By Frank Miller
Hold That Hypnotist
Brief Synopsis
Hypnotism sends the Bowery Boys to battle pirates in the 17th century.
Cast & Crew
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Austen Jewell
Director
Huntz Hall
Horace DeBussy "Sach" Jones
Stanley Clements
Stanislaus "Duke" Coveleskie
Jane Nigh
Cleo Daniels
Robert Foulk
Dr. Simon Noble
James Flavin
Jake Morgan
Film Details
Also Known As
Out of This World, Roving Eyes
Genre
Comedy
Crime
Release Date
Feb
24,
1957
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Distribution Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Country
United States
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 1m
Film Length
7 reels
Synopsis
Stanislaus "Duke" Coveleskie is concerned when he and Horace DeBussy "Sach" Jones discover that their landlady, Kate Kelly, who has been reading a book about reincarnation, has made an appointment with the book's author, Dr. Simon Noble, to be hypnotized and "regressed" in order to find her former selves. Duke is aware of Noble's background in quack medicine and advises Mrs. Kelly to save her money, but she insists on keeping the appointment. Duke decides that he, Sach, Chuck and Myron, who are known as The Bowery Boys, will expose Noble before Mrs. Kelly hands over her cash, and when he finds out that Noble and his business partner, Jake Morgan, are hosting a press reception, the boys crash the event. Meanwhile, Noble and Morgan want to get rid of Noble's voluptuous, scatterbrained "secretary," Cleo Daniels, because she knows that the subject in Noble's book was paid by the doctor to say what he told her about her previous lives. Duke challenges Noble to regress him in front of the reporters and although the doctor fails to regress Duke, Sach falls into a hypnotic trance after staring at one of Cleo's earrings that Noble is using to hypnotize Duke. Sach tells them that he is Algy Winkle and, in a flashback, he enters a 1682, Charleston, South Carolina inn to collect taxes. Algy confronts notorious pirate Blackbeard and insists that he pay taxes on all his loot. Impressed by Algy's naïve gall, Blackbeard challenges him to a self-devised game of chance and wagers a map showing where his treasure is buried against Algy's tax receipts for the day. Although Algy has never played the game, he wins and a fight breaks out. Back in the present, Sach wakes up before he can tell Noble if he found the treasure. Duke and the boys, impressed by the apparent veracity of Sach's experience, go to a library and research Algy Winkle's life. They discover that Algy was on his way to claim Blackbeard's treasure when he was drowned in a storm at sea. Duke believes that Sach can be hypnotized into remembering the map's details, so they return to Noble and offer him a share of the treasure, if it can be recovered. They soon discover, however, that the hypnosis does not work without Cleo's earring. As Morgan has paid off Cleo, the boys go looking for her and find her working as a swimsuit model in Jersey City. Cleo is willing to hand over her earrings, but insists upon a share of any treasure. When Noble finally regresses Sach, he goes back too far in time and Sach finds himself as Marc Antony, addressing the citizens of Ancient Rome. Algy eventually emerges and states that he memorized the map and gives explicit directions to a cave in Hudson's Cove. Noble and Morgan then pull out revolvers and state that they intend to claim the treasure for themselves. Leaving the still-hypnotized Sach with a gun and instructions to stop the others from following, Noble and Morgan leave. While the crooks attempt to locate the cave in greatly changed terrain, Cleo frees Sach from his trance by kissing him. When the boys arrive near the cave in their old jalopy, Sach finds an old magazine among the car's tools and suddenly realizes that his subconscious has created the entire Blackbeard episode as a result of his having read about the pirate in the magazine. An enraged Duke chases after Sach, who hides in a cave where he discovers a chest filled with jewelry. Noble and Morgan attempt to stop them from leaving, but the boys thwart them and leave with the jewels. Later, as the boys are hosting a celebratory party at Mrs. Kelly's, a police detective arrives to inform them that the "treasure" they found was actually stolen from a jewelry store six years earlier, and hidden by the robbers before they were arrested. Although the boys have to return all the jewelry, Sach still receives an exciting kiss from Cleo.
