Movie Listings by Genre

Director: Roland West    More Info
Starring: Chester Morris, Chance Ward, Una Merkel, Richard Tucker, Wilson Benge, Maude Eburne, Gustav von Seyffertitz, Spencer Charters, William Bakewell, DeWitt Jennings

 Director Roland West's remake of his 1926 "The Bat" again uses interesting camera shots and a dark mood to set the tone. This time around, the masked super-criminal sets his sights on a country mansion filled with assorted characters–and the spoils from a robbery.

Director: Frank Tuttle    More Info
Starring: William Powell, Natalie Moorhead, Eugene Pallette, Paul Lukas, William "Stage" Boyd, E.H. Calvert, Richard Tucker, May Beatty, Mischa Auer, Otto Yamaoka

 S.S. Van Dine's suave detective, Philo Vance (William Powell), is back and becomes involved with the murder of Anthony Benson–a shifty, wealthy, womanizing stock broker–who is hosting Philo at his estate. Now our sleuth must sift through the several suspects to come up with the culprit. Van Dine's novel was based on an actual murder in 1920 that is still unsolved.

Director: Nick Grinde    More Info
Starring: Basil Rathbone, Leila Hyams, Roland Young, Alec B. Francis, Carroll Nye, George F. Marion, Bodil Rosing, Delmer Daves, Charles Quatermaine, Zelda Sears

 The body of "Cock Robin" is discovered with an arrow through his heart. He is one of a series of murder victims in which the killer leaves nursery rhymes in his wake. Detective Philo Vance (Basil Rathbone) goes to work and finds the psychopathic killer.

Director: Alfred Hitchcock    More Info
Starring: Herbert Marshall, Phyllis Konstam, Norah Baring, Edward Chapman, Miles Mander, Donald Calthrop, Una O'Connor, Esme Percy, Esme V. Chaplin, Amy Brandon Thomas

 A jury member (Herbert Marshall) believes that the accused murderess (Norah Baring) is innocent, but he must identify the real murderer in order to prove her innocence.

Director: Hamilton MacFadden    More Info
Starring: Warner Oland, Sally Eilers, Bela Lugosi, Dorothy Revier, Robert Young, Victor Varconi, J.M. Kerrigan, Mary Gordon, Richard Tucker, C. Henry Gordon

 A young actress is murdered, and Charlie Chan (Warner Oland) steps in to investigate a string of murders in Hawaii.

Director: Hamilton MacFadden    More Info
Starring: Warner Oland, Marguerite Churchill, John Garrick, Warren Hymer, William(2) Holden, George Brent, Jason Robards Sr., Marjorie White, C. Henry Gordon, Peter Gawthorne

 This film, lost in the archives, features Warner Oland in his first role as Charlie Chan. Charlie is vacationing in London when a wealthy American is murdered in a London hotel. Charlie follows clues that lead him from London to Nice, San Remo, Hong Kong, and Honolulu. This film was remade in 1940 as "Charlie Chan 's Murder Cruise" with Sidney Toler in the title role.

Director: Roy Del Ruth    More Info
Starring: Ricardo Cortez, Bebe Daniels, Dudley Digges, Una Merkel, Robert Elliott, J. Farrell MacDonald, Oscar Apfel, Thelma Todd, Walter Long, Dwight Frye

 Although not as popular as the Humphrey Bogart version 10 years later, this first (of three) filming of Dashiell Hammett's story, is good. Private Eye Sam Spade (Ricardo Cortez) takes a case for Ruth (Bebe Daniels), whose sister is missing. Ultimately, it becomes a case of looking for a valuable statuette (with others also in pursuit) and pursuing the murderer of his partner. The 1936 version is titled "Satan Met a Lady."

Director: Frank R. Strayer    More Info
Starring: Aileen Pringle, Alice White, Hale Hamilton, Robert Elliott, Clara Blandick, Brandon Hurst, Leslie Fenton, William Humphrey, Tyrell Davis, Aileen Carlyle

 During a parlor game, Jim (Kenneth Thomson) pretends to shoot his secretary, but his gun was loaded with real bullets. The police call in Phillip Montrose (Hale Hamilton) to help in the investigation. When Jim is soon killed, the police believe that it was a murder/suicide. But we (and Phillip) know there is a ruthless killer on the loose. Oh, by the way, did you know that Phillip was Jim's wife's (Aileen Pringle) lover?

