
“Chan stalks a fiendish murderer!”
Chinese detective Charlie Chan solves a murder linked to the occult.
Release Date: 8/19/1944
Runtime: 67 minutes
Languages: English
Director: Phil Rosen
Budget: $0.1M
0Companies: Monogram Pictures
Countries: United States of America
CinemaSerf
Now then, this one really struggles to get going. This time it's daughter "Frances" (Frances Chan) who helps "Pop" investigate some odd activity at the home of the new employers of "Birmingham Brown" (Mantan Moreland), who has been released by "Charlie" - who just wants to get back to Honolulu. When hypnotism causes one woman to take a step too far; the race is on to thwart the mysterious, evil, perpetrator before anyone else comes a cropper. Moreland tries too hard, his daftness is too contrived and strained, and though he could be annoying from time to time, it misses "Jimmy" too. The psychic/occult theme has provided well for these films, but maybe this one tries to squeeze just a little too much from an already well exhausted fruit (might that be a "Charlie-ism"?) and i found it quite a long watch. It has it's moments of suspense, though, it's not terrible - it's just lacking certain important ingredients.

Sidney Toler
Charlie Chan

Frances Chan
Frances Chan

Mantan Moreland
Birmingham Brown

Joseph Crehan
Police Sgt. Matthews

Ralph Peters
Officer Rafferty

Jacqueline deWit
Justine Bonner

Helen Beverly
Norma Duncan aka Nancy Wood

Harry Depp
Charles Edwards
Frank Jaquet
Paul Hamlin

Geraldine Wall
Harriet Green

Charles Jordan
Tom Starkey

Claudia Dell
Vera Starkey
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