Annapolis Salute

A standard RKO programmer about the loves and lives of midshipmen at Annapolis is enlivened by three factors: cast, location shooting at Annapolis and the usual handsome work of Christy Cabanne.

The cast includes Van Helfin in his early, semi-villain phase, Arthur Lake at the end of his juvenile period -- the following year he would begin playing Dagwood in the Blondie series, which would keep him busy in movies and TV for the next twenty years -- and the always entertaining Harry Carey as the father of James Ellison, the nominal lead.

Let me, in yet another review, call your attention to the work of Christy Cabanne, usually cited as the least of D.W. Griffith's followers, who worked with him at Biograph and continued working until his death in 1948. TCM has recently been running more of his work at Warner's and RKO and they are surprisingly good, with off-kilter framing. He knew how to use the camera for psychological effects and even in his cheapest B westerns show their moments of flair. Here, equipped with a decent if not huge budget he takes a movie that should be meaningless and makes something very nice of it. Doubtless some of the lovely camera placement is due to familiarity with Annapolis. He was a graduate of it.