Here Comes Trouble


1h 2m 1936

Film Details

Also Known As
The Black Gang, The Roughneck
Genre
Comedy
Release Date
Feb 21, 1936
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp.
Distribution Company
Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp.
Country
United States

Technical Specs

Duration
1h 2m
Film Length
5,650ft (6 or 7 reels)

Synopsis

As an ocean liner nears Havana, ethnologist and archeologist Professor Howard and his daughter Evelyn listen attentively to Ivan Petroff talk about the Mahal ruby, which Petroff plans to purchase upon landing. At another table, listening just as intently, are two bumbling jewel thieves, Crowley and Adams. Crowley thinks he has seen the professor before, but cannot remember where. In Havana, after Margie Simpson, the ship's manicurist, refuses a date with the boss of the stoke hole, third engineer Duke Donovan, whom she thinks will never amount to much, he goes with his pal Grimy, a coal stoker, to a dive where they get into a fight and are arrested. After Petroff buys the ruby for $100,000, Crowley and Adams demand it at gunpoint, but Petroff says that he sent it to the ship by messenger. Aboard ship, Petroff shows the professor and Evelyn that he had the ruby hidden in his cigar and gives it to the purser to be put in the safe during the trip to New York. Duke and Grimy get out of jail just in time to see the ship leave port. After Duke hires a launch to reach the ship, the captain, annoyed at having to stop, takes away Duke's stripes and sends him and Grimy to shovel coal. When Petroff and Evelyn tour the hole, a sick stoker strikes at his brutalizing boss with his shovel and also hits a steampipe which bursts. Duke carries Evelyn to safety, and after he and Grimy prevent a boiler explosion, Petroff calls them heroes and pays for an expensive suite for them. As they recuperate, Evelyn's attentions to Duke provokes Margie's ire and jealousy. One night, as the ship approaches New York, Evelyn entices the purser to open the safe so that she can put a bracelet inside. The professor then knocks the purser cold and, after tying up Evelyn for effect, steals the ruby. Evelyn, who has given Duke a cigarette lighter as a present, secretly places the jewel inside the lighter so that he can unwittingly get it past officials at the dock. She then invites him to her house in Westchester, where she plans to get the ruby back. Before Duke leaves, however, Grimy's pet monkey Jennie opens the lighter, and the jewel spills on the floor without Duke or Grimy seeing it. In New York, Petroff, after revealing that he is really an agent of a jeweler's protective association, plans to follow the professor and Evelyn, really "Picadilly Joe" and "Boston Betty," respectively, whom he has baited to be able to catch them with the goods. However, Crowley, who has finally remembered the professor's real identity, knocks Petroff away and, with Adams, pursues the professor and Evelyn to the house in Westchester. Crowley and Adams are subdued by the professor's gang just before Duke arrives. Meanwhile, Grimy has found the ruby and, with Margie, Petroff and the police, heads to Westchester. After a fight in which the gang are captured, Margie comforts a slightly battered Duke, while Jennie kisses Grimy.

Film Details

Also Known As
The Black Gang, The Roughneck
Genre
Comedy
Release Date
Feb 21, 1936
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp.
Distribution Company
Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp.
Country
United States

Technical Specs

Duration
1h 2m
Film Length
5,650ft (6 or 7 reels)

Quotes

Trivia

Notes

This film's working titles were The Roughneck and The Black Gang. "Here Comes Trouble" was the title of an original story written by J. Robert Bren and Norman Houston, which was the basis of the film High Tension, which Twentieth Century-Fox released later in 1936. While material in the copyright descriptions states that the film was seven reels in length, the print viewed was six.