Best movies like Only Saps Work

You Just Know It's Funny!

A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like Only Saps Work Starring Leon Errol, Richard Arlen, Mary Brian, Stuart Erwin, and more. If you liked Only Saps Work then you may also like: Nothing But the Truth, Rhythm of the Islands, Kick In, Alibi, Baby Take a Bow and many more popular movies featured on this list. You can further filter the list even more or get a random selection from the list of similar movies, to make your selection even easier.

Rubber-legged comedian Leon Errol made his talkie starring bow in Paramount's Only Saps Work. Based on a play by Owen Davis Sr., the film casts Errol as James Wilson, a kleptomaniac who starts with picking pockets and ends up robbing a bank. Wilson's friend Lawrence Payne (Richard Arlen) inadvertently aids our hero during one of his heists, ending up in deep doo-doo with the law. Before Wilson is able to extricate Payne from his dilemma for the sake of heroine Barbara Tanner (Mary Brian), he pauses long enough to pose as a private eye -- and even gives bellboy Oscar (Stu Erwin) tips on how to spot a crook! If only all of Leon Errol's feature films had been as consistently hilarious as Only Saps Work.

selected filters: Sort: Default

You may filter the list of movies on this page for a more refined, personalized selection of movies.

Still not sure what to watch click the recommend buttun below to get a movie recommendation selected from all the movies on this list

Know any good movies to watch like Only Saps Work 1930. With a similar plot or stoyline. Suggest it.

Nothing But the Truth

A young man bets $10,000 that for 24 hour he can tell nothing but the truth.

Rhythm of the Islands

Rhythm of the Islands is set in the South Seas, presumably far away from the shooting war. The nonsensical plotline finds hero Tommy (Allan Jones) posing as a native chief. Joan Holton (Jane Frazee), daughter of a millionaire (Ernest Truex), falls in love with Tommy, unaware that he's a charlatan.

Kick In

Chick Hewes is released from prison and finds work as an accountant. Two years later, Chick's crooked friend, Benny LaMarr, to whom he is indebted for past kindnesses, steals a diamond necklace from the home safe of the district attorney. When the district attorney threatens to accuse the police of inefficiency in crime fighting, Garvey, who is campaigning for the office of police commissioner, promises to catch the thief in twenty-four hours.

Alibi

Chick Williams, a prohibition gangster, rejoins his mob soon after being released from prison. When a policeman is murdered during a robbery, he falls under suspicion. The gangster took Joan, a policeman's daughter, to the theater, sneaked out during the intermission to commit the crime, then used her to support his alibi. The detective squad employs its most sophisticated and barbaric techniques, including planting an undercover agent in the gang, to bring him to justice.

Baby Take a Bow

Eddie Ellison is an ex-con who spent time in Sing-Sing prison. Kay marries him as soon as he serves his time. Five years later, Eddie and his ex-convict buddy Larry, have both gone straight, and Eddie and Kay have a beautiful little girl named Shirley. However, Welch has kept a close eye on them for years. He believes in "once a criminal, always a criminal." Then, when Eddie's employer's wife's pearls go missing, it comes out that Eddie and Larry both spent time in prison, and they're fired. Welch suspects that Eddie and Larry have something to do with the theft of the pearls. Will Welch prove that Eddie and Larry had something to do with the theft, or will the truth prevail?

Bottoms Up

Promoter "Smoothie" King helps a pair of phonies con their way into a movie company. As Wanda heads toward stardom, she turns more and more from King toward the matinée idol. King must decide between his plans and her happiness.

Heroes for Sale

Tom Holmes is someone guided by honesty and moral rectitude, a heroic veteran of the World War I marked by the unbearable suffering caused by his battle wounds, a traumatized but courageous man who will experience, in the years to come, the pain of misfortune but also the happiness of success and hope and love for other human beings.

Flight

Two Marine pilots in love with the same girl are assigned a mission to find a notorious bandit in Nicaragua. This early talkie from director Frank Capra, released in 1929, stars Jack Holt, Ralph Graves and Lila Lee.

Brown of Harvard

Tom Brown shows up at Harvard, confident and a bit arrogant. He becomes a rival of Bob McAndrew, not only in football and rowing crew, but also for the affections of Mary Abbott, a professor's daughter.

Above the Clouds

Robert Armstrong stars as Scoop Adams, an ace newsreel cameraman whose love affair with the bottle all but destroys him professionally. Scoop manages to get his photographer pal Dick (Richard Cromwell) fired as well, but he promises to restore Dick's reputation, some way or another. He gets his chance while covering a dirigible wreck (some three years before the Hindenburg), saving the day for both Dick and himself.

Convention City

Extra-marital fun and games at a convention of the Honeywell Rubber Company in Atlantic City.

Speakeasy

Newspaper staffer Alice Woods persuades the editor to allow her to chase a story, that of prizefight contender Martin, who is about to fight for the championship. However, he does not know that his manager is preparing to double-cross him.

Danger Zone

A San Francisco man is paid to bid on a saxophone and escort a woman to a yacht party.