Director: Edward Sloman    More Info
Starring: William "Stage" Boyd, Lilyan Tashman, Irving Pichel, Regis Toomey, Blanche Friderici, Walter McGrail, Sally O'Neil, Lester Vail, Frank Sheridan, Lenita Lane

 Police Lieutenant Valcour (William "Stage" Boyd) is put in the position of tying together a bizarre woman who has a communications device in her grave with a series of murders performed like clockwork.

Director: William A. Wellman    More Info
Starring: Barbara Stanwyck, Joan Blondell, Ben Lyon, Charles Winninger, Clark Gable, Edward J. Nugent, Blanche Friderici, Walter McGrail, Ralf Harolde, Vera Lewis

 Student nurse Lora Hart (Barbara Stanwyck) learns of a plot to starve her young patients Nanny (Marcia Mae Jones) and Desney (Betty Jane Graham) who are heirs to a large inheritance. The family chauffeur Nick (Clark Gable) plans to marry the children's mother (Charlotte Merriam), and he wants to take control of the inheritance. Now it is up to Lora's nurse friend B. Maloney (Joan Blondell) and bootlegging boyfriend Mortie (Ben Lyon) to come to Laura's aid and save the children.

Director: Alan James    More Info
Starring: Guinn "Big Boy" Williams, Allene Ray, Niles Welch, Tom O'Brien, Sheldon Lewis, Wilfred Lucas, Violet Knights, William Gould, Bobby Dunn, William Jackie

 A killer known as "The Phantom" escapes from jail and sets out to avenge his conviction by killing the District Attorney (Wilfred Lucas). But young reporter Dick Mallory (Guinn "Big Boy" Williams) is on the case and tracks the mad man to an insane asylum he is running. Played for laughs as well as chills.

Director: Thornton Freeland    More Info
Starring: Una Merkel, William Collier Jr., Zasu Pitts, Purnell Pratt, Clyde Cook, Ralf Harolde, June Clyde, Rita La Roy, Paul Hurst, Nat Pendleton

 Wealthy philanderer Herbert Folsom (Hooper Atchley) is found dead from a bullet wound, and there are several suspects who include his wife (Rita La Roy) and the brother of his latest mistress–who committed suicide when Herbert had refused to dump his wife. Ditzy neighbor Lois Martin (Una Merkel) helps in identifying the culprit.

Director: Jack Raymond    More Info
Starring: Raymond Massey, Athole Stewart, Lyn Harding, Angela Baddeley, Nancy Price, Stanley Lathbury, Marie Ault, Joyce Moore, Charles Paton, Franklyn Bellamy

 Raymond Massey stars as Sherlock Holmes in this adaptation of Conan Doyle's story that takes crime solving out of the 19th century and into 20th-century technology as Holmes and Dr. Watson (Athole Stewart) solve the murder of a young woman. Dr. Watson's friend, Helen Stoner (Angela Baddeley), reports that her sister Violet (Joyce Moore) has died, but the cause of her death has not been determined. Her final words were, "The Speckled Band!" Helen is worried that she will become the next victim, and she asks Holmes and Watson to investigate.

Director: Jack Conway    More Info
Starring: John Barrymore, Lionel Barrymore, Karen Morley, John Miljan, Tully Marshall, Henry Armetta, George Davis, John Davidson, James T. Mack

 In their first joint screen appearance, John and Lionel Barrymore play a gentleman rogue, Arsene Lupin (John), and the French detective, Guerchard (Lionel), who is hot on Arsene Lupin's trail.

Director: John Francis Dillon    More Info
Starring: Jack Holt, Constance Cummings, Boris Karloff, Claude King, Edward Van Sloan, Bertha Mann, Willard Robertson

 A United States Secret Service agent infiltrates a drug ring headed by an unscrupulous doctor who uses caskets to store illegal drugs.

Director: John G. Blystone    More Info
Starring: Warner Oland, H.B. Warner, Alexander Kirkland, Marian Nixon, Ralph Morgan, Linda Watkins, James Kirkwood

 This film, lost in the archives, featured Warner Oland as Charlie Chan who received aid from Scotland Yard and New York in solving the murder of a fellow detective.

Director: H. Bruce Humberstone    More Info
Starring: Ben Lyon, Zasu Pitts, James Gleason, Irene Purcell, C. Henry Gordon, Raymond Hatton, Roscoe Karns, Berton Churchill, Spencer Charters, Robert Frazer

 When amateur detectives track down a secret society of hooded students of the occult and confront them in a haunted house, mayhem ensues.

