Lewis Stone

Pure heaven for baseball-movie fans, this charming 1951 fantasy will even make believers out of jaded younger viewers only familiar with the 1994 special effects-laden remake. A pitch-perfect Paul Douglas stars as "Guffy" McGovern, the brawling manager of the last-place, laughing stock Pittsburgh Pirates. The hated, profanity-spewing McGovern is touched by an angel in answer to an orphan girl's prayers for the hapless team. If he cleans up his act, a roster of celestial all-stars will "help" the Pirates.

Boris Karloff is wonderfully creepy as Sax Rohmer's evil genius, Dr. Fu Manchu. It would not be the last time Karloff played a Chinese, as he later starred as Mr. Wong in Monogram's low budget detective series later in the decade. The plot concerns a race between good guy Lewis Stone and Fu Manchu to find the tomb of Ghengis Khan. If Fu Manchu gets there first he will possess the magical relics placed there which, in turn, will allow him to enslave the world. Look for a young Myrna Loy in a delightful turn as Fu's diabolical, and scantily-clad, daughter.