When a patient makes a phone call after he's been dead for six hours, with a bullet hole, detective Wade Boteller comes calling. He finds pompous chief of staff Sig Ruman, efficient Jane Darwell, pretty Sally Blane, frenetic Joan Davis, a couple of doctors and William Demarest suffering from appendicitis.
Although director James Tingling directs this Fox B movies for speed, it turns out pretty good with a nice assortment of clues. That's because it's from a Mignon Eberhart story. Surprisingly for a B, it was adapted by Bess Meredyth. She had entered the movies as a writer for D.W. Griffith, and basically produced a good chunk of BEN-HUR. When Zanuck started 20th Century, she wrote for him, and came over when that company merged with Fox. While Zanuck worked on getting the company's script department in shape -- long a weakness for Fox -- she did uncredited work on scripts and had her name on several B productions, including this one. She would return to the A-list in 1939, with a Shirley Temple movie, then THE MARK OF ZORRO and the funny THAT NIGHT IN RIO, then ease off, with one more credited movie.
The character actors don't really work well in the context of the move; each is busy doing his or her shtick. But what fun that is!
Although director James Tingling directs this Fox B movies for speed, it turns out pretty good with a nice assortment of clues. That's because it's from a Mignon Eberhart story. Surprisingly for a B, it was adapted by Bess Meredyth. She had entered the movies as a writer for D.W. Griffith, and basically produced a good chunk of BEN-HUR. When Zanuck started 20th Century, she wrote for him, and came over when that company merged with Fox. While Zanuck worked on getting the company's script department in shape -- long a weakness for Fox -- she did uncredited work on scripts and had her name on several B productions, including this one. She would return to the A-list in 1939, with a Shirley Temple movie, then THE MARK OF ZORRO and the funny THAT NIGHT IN RIO, then ease off, with one more credited movie.
The character actors don't really work well in the context of the move; each is busy doing his or her shtick. But what fun that is!