Black Diamonds (1940) User Reviews (3)

Richard Arlen Is A Hoodoo

[boblipton · 5/10 · 17 May 2022]

Where there's a disaster, there's reporter Richard Arlen. A town burns down? There he is, snapping his camera and writing his story. A village is destroyed by floods? As a man struggles to save himself by clinging to wreckage amidst the deluge, Arlen takes his picture as he goes down for the third time. His editor decides to send him to Europe as a war correspondent, thinking, no doubt, that he can't do any more damage than the fighting is doing anyway. So Arlen goes to visit his folks in the little mining town. Of course there's a cave-in, which kills his father.

It moves along at a good clip, with Andy Clyde as the comedy sidekick, as well as Mary Treen, Paul Fix, James C. Morton, and Claire Dubrey in a tiny and very funny bit.

Diamonds are not forever, and they certainly aren't divine.

[mark.waltz · 3/10 · 10 July 2022]

This film starts off great with big city reporter Richard Arlen returning to his hometown and reconnecting with family and friends which includes old girlfriend Kathryn Adams and pal Andy Devine. The story surrounds a disaster in the local mine which injures Arlen's father. Normally Devine gets on my nerves in the way that he is intermingled in Arlen's life, but here, it is done properly. Everything is fine until after a mining disaster, he ends up in a pointless scene with one of the mine guards regarding needing a match. From there, he's back to the clumsy style of comedy, and it looks like he's intertwined in Ireland's life again, being involved with his sister, Mary Treen. Devine progressively it comes louder and more disagreeable, eventually bringing the normally likable Treen to his level.

As the mine plotline becomes more secondary to Devine's antics, the film begins to decrease in its credibility, with Arlen in the hospital visiting with girlfriend Adams while all you hear is Devine screaming in the background. Normally films has me disliking them at first and then beginning to see the point, but this one has a complete opposite effect. I started off liking it and by the time it reached the last couple of reels, I began having a difficult time even bearing to watch it. This really could have had a social impact on revealing the dangers of the mines, but the writers went for schtick instead of substance, and that completely destroyed it for me.

The response to Warner Brothers fast paced flicks

[searchanddestroy-1 · 18 April 2024]

Richard Arlen and Andy Devine have made a series of films together for Universal Studios during the early forties, a mix up of drama, comedy, adventure, war, crime movies I have not watched them for a while, more than thirty years, and I had in mind that they were all more or less the same: high high fast paced, never long, action packed, never boring, but all the same kind of plots and directing. It is pleasant to see BLACK DIAMONDS again, and I understand now why Universal studios also decided to produce serials during this period, though not as efficient as Republic Pictures ones. The serials from Ray Taylor and Lewis D Collins were exactly in the line of this film, and far better than the Columbia serials except maybe the Lambert Hillyer's BATMAN from 1943. Concerning BLACK DIAMONDS, there is really nothing special to say. It is an excellent time waster for those who don't know this period.