Powerful

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Actress Bonita Granville wasn't a raving beauty, but she was spunky and she could act circles around other dames. "Nancy Drew, Reporter" was the second of the four Nancy Drew B-movies that she appeared in for Warner Brothers. This crime thriller about a wrongly accused murderer is fairly average, but "Case of the Stuttering Bishop" director William Clemens keeps the action moving at a breakneck pace. This is one of the B-pictures that Bryan Foy produced for the studio and it looks polished with several Warner Brothers contract players, one of whom is Joan Leslie. Leslie went on to become a major Warner Brothers starlet in movies like "Sergeant York" and "Yankee Doodle Dandy." The biggest mystery in this fast-paced yarn is the murder weapon, something called sodium ferrinide that contains poison and is used to kill a woman. Mind you, the murder occurs off-screen before the narrative unfolds. One of the most memorable lines is Nancy's description of a reporter: "A reporter has the right to do things an ordinary citizen shouldn't."

No doubt some of today's young people (at least the less lascivious ones) will like these well made Nancy Drew programmers from the late 1930's, but they are likely best received by old geezers such as yours truly. That is geezers who just love cute, beautiful, sassy, exuberant, 16-year old Bonita Granville as Nancy Drew, just like the granddaughter they have or wish they had! Sweet, manipulative, cute little Nancy! I say little because she was short, even though built like a miniature Joan Blondell. She can twine her stern, dignified, swank attorney father (John Litel) around her pinkie with one hand tied behind her back and the fingers crossed -- just as easily as she could yours truly! Okay, it is a grandpa syndrome. I just love these little Nancy Drew movies, but the grouchy old wife, after watching the first picture of the series, finds Nancy silly, irritating, and fluffy, and furthermore refuses to watch any other.Nancy Drew, Detective, the second of the four-picture series, is breezy, clever, fast moving, fast talking, light-hearted fun. Though assuredly a B-picture, it gets the same high-gloss production values from Warners as the others of the series. The sets are first-rate, even if the same ones are used in all four movies. Direction by William Clemens and cinematography by Arthur Edeson are "A" class, and Heinz Roemheld's florid original score propels the action along at a break-neck pace.The young actors who carry most of the load are kept on their toes by Warner's stable of superb character actors, led by the ever reliable Litel and including Thomas E. Jackson, as a tough city editor giving Nancy a bigger break as a reporter than he knows, and Olin Howland as the police sergeant who helps the kids get the goods on the bad guys. The lanky, 6-foot-plus Howland is hilarious in his disguise as a grumpy, elderly woman!But it is the adorable and energetic Bonita who carries the picture, along with Frankie Thomas as Nancy's long-suffering, much-manipulated boyfriend Ted. In this picture the two teen sleuths get some bratty, tag-along help from Ted's horrid little sister (Mary Lee) and her equally obnoxious pal (Dickie Jones). Actually the brats are cute if you view them in the right light. This picture is more of a comedy than a mystery, and one of the best scenes occurs when Nancy, Ted, and the brats get in trouble at a Chinese restaurant and have to sing for their supper. It's a cute number if you're in the right mood. Astonishingly, Mary Lee, who was actually 15 but looked only ten, had a voice like a chain-smoking, thirty-six year old torch singer! Bonita could sing, too, the adorable, little cutie!Nancy Drew, Reporter is primarily for fun. I probably rated it higher than I should have. Certainly not Accademy Award material. But a delight from beginning to end. An enduring example of how the big studio systems of Hollywood's Golden Era could turn out good-looking, entertaining pictures while only half-way trying.

City Editor Thomas E. Jackson is not a happy man being saddled with these six high school kids who won a day to spend as a reporter on his paper. But when one of them is Bonita Granville as Nancy Drew, you know they're in for some big trouble.Nancy's not happy with the puff assignment she received, she takes a real one from a reporter's desk who's late that day to cover a coroner's inquest. Betty Amann who nursed a rich old lady is being charged with her murder. Nancy sees some suspicious behavior from a man in the audience and she follows him to the crime scene which is still taped off. If you think that stops her, you haven't seen any of the films in this series.Two things stand out about this one. The teenage girls of 1939 got to see young Frankie Thomas as Ted Nickerson stripped to the waist as Nancy convinces him to pretend he's a boxer. He goes into the ring with a real boxer who's her real suspect and the results are predictable.The second thing is that this is the only one of the Nancy Drew series with a musical number. Granville, Thomas, and two younger kids in their charge, Mary Lee and Dickie Jones are stuck for a bill in a Chinese restaurant. Owner Willie Fung says sing for your supper or wash dishes. Young Mary Lee is up to the challenge with a nursery rhyme swing medley that's real nice.Again, nothing outstanding, but amusing nonetheless.

"Fun" would be the best way to describe this film in one word. It is not a cinematic masterpiece, nor is it especially well made, but it is a delight to watch nonetheless. Granville gives it her best in the title role and some of the situations that she and her friends get involved in, such as having to do karaoke and a boxing match, make really amusing viewing. There is a certain charm to the film that is hard to deny. It fails to create much suspense with most of the mystery solution given early on, the plot is slim, the supporting performances are mediocre… but overall it really hits the spot if one is in the mood for an entertaining film that does not require much thought.