The Pay-Off

A thug robs a young engaged couple of their last few dollars. When the thug's gang boss hears of the robbery, he gives them back their money and takes them under his wing. The thug, resentful of the couple, plans to organize a mutiny against the gang's boss, but when he is killed in a botched robbery, the police focus their attention on the young couple.

The Cock-Eyed World

Two Marines are sent to South Sea island where they fight over a local island girl.

Gang War

Saxophone player Clyde meets a woman named Flowers, and teaches her to dance. He later discovers that gangster boss "Blackjack" is also in love with her. "Blackjack" is also battling gang boss Mike Luego in a violent turf war.

Paramount on Parade

This 1930 film, a collection of songs and sketches showcasing Paramount Studios' contract stars, credits 11 directors

Her Wedding Night

Norma Martin is an American movie star in France trying to avoid the attention of men. Going to visit a friend in Southern France, she finds herself "married" to a playboy song writer Ralph Forbes she hadn't yet met. Some of his lady friends then show up. Some very good sequences, but also some flat spots. Her "husband's" house is very Hollywood deco and some of the costumes are very good.

His Night Out

When a meek purchasing agent is told by a quack doctor that he only has three months to live, he gets involved with a bank robbery and kidnapped by the gang.

The Show-Off

Aubrey cons Amy into thinking he's a railroad bigwig. When he loses his job he takes one wearing a sandwich board. After he helps Joe sell his patent for a good price and an old railroad deal comes through, he's back on top and ready to marry Amy again.

Woman Trap

In Woman Trap, Hal Skelly is hard-bitten police sergeant Dan Malone, whose mission in life is to rid his community of gangsters. The revelation that Dan's own brother Ray is the secret head of all local criminal activities does not weaken Dan's resolve in the least. The barely relevant title is a reference to "heroine" Kitty Evans, the wife of a minor gang functionary. Screenwriter Joseph L. Mankiewicz, presumably on a dare, makes a brief appearance as a crime reporter.

The Man I Love

Wellman’s first all-talkie, scripted by Herman Mankiewicz, with arrogant boxer Richard Arlen romancing Mary Brian, then falling for temptress Olga Baclanova (Freaks) on the eve of the big fight.

Ex-Bad Boy

A man gets in trouble with his girlfriend when a beautiful movie star and her fiance come to his small town.

Rainbow Over Broadway

Ex-vaudeville performer Trixie makes a come-back, and threatens to thwart the ambitions of her song-writing step-children, Bob and Judy.

The Mad Game

Bootlegger Ed Carson is sent to prison. His old gang turns from liquor (now legal) to kidnapping. When they nab the son and daughter-in-law of the judge who sent Carson to prison, he is paroled to help in the capture.

The Mystery Man

Hard-boiled newspaper reporter Larry Doyle (Robert Armstrong) goes a bit too far in celebrating a work bonus and wakes up on a train bound for St. Louis with only a buck on his person. To remedy the problem, Doyle pawns the revolver he's carrying. When the gun is subsequently used in a murder, Doyle's problems only multiply. In the meantime, he's also fallen in love with a comely stranger (Maxine Doyle) he convinced to impersonate his wife.

Hardboiled Rose

A Southern Belle must work in a gambling house to pay off her father's debts, which drove him to suicide. She then meets a man who sweeps her off her feet and takes her away from it all.

The Santa Fe Trail

A sheepman tries to hire Indians as herders. Though the Indians are blamed for farmers' losses, the hero shows that a white crook is responsible.

In Line of Duty

A Canadian Mountie officer pursuing a fugitive from the law, is left in a moral conundrum when the fugitive saves his life.

Fighting Mad

Ann Fenwick is a witness to a bank robbery in the U.S. and the bandits, led by Trigger and Leon capture her and when she disappears, a warrant is issued for her arrest as a material witness. The bank robbers flee across the border into Canada where they steal a trailer in which they lock Ann and the loot. The hitch breaks and the trailer plunges into a lake. Sergeant Renfrew and Constable Kelly, of the Canadian Mounties, rescue Ann and she tells them she is a hitch-hiking tourist and gives a false name. Renfrew sends Kelly for aid, Ann escapes and Kelly returns with the news that she is wanted. The leader of the gang, Cardigan, sends the gang back for Ann and the loot, which Ann has hidden in a trappers cabin, just before Trigger recaptures her. Renfrew goes to her rescue, but is also captured. But reliable Constable Kelly is somewhere in the woods.

The Last Parade

During the war two friends love the same nurse. After the war one becomes a detective, the other a racketeer.

The Gambling Sex

A wealthy young socialite gets the gambling bug, and soon it goes from being just a fun pastime to an addiction, and she begins to lose more and more of her fortune.

The Sweetheart of Sigma Chi

A campus flirt who has been "pinned" by most of the boys of Sigma Chi fraternity falls for a no-nonsense athlete who doesn't have time for such diversions as women.

More related lists

Sort results by:

X close
Default
Clear filters
...