Though I greatly dislike dogs (I'm a cat person), I have always admired their loyalty--definitely an underrated trait in the fickle, Johnny-come-lately environment of 2016 society. This film (which was titled 'Robot Pilot' in my Mill Creek 50-pack called 'Nightmare Worlds') started rather slowly, and I didn't think I was going to end up liking it. Though director Beaudine had made a ton of films (he has over 370 directing credits on IMDb), I had only previously seen his 'The Old Fashioned Way', from 1934 and starring W.C. Fields, which I had absolutely loved. So I was patient with it, even though Thornton Edwards' character 'Pedro' was crassly demeaning to Mexicans, and many early sequences that featured him were glaringly awful. I had also loved Evelyn Brent, who had IMHO been an outstandingly sexy and provocative presence in two of Josef von Sternberg's silent masterpieces ('Underworld' and 'The Last Command'), and it intrigued me to see her this much after those glory days.I am glad that I stuck with the film. The last two-thirds more than made up for the picture's slow start, and ended up combining a then-topical plot line of enemy foreign agents stealing an experimental plane with a fun, enjoyable and entertainingly comical subplot 'morality tale' of the airplane manufacturer's spoiled daughter being made a prisoner for stealing gasoline and getting her comeuppance. Beaudine's taut direction cleverly brought together the disparate threads into a satisfying whole--and the hilarious ending made my belly ache from laughter. If you can handle B-pictures from the 30's and 40's and the aforementioned slow start, it's well worth your time and you won't be disappointed.

Emergency Landing, a film I saw under the title Robot Pilot, is essentially a romantic comedy disguised by a story of war production of planes, an invention of a new navigational remote control system, and foreign spies and intrigue. Forrest Tucker , a very young Forrest Tucker, plays Jerry Barton, a pilot trying to convince a big airplane producer to see his friend's navigational remote control system. The test fails and Barton goes home with Doc - only to soon both become "wardens" to the pretty daughter of the fly tycoon and his sister Aunt Maude - for their complicity in stealing gasoline. You get then a bunch of scenes of the two- Tucker and the spoiled brat Carol Hughes fighting against each other only to fall in love and the same for Maude and the inventive Doc. As far as romantic comedies made on the real cheap, you could do far worse. Director William "One Shot" Beaudine has some skill with the camera and all of the actors are engaging - something you seldom see in these kind of movies. Tucker is amiable if nothing else, Hughes does a believable job, Emmett Vogan plays his part as Doc with great gusto, and Evelyn Brent does the best job as Aunt Maude with great style and a wonderful sense of humour. Even the worst actor, Thornton Edwards playing Pedro - a Mexican stereotype that would have every civil liberties group out against you today, has moments that are funny. The real problem with this film is that is is advertising to be what it is obviously not - a spy thriller or war picture or science fiction film even. It really is nothing close to any of those things. It is a simple little comedy that is cheaply made and has some good scenes working with the materials at hand. I was entertained at the very least although I was expecting something else. A minor bonus: Midget extraordinare Billy Curtis makes a brief cameo as a hard-dealing, justice-giving judge of the West. Funny and cute!

There is little to recommend this. It's a silly tale of some people trying to develop a remote control plane to be used in war. Most of it is a meaningless romance where spoiled people are holed up in the desert. One is trying to teach the others a lesson. Some gasoline is stolen, some bad guys come to mess things up, but mostly not a thing happens. There is a lot of screaming and pratfalls. The main character is pretty tiresome. The joke goes on and on and on. The plane, which should be the star of the show, is practically non-existent. It would be interesting to see what technology there was at the time. I'm sure the truth of that question would be much more interesting than anything that happens in this film.

Because of a back-log of war orders, the Lambert Airplane factory is unable to try-out the robot-controlled plane developed by test pilot Jerry Barton (Forrest Tucker) and weather bureau observer, "Doc" Williams (Emmett Vogan). The pair lie in wait for factory owner George B. Lambert (William Halligan)while he is playing golf with his spoiled débutant daughter, Betty (Carol Hughes), and send up their radio-controlled model where Lambert cannot fail to notice it. But Jerry sets the model down in a pool of water and douses Betty, in a P.R.C. version of a "cute meeting." Hey, M-G-M has some cute meetings worse than this one, none which provided a lobby card showing skin-up-past the skivvies. In the scene, Carol Hughes is playing golf wearing a short white skirt---real, real short---and Forrest Tucker has picked her up...and the skirt has risen and there is a shot showing most of the bottom half of Miss Hughes' fancy panties and very shapely rear end. The still photographer caught it, and it was used as in inset on the one-sheet poster, the press book cover and on the Title Card of the 12x14 lobby card set, and also as a full scene on the 8th card of the set. The Breen Office also caught it, and P.R.C. had to hire an artist to come in and draw a white skirt extending well past Miss Hughes knees, and that is what is currently shown on the one-sheet, the press book cover and the 12x14 title card. But the Breen censor must have missed seeing lobby card number eight in the set, and Miss Hughes is still shown on it in all of her well-dimpled glory. And a mighty nice card it is. No, of course it's not for sale.Anyway, old dad Lambert authorizes Jerry and Doc to test their remote-controlled robot pilot on one of his planes for the Army. Jerry flies the plane up, bails out and Doc is to land the plane using his remote control box. But foreign agents, wishing to hamper the development of the robot pilot, have tampered with the controls, and Doc is unable to pull the plane out of a spin, and it crashes. Lambert fires Jerry and he and Doc return to the remote weather outpost to do more work on their invention.Cute Meeting number Two occurs when Betty, on her way to Hollywood to be a movie star, is driving across the desert with her Aunt Maude (Evelyn Brent) and runs out of gas,and Betty borrows some gas belonging to the U.S. government, and is caught by Jerry. He decides to place her under arrest, pending the arrival, in a week's time, of the U.S. Marshal. But, alas, nothing happens in this scene to incur the wrath of the Breen office, unless they made Martin Mooney write in Aunt Maude to ensure Betty and Jerry would have a full-time chaperon for the week, although Evelyn Brent is not the run-of-the-mill chaperon type. Patsy Kelly or Mary Treen must have been unavailable...thank goodness.Anyway, Jerry makes Betty and Aunt Maude do housework and chores, and seeing any character played by Evelyn Brent doing housework is, if not cute, unique. And the spies steal a plane, crash in the desert, show up and make some trouble, and try to get away in a car in which Betty and Aunt Maude are hiding in the trunk and some more stuff.