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Penrod and Sam Reviews

1937
1 hr 8 mins
Drama, Kids
NR

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Penrod (Billy Mauch) and his gang find the hoodlums who orphaned a black child (Philip Hurlic). Sam: Harry Watson. Mr. Schofield: Frank Craven. Mrs. Schofield: Spring Byington. Dude: Craig Reynolds. Well-handled modernization of the Tarkington story. William McGann directed.

This third treatment of author Tarkington's popular story deviates from it the most. Tarkington, who never patronized or sentimentalized his youthful rustic ruffians, should have been appalled to see them turned into Hoosier sleuths, rounding up a band of criminals. Black actor Hurlic, as a youth orphaned by gangland bullets, steals the show in this one. Many of the cast members went on to perform in a sequel, PENROD AND HIS TWIN BROTHER (1938), featuring young Mauch's twin brother Bobby. It was equally bowdlerized, having a similar youthful-detective story. The twins and their peers did it once again that same year with the same basic plot in PENROD'S DOUBLE TROUBLE.