The Shadow (1933)
IMDb meta-data is 1 hour and 3 minutes, rated 6.1 by 99 cinematizens.
Genre: Old Dark House (Honourary).
Verdict: It seemed longer.
N. B. This is not T-H-E Shadow of Mutual Radio though the time coincides with the eponymous Shadow. Confusing? This is a very British production quite independent of that radio program. Got it? Repeat after me: this is a shadow but not T H E Shadow.
The Set-Up: A masked figure has been blackmailing wealthy personages (see, it is a British film and they are personages, not just people), driving several to suicide. Wow! What did he have on them! I’d like to know. Where did he get it? Wikileaks? Pox News? Is there more there? These are all excellent questions that are never addressed by the stiffening lips. Instead the forces of order gather to protect these child molesting aristos. Nothing ever changes.
Clues and leads are few, but one Scotland Yard stalwart lays a cunning trap for this murderous Shadow. It is so cunning that One forgets to load his gat and the Shadow makes short work of him. Dick One is a dead dick in the first five minutes. Maybe not so cunning after all.
A Second Dick is assigned the case and sets about annoying dialogue with the Head of the Criminal Investigation Branch, Sir Forgotten Name. In the midst of the most terrible crime wave of the century (since if concerns wealthy personages being blackmailed for the heinous crimes they had committed) Name sets out for his country estate for the weekend to play golf. Hmmm. What does that remind me of?
Ah, at last, an Old Dark House, hoped the fraternity brothers.
For reasons unknown to the scriptwriter the Shadow is there, too, and for reasons unknown to the scriptwriter Second Dick knows that the Shadow is there, and rushes — ever so slowly — to warn Sir Name, when….! Second Dick is shot to death on the winding five-mile driveway of the country estate. Maybe a poacher shot him by accident, but is that likely? Well, yes in Midsomer, but the end result is: Two dead dicks!
Well, never mind, there are more dicks where those two came from and another middle aged, overweight, dolt is called to the country estate who confirms that Dick Two is dead. Enter the Third Dick.
In the Old Dark House are gathered the usual suspects: a butler, a scrumptious daughter, her unsuitable suitor, a toff of no apparent value who blunders about looking for the other two stooges, a maiden aunt who still hopes for the best, along with a sneak thief who passes himself off as a gentleman with an Eton tie, his girlfriend, and someone else whom I have overlooked. They do not add up to ten and soon subtraction begins.
There is also a ringer who passes briefly through the halls before being killed. This latter is the butler’s son escaped from a conveniently located nearby looney bin. (See any version of Hound of the Baskervilles for the prototype of this plot device.) Ringer makes the mistake of getting in the way of the Shadow and clonk he goes back to central casting.
The Third Dick with a body guard assistant muddies the waters. Much this and much that follows on the Dali watch. Frail swoons. Toff toffs. Plod plods. Name names. Butler butlers. Got it? Care?
Spoiler ahead!
Then Third Dick reveals all by means of reading the script off camera. In standard operating procedure screenwriting the least likely did it. No, wait, not the maiden aunt, but rather….[pause] the garrulous Toff. He transform from tiresome bore to tiresome villain. Now Richard Dix could have made this transformation worth watching but in this case one Henry Kendall could not and did not. We were all just glad to see The End.
There is one scene with some acting in it when Name comforts the Butler about the death of his psycho son, but that two minutes is not worth the rest. It has nothing to do with the plot.
There is also an oddity on the IMDb entry, where there are 184 photographs linked to this title. That is an extraordinary number for any film, let along one of this era, and from Great Britain. The Shadow Laughs (1933) has two photographs and that is a typical number, and this is the real Shadow, too!