Director: Spencer Gordon Bennet    More Info
Starring: William "Stage" Boyd, Claudia Dell, Huntley Gordon, John Harron, Hooper Atchley, Henry Hall, Lloyd Whitlock, Phillips Smalley, Lloyd Ingraham, Lon Poff

 Back in the USA after traveling in the Orient, Enid (Claudia Dell) and her brother checked into a hotel, and a few hours later her brother disappeared. Witnesses claim he vanished into thin air, and now Enid is told there never was a brother and that she is going insane. Detective William Cornish (William "Stage" Boyd) enters the case and uncovers the truth: Enid's brother died of the bubonic plague, and the hotel–not wanting to alarm the guests–is involved in a coverup. This story grew out of rumors involving a hotel guest's death during the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

Director: Richard Thorpe    More Info
Starring: Jack Mulhall, Josephine Dunn, Marjorie Beebe, Eddie Boland, Mischa Auer, Martha Mattox, Crauford Kent, Alfred Cross, Phillips Smalley, George Reed

 Professor Harrington (Jack Mulhall) invents a new energy source in his mountain hideaway that could become a death ray if it fell into the wrong hands. Trouble starts when his daughter and her husband arrive, and the crazy caretaker kidnaps the professor in order to obtain secrets of the invention. A weak, old-dark-house mystery/comedy.

Director: Graham Cutts    More Info
Starring: Arthur Wontner, Isla Bevan, Ian Hunter, Graham Soutten, Gilbert Davis, Herbert Lomas, Miles Malleson, Kynaston Reeves, Clare Greet, Roy Emerton

 Mary Morrison (Isla Bevan) has been given a huge pearl by a mysterious stranger. Her father has disappeared and the stranger terrifies her, so Mary asks for help from Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson (Arthur Wontner and Ian Hunter). Their trail leads to the carnival underworld and the mysterious peg-legged crook and his pygmy aide.

Director: Armand Schaefer    More Info
Starring: Jack Mulhall, Phyllis Barrington, Crauford Kent, Mischa Auer, Louis Natheaux, Lloyd Ingraham, James P. Burtis, Phillips Smalley, Gertrude Messinger, Helen Foster

 Police Captain Herbert Devlin (Jack Mulhall) investigates a wealthy man's murder during a seance. There are plenty of attendees at the seance who had a motive in this low-budget, forgettable film.

Director: Phil Whitman    More Info
Starring: Regis Toomey, June Clyde, Lucille La Verne, William V. Mong, Jason Robards Sr., Eddie Phillips, Dwight Frye, Isabelle Vecki, Alan Roscoe, Nadine Dore

 A hooded killer is on the loose after murdering Silas Wayne (William V. Mong) in the presence of his would-be heirs. Now it is up to police Detective-Sergeant Mitchell (Regis Toomey) and news reporter "Nosey" Toodles (Jane Clyde) to solve the case.

Director: Frank R. Strayer    More Info
Starring: Lloyd Whitlock, Doris Hill, Glenn Tryon, Vera Reynolds, Sidney Bracey, Gene Morgan, Ethel Wales, Syd Saylor, Monaei Lindley, James B. Leong

 After a forced landing in the desert, passengers and crew of a plane bound for Los Angeles find refuge in an old house. Then the lights go out, one passenger is murdered, and his bag of diamonds is missing. An insurance investigator (Sidney Bracey) has his work cut out for him to identify the killer before more murders and mayhem ensue.

Director: Albert Ray    More Info
Starring: Ginger Rogers, Lyle Talbot, J. Farrell MacDonald, James Eagles, Eddie Phillips, Erville Alderson, Paul Hurst, Crauford Kent, Ethel Wales, Phillips Smalley

 Thirteen years ago the host of a dinner party died at the table after naming the person who would inherit his house. Twelve of the 13 invited guests were on hand, with the heir being the only absentee. Now, after the mansion had been closed up all these years, bodies start showing up at the table in the same chair that each was in at the dinner. Phil (Lyle Talbot), a playboy sleuth, is called in to solve the case and bring the hooded killer to justice.

Director: Michael Curtiz    More Info
Starring: Spencer Tracy, Bette Davis, Lyle Talbot, Sheila Terry, Louis Calhern, Grant Mitchell, Arthur Byron, Warren Hymer, Spencer Charters, Harold Huber

 Life in Sing Sing prison is depicted as Bette Davis plays the role of Fay, the loyal woman who gives her life and love to Tom Connors (Spencer Tracy).