Excellent, a Must See

Am I Missing Something?

A Brilliant Conflict

Clever and entertaining enough to recommend even to members of the 1%

An amusing B comedy mystery has Lis Angeles D.A. Neil Hamilton up against a mystery playwright (Evelyn Venable) to solve a real murder mystery after he criticizes her latest play. The future commissioner Gordon of "Batman" T.V. fame is far less serious in his crime fighting efforts, trying to take Venable down a peg as she keeps upping him every chance she gets. The stadium mystery surrounds the sudden murder of a prize fighter, and Venable makes herself very useful on solving the case which had fellow boxers, various lady friends and underworld sorts among the suspects. Several non-suspects take credit for the killing, only briefly throwing a monkey ranch into the plot. Cheaply done but fast moving, this may not be worthy of a series like other comedy detective stories, but it is an awful lot of fun.

There are a couple of neat hooks in this picture, but otherwise the story left me flat. I liked the creative opening where the title and opening credits were conveyed via newspaper headlines as bundles were thrown from the back of a delivery truck. Shortly later, Smiley Burnette turns up, not as a character in the film per se, but as Smiley Burnette - introduced to three rows of detained murder suspects at a boxing match in order to provide entertainment! The whole idea of that occurring just seemed so awkward and off base that it left me scratching my head.The main story concerns the murder of a championship contender in the middle of a boxing ring. Attempting to sort things out are District Attorney, Bill Devons (Neil Hamilton), and perky playwright Pauline 'Polly' Ward (Evelyn Venable). They develop a playfully contentious battle of wits throughout the story, supported in part by placing five dollar bets on who'll come up with the next winning strategy. The thing is, I couldn't picture these two as a couple no matter how hard the picture tried to take me there. Especially when Devons proposed in the middle of the story for the sole purpose of boxing Polly's ears once they got married. That was a just a good grief moment for me.Somehow through all of this, a connection is made to the identity of the killer by way of a Gene Autry movie poster Polly happens to see; it's for the 1936 film "Comin' Round the Mountain". Wouldn't you know it, the murderer can't get that tune out of his head and blows his cover by whistling at ringside. Never mind that a band at the arena is repeatedly playing that same song throughout the evening, which would prompt just about anyone to join in. So the whole resolution to the mystery seemed just a little dubious to me. But just so there's no doubt of the murderer's motivation, sports commentator Nick Nicholls (Jimmy Wallington) spells out the whole scenario for Polly and the viewer, thereby relieving anyone of actually doing any investigative work to solve the crimes. Then, just as Nicholls is about to put Polly away, the DA and a trio of cops are right there to make the save. When I say they were right there, it's not like they burst on the scene in the nick of time - they were just standing there in the doorway ready to make the arrest! Well I don't know, other reviewers on this board got a lot more from this flick than I did by the sound of it. For my part, I'm just going to move on to the next picture. That will probably be "Comin' Round the Mountain". Smiley Burnette's in it.

A boxing match is the setting for a whodunit murder mystery. But the real focus here is the camaraderie between the local D.A. (Neil Hamilton) and a famed mystery writer (Evelyn Venable). The two engage each other in a friendly duel to see which one can solve the case. The focus on them and their good-humored banter drains away any tension or suspense the story might otherwise have had. But that's hardly the only problem.Character development of the various suspects is almost non-existent. And only when the puzzle solution is revealed do we learn important information related to the killer's motive. For a murder mystery, that's a no-no. It puts the viewer at an unfair disadvantage. Further, the key clue that leads to the identity of the killer is not at all credible.In addition, characters talk unnaturally fast. Frequently, there are no pauses between lines of dialogue. The film's runtime of just sixty-two minutes conveys the impression that the project had a serious budget problem.The film's sound is terrible. Lighting is not much better. Production design is cheap. Acting is marginally acceptable. About the only element worth a positive note is the presence of actress Barbara Pepper, as a Hollywood starlet.Otherwise, this is a forgettable, way below average film that uses a whodunit storyline as an excuse to provide a cinematic vehicle for the two main actors.

Neil Hamilton plays a District Attorney investigating the murder of a boxer moments before a championship fight. The fighter collapsed with no clear signs of foul play after a tribute to a recently deceased champion. Forced to match wits and trade wisecracks with a mystery writer, played by Evelyn Venable, the DA must try to contend with an arena full of suspects including Smiley Burnette.This is a great little thriller that gets along mostly on the winning performance of the two leads and the smart quips they trade. They are a later day Nick and Nora who are forever trying to one up each other so as to win which ever five dollar bet that is currently passing between them. While the murder itself doesn't make a great deal of sense when its finally revealed, you really won't care since you'll be having too much fun watching the DA and mystery writer try to out do the other.I have to say that the look and feel of this movie is spectacular. Looking at it you'd be hard pressed to believe that this was a B-movie with its large cast, numerous and varying sets. Actually to be honest this is what B-movies really used to be, well produced features for the second part of a double bill. If it wasn't for the B-list cast this could easily pass for a main feature.This is little gem thats worth keeping an eye out for.