a proposal of marriage to Katina. Desperately wanting out, James gets his buddy to help him.

Chronicle of a spoiled rich boy who joins the Marines with an off-handed attitude and finally becomes a battle-wise soldier.

Down-on-his-luck Mike Cormack is hired to fly to a Caribbean island to retrieve a missing ruby. On the island, possibly involved with the ruby's disappearance, is his ex-girlfriend.

A tough, womanizing high-stakes gambler known only as Tennessee has an uneasy relationship with Duchess, madam of a thinly-disguised bordello, and no other friends at all. But he's saved from murder by a lonesome cowpoke ('My friends call me Cowpoke'), in town to meet his fiancée Goldie on the steamboat. When she arrives, there's a mysterious undercurrent between Goldie and Tennessee, whose newfound friendship with Cowpoke is destined to be severely tried...

A champion auto racer who unhappily learns his kid brother wants to enter the same profession rather than finish school.

A ship company employee, Jay Williams, is sent to Florida where one of the company cruise ships is stuck on a reef off of the coast. He obtains waivers from all of the passengers with the exception of Nan Spencer, a department store salesgirl who wants her vacation now, not later. Jay is instructed to take Nan to Havana, set her up in the best hotel, and keep her entertained. She visits a nightclub where the star attraction is Rosita Rivas and meets Rosita's worthless manager, Monte Blanca, who makes a play for her. Trouble also comes in the form of Jay's fiancée, Terry McCracken, when a romance develops between Nan and Jay.

Ex-confederate officer Clay Fletcher jumps at the chance to reunite with his once lady-friend, Susan Jeffers, when his father, Judge Fletcher, sends him on an errand to El Paso, Texas to get the signature of Susan's father, Judge Jeffers, on a legal document. Once there he finds the judge has become a drunk and a laughing stock, doing the bidding of local magnate Bert Donner and his running dog, Sheriff La Farge. Just as Clay starts straightening out the town's problems, events occur which force him to abandon the legal system and instead adopt the murderous tactics of a vigilante.

A young husband becomes a game-show participant in the hopes of winning the cash to pay his pregnant wife's doctor.

A U.S. lawman busts Copenhagen counterfeiters to help his sister, falsely accused of murder.

A sailor gets his boat stolen from him after he's set up for a crime.

A man with a dog helps a young woman being chased by hoodlums in the desert.

Aided by her eccentric friends, a young woman goes looking for her missing brother.

The title character, played by John Payne, is a ship's captain whose embittered behavior after losing his lady love seemingly leads to tragedy. Accused of deliberately scuttling his ship during a typhoon, Captain China hopes to clear himself by signing on as a common seaman on a vessel captain by his former first mate Brendensen. There's no love lost between the two men, and their mutual animosity is intensified when both fall in love with beautiful passenger.

A brash night club singer becomes a cop to impress a woman.

A waiter who sings gets in a fight with rude customers and overpowers them. A boxing promoter sees this and transforms him into "Kid Nightingale," marketing him as a boxer who sings.

Conceited World Champion boxer Tommy Lundy decides to test his popularity in a Broadway show. Tommy always has an eye for the ladies and he starts paying attention to beautiful chorus girl Pat Lambert. Pat's boyfriend Bill Smith isn't impressed with Tommy even though Tommy gets him a boxing part in the show. When Tommy finds out that Pat and Bill were secretly together the night before the show opens, he angrily plans to turn the boxing scene with Bill into a real bout.

Gracie Alden tries to graduate from college to get an inheritance.

In 1805, the United States battles the pirates of Tripoli as the Marines fight to raise the American flag.

When Hollywood film studios reject her because she's too young, an Arkansas woman sets out to build a career as an actress on her own.

Two sisters from Hungary become famous entertainers in the early 1900s. Fictionalized biography with lots of songs.

In turn-of-the-century San Francisco, an ambitious vaudevillian takes his quartet from a honky tonk to the big time, while spurning the love of his troupe's star singer for a selfish heiress.

The plot concerns a female press agent who must select a "Mr. Manhattan" and "Miss Brooklyn" for an ad campaign mounted by a soup company. The Mr. Manhattan chosen is a singing soda jerk, who doesn't want to play along until he is given the honor of choosing his own Miss Brooklyn.

In 1863, having escaped from a rock-quarry prison in Salt Lake, six inmates led by convicted murderer Pete Black take over a small wagon train headed by preacher Jacob Karns. Tensions and hardships grow as the travelers continue to trek toward California across dry, desolate country.

After WWI two men go into radio. Failure leads the wife of one to borrow money from another; she goes on, after separation, to stardom. A coast-to-coast radio program is set up to bring everyone back together.

Released as part of a series of WB shorts under the collective title of "Technicolor Specials" (WB production number 2003) this short most likely holds the WB house record for a 20-minute film containing footage from the most different titles in their inventory. It's theme of a singing guided tour of the lot (and some of the footage) is from 1944's "Musical Movieland", the former title holder, and it contains clips from 1939's "Quiet, Please" and "Royal Rodeo"; "Sunday Roundup" from 1936 and 1940's "The Singing Dude." Pieces from "Out Where the Stars Begin" and "Swingtime in the Movies" may also be used, but it's hard to tell since they all tend to run together and show up in a lot of places during the 1940's Warner shorts. Its title of "Movieland Magic" is most apt considering the sleight-of-hand performed by the WB Shorts and Sales departments in once again selling the same film clips for the 3rd, 4th or more times.

Songwriters Calhoun and Harrigan get Katie and Lily Blane to introduce a new one. Lily goes to England, and Katy joins her after the boys give a new song to Nora Bayes. All are reunited when the boys, now in the army, show up in England.

A crusading politician falls prey to the temptations of power.

Ex-Confederate Bedloe Mason and his four sons ride into a small Western town with robbery in mind. Hearing a suspicious "click," Wes Mason whirls and shoots dead a boy playing with a cap pistol. The Mason clan then flees but Gray Mason, feeling remorse, decides to return to the town. He winds up at the home of John and Nora Willoughby who, unknown to him, are parents of the dead boy. Nora recognizes him as one of the Confederates but keeps quiet, wishing to avoid more violence. However, when John learns of Gray's true identity, he determines to avenge his son's death

The first musical comedy from the Grand National assembly line, Hats Off stars John Payne and Mae Clarke as rival press agents Jimmy Maxwell and Jo Allen. Both have been assigned to stir up publicity for separate expositions at the 1936 Texas Centennial (newsreel footage of which predominates throughout the film's short running time). To throw Jimmy off the track, Jo pretends to be a schoolteacher, but by the time the ruse has been revealed, the two leading characters have fallen in love.

In California's Death Valley a chemistry whiz-kid helps a sheriff track the man who murdered a wealthy mine owner who had been staying at a fancy winter resort.

A woman tormented by the hunting death of her husband forbids her son to have anything to do with horses. But when he falls for the daughter of his father's trainer, he defies his mother by entering the Maryland Hunt.

A young monarch, bored with responsibility and craving excitement, invites a traveling rodeo show to perform at his palace.

Estranged brothers (John Payne, Richard Arlen) find themselves on the same lumberjack crew hired by a feisty widow to clear the timber from her Nevada property.