Penrod and Sam

School bully Rodney Bitts keeps picking on little Verman. Penrod Schofield (Billy Mauch) comes to the rescue to fight Rodney. Rodney goes crying to his powerful father who owns the local bank and makes up all kinds of lies about Penrod's criminal gang. Penrod's father works for Rodney's father. In reality, Penrod leads the local boys in a crime solving G-Man group to catch real criminals in their neighborhood. When the bank gets robbed, Verman's mother gets killed in the shootout. The bank robbers and the boys get tangled up.

It's pre-Code and it's a book. Director William Beaudine made the previous silent film adaptation. It's all very Our Gang like for awhile and then somebody's mother dies. That's dark. It's Disney dark. It's a little jarring. While keeping it light would have been better, this is still fine for the kids, I think.