Der Engel mit der Trompete (1945)

Der Engel mit der Trompete: Directed by Raoul Walsh. With Jack Benny, Alexis Smith, Dolores Moran, Allyn Joslyn. A trumpet player in a radio orchestra falls asleep during a commercial and dreams he’s Athanael, an angel deputized to blow the Last Trumpet at exactly midnight on Earth, thus marking the end of the world.

“Even though I cannot for the life of me wrap my mind around the concept of a coffee that puts you to sleep Jack Bennyu0026#39;s The Horn Blows At Midnight is not as bad as the reputation it has. A reputation by the way that Benny himself gave the film. It was a running gag on his radio and television show that Benny forsook movie making because of the bad reviews the film received.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eSeeing it today itu0026#39;s not as bad as all that, in fact it has a few funny moments. Benny is a trumpeter in a radio studio orchestra and he falls asleep during the announceru0026#39;s commercial for Paradise Coffee, the coffee that makes you sleep. In his dream Benny becomes an angel playing trumpet in a heavenly orchestra, larger than anything Leonard Bernstein ever directed. He gets an assignment from one of the bosses Guy Kibbee to blow his heavenly trumpet at midnight to signal the utter destruction of a minor planet the natives call Earth.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eNeedless to say Benny bungles the job and the film is his effort to complete his assignment. Kibbeeu0026#39;s not pleased and he sends Alexis Smith down from heaven to babysit Jack. Later on Kibbee himself shows up. There are a couple of fallen angels played by Allyn Joslyn and John Alexander who like the life theyu0026#39;ve got on earth now. And thereu0026#39;s Reginald Gardiner whou0026#39;s a musician and a society burglar with his assistant Dolores Moran who Benny interrupts mid crime and a host of other familiar movie faces which in itself is reason enough to watch The Horn Blows At Midnight.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eJack plays some tribute to Harold Lloyd with some stunts at the climax involving some great height. Thereu0026#39;s a gag involving a human pendulum that was later used with other familiar faces in Itu0026#39;s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World. Jack also becomes rocket man at one point, clearly copying Bob Hope being shot out of a cannon in The Road To Zanzibar.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eDonu0026#39;t believe the hype about The Horn Blows At Midnight, you might actually like it.”