Nick Carter, Master Detective

USA 1939
produced by
Lucien Hubbard for MGM
directed by Jacques Tourneur
starring Walter Pidgeon, Rita Johnson, Henry Hull, Stanley Ridges, Donald Meek, Addison Richards, Henry Victor, Milburn Stone, Martin Kosleck, Frank Faylen, Sterling Holloway, Wally Maher, Edgar Dearing, Don Castle, Frank Ball
story by Bertram Millhauser, Harold Buckley, screenplay by Bertram Millhauser, based on a character created by John R.Coryell, Ormond G.Smith, originally published by Street & Smith, music by Edward Ward

Nick Carter, Nick Carter (Walter Pidgeon)

review by
Mike Haberfelner

An airplane carrying top airplane developer Keller (Henry Hull) and a briefcase of his top secret blueprints, is forced to land by enemy agents, and it's only thanks to one Robert Chalmers (Walter Pidgeon), newly appointed vice president of the company Keller is working for, that the blueprints don't fall into the hands of the enemy. Chalmers is of course really secret agent Nick Carter, who was appointed by the president (Addison Richards) of the comapny Keller's working for to find out who is stealing the blueprints and why. Carter first suspects Keller himself, but then he is killed. Then he suspects Lou (Rita Johnson), the stewardess on the plane that almost fell into the hands of the enemy, even though it was her who flew the plane on their escape. However, Lou soon proves to be a great help in Carter's investigations, and she and Carter also find themselves attracted to one another. Finally, Carter figures the plant's doctor (Stanley Ridges) must be the mole, smuggling out the blueprints on microchips hidden in his patients' bandages. The doctor admits to it, but has since taken Lou hostage, and now gets away scot-free - or so he thinks, because Carter follows him in an airplane that's hard to spot from the ground, and eventually, when the doc and his gang want to leave the country by boat, he uses machinegun fire to stop them - and of course he gets the girl in the end ...

Donald Meek plays Carter's (rather annoying) bee-collecting sidekick.

Very routine espionage thriller of the B-variety that is certainly not the worst movie ever, but it also has very little to go for it: The plot is too straight-forward to spark much interest, it's almost free of any interesting twists, the cast isn't bad, but to call their performances anything above routine would be an exaggeration, and the characters they play are hardly interesting.

Basically, only if you love vintage airplanes, you will get a real kick out of this one!

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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