Director
Austen Jewell
Director
Cast
Huntz Hall
Horace DeBussy "Sach" Jones
Stanley Clements
Stanislaus "Duke" Coveleskie
Jane Nigh
Cleo Daniels
Robert Foulk
Dr. Simon Noble
James Flavin
Jake Morgan
Queenie Smith
Kate Kelly
David Condon
Chuck
Jimmy Murphy
Myron
Murray Alper
Gale
Dick Elliott
Hotel clerk
Edward Stepner
Bruno
Frank Orth
Beedle
Mel Welles
Blackbeard
Mary Treen
Maid
Irving Mitchell
Agnew
Lee Roberts
Reporter
Robert Bice
Reporter
Bob Roark
Reporter
John Close
Sgt. Benton
George Barrows
Pirate
Ed "skipper" Mcnally
Crew
John Banse
Assistant Director
Ralph Butler
Recording
Irene Caine
Wardrobe
Richard M. Chaffee
Set Construction
Bert Henrikson
Wardrobe
John Hickson
Camera Operator
Joseph Kish
Set Decoration
Emile Lavigne
Makeup Artist
Bert Lawrence
Dialogue Director
Maurice Lessay
Assistant Director
August Lohman
Special Effects
Dave Milton
Art Director
Sid Mintz
Wardrobe
Edward Morey Jr.
Assistant Director
Ted Mossman
Props
Harry Neumann
Director of Photography
Dan Pepper
Writer
Charles Schelling
Sound Editing
Ben Schwalb
Producer
Marlin Skiles
Music
James West
Const Supervisor
George White
Film Editor
Allen K. Wood
Production Manager
Film Details
Also Known As
Out of This World, Roving Eyes
Genre
Comedy
Crime
Release Date
Feb
24,
1957
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Distribution Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Country
United States
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 1m
Film Length
7 reels
Articles
Hold That Hypnotist
Reincarnation was all the rage in the late 1950s after a Colorado housewife claimed to have discovered a past life as Irish farm girl Bridie Murphy. The Bowery Boys at Allied Artists came up with their own reincarnation story within a year. This time its Sach (Huntz Hall) who discovers under hypnosis that he had been a tax collector in 17th century England. That leads the Bowery Boys in a slapstick race to beat the crooked hypnotist to a pirate's treasure only Sach's past self can find. This was the 44th of the 48 Bowery Boys movies and only the third made after Leo Gorcey left. With the death of Gorcey's father, Bernard, who played the owner of the malt shop where the boys hung out, the focus shifted to the boarding house where they all lived. Stanley Clements, who had appeared in a few of their earlier films as the East Side Kids, stepped in as Hall's comedy partner. Fortunately Hall still got to show off his talents as a farceur. His past self even gets some nifty scenes with B-movie star Mel Welles as Blackbeard the Pirate.
By Frank Miller
By Frank Miller
Hold That Hypnotist
Reincarnation was all the rage in the late 1950s after a Colorado housewife claimed to have discovered a past life as Irish farm girl Bridie Murphy. The Bowery Boys at Allied Artists came up with their own reincarnation story within a year. This time its Sach (Huntz Hall) who discovers under hypnosis that he had been a tax collector in 17th century England. That leads the Bowery Boys in a slapstick race to beat the crooked hypnotist to a pirate's treasure only Sach's past self can find. This was the 44th of the 48 Bowery Boys movies and only the third made after Leo Gorcey left. With the death of Gorcey's father, Bernard, who played the owner of the malt shop where the boys hung out, the focus shifted to the boarding house where they all lived. Stanley Clements, who had appeared in a few of their earlier films as the East Side Kids, stepped in as Hall's comedy partner. Fortunately Hall still got to show off his talents as a farceur. His past self even gets some nifty scenes with B-movie star Mel Welles as Blackbeard the Pirate.
By Frank Miller
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
This film's working titles were Out of This World and Roving Eyes. The opening title cards read: "Allied Artists Pictures Corporation presents Huntz Hall and the Bowery Boys in Hold That Hypnotist." Although the CBCS credits Louis Morheim with the screenplay, the onscreen credits credit the screenplay to Dan Pepper. For more information about "The Bowery Boys" series, please consult the Series Index and the entry for Live Wires in AFI Catalog of Feature Films, 1941-50.
