Sometimes it's hard to separate the stinkers from the giants. Most of the big name actors of yesteryear never really acted, they just played the same role over and over again. Clark Gable always played Clark Gable, Katherine Hepburn always played Katherine Hepburn, Errol Flynn always played Errol Flynn, etc, etc., and though it grieves me to say it, Humphrey Bogart always played Humphrey Bogart—typecasting, I guess. But usually that was enough. Bogart broke loose later on. He really acted in "The African Queen" and "The Caine Mutiny." Showed what he could do when he got worked up a bit.

How about those Technicolor South Sea epics where, at the last minute, the tall, handsome, bare-chested Jon Hall saved the sarong-clad Dorothy Lamour from the evil kahuna just as he was about to placate an angry Pele by tossing her into an erupting volcano? They just don't make 'em like they used to!

Don Firth