Footsteps in the Dark (1941)

It is a performances centric movie

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Errol Flynn shows here that he could excell at comedy as well as swashbuckling.Flynn plays an investment banker moonloghting by writing Mystery stories under a pen name, and in the process making such fun of his Wifes' and his mother in law's society friends that they want to find the author and Sue Him! When the truth comes out his wife is amused but his mother in law says"How can you be such a TRAITOR to your class !".Naturally Flynn gets involved in solving a REAL murder.This is a very underrated movie as far as I am concerned,with an excellent cast. Flynn and Brenda Marshall make a well matched team, and it is a pity that it didn't lead to a series of films.I understand that one called Ghosts Don't Leave Footsteps was planned but shelved due to poor box office of this film.Perhaps people just weren't used to Flynn inn this kind of film A great pity because I believe that a series of these films would have developed into serious competition for the Thin Man Series. But at least we have this overlooked Gem to enjoy.

"Footsteps in the Dark" should be a very good comedy crime film. Yet, it is just fair at best. One can't quite put a finger on what keeps it from being a very funny and intriguing film. The plot idea is a good one – and it has been done before, with an alias fiction writer and a sleuth. Indeed, audiences like that sort of thing – witness the 13-season long TV series, "Murder, She Wrote," that starred Angela Lansbury from 1984 through 1996. But things just don't click well in this movie. I think the culprit is not one thing but many smaller things that combine to give it a sort of "ho-hum" effect. Errol Flynn's Francis Warren has the usual energy of a Flynn character. Allen Jenkins is OK as his man of all trades, Wilfred. Brenda Marshall is fine in her small part as Rita Warren, Flynn's wife. And Lee Patrick is quite good as Blondie White. But the rest of the cast aren't very convincing. Alan Hale has a large role as inspector Mason, and he's just too affable and easy going a character. He comes across as sweet as syrup at times, so that role should have had some bite in it. William Frawley is overboard as the doofus Hopkins. Ralph Bellamy seems a little too smooth and eager. The rest just aren't very good. The screenplay seems to misfire at times. The dialog between characters, especially Francis and Mason, switches between the straight and the absurd at times. It's very awkward. The writers pepper the script with occasional lines that are supposed to be funny but that seem, more than anything, to be out of place. This is the type of film that would fit William Powell or Fred MacMurray perfectly. They would have been able to make more out of this screenplay than does Error Flynn here. But even they would have had troubles with the script. This is just a fair film at best. There aren't many witty or clever lines of dialog. Here are my favorite two. For a few more, look under the Quotes section of this IMDb Web page on the movie. Francis, "What're you doing here?" Hopkins, "We ask the questions." Francis, "OK, how long have you been here?" Inspector Mason, "You wouldn't by any chance be insulting me would you?" Francis, "Oh, no, I was just being philosophic." Hopkins, "Oh, so that's your racket, huh?"

Errol Flynn's films that are have a contemporary setting didn't seem to be as successful at the box office as his other ones. "Footsteps in the Dark" is an example of this and it isn't as good as it could have been. The film is a pale imitation of the "Thin Man" films made by "M.G.M," which are were made with more style and wit. Flynn's frequent co-star Alan Hale is a welcome addition but his scenes with Errol aren't their usual because they are antagonists. The plot is very predictable with murders and disappearances occurring every which way you look. Flynn is leading a double life as an author of crime novels and he can't bear to have his wife or mother-in-law find out. William Frawley is quite good as the slow-witted police officer. Occasionally, there is some humour that works but this is a failure most of the time.

It seems lots of people didn't like this film very much but I absolutely loved it. Flynn plays blue blood investment adviser Francis Monroe Warren II with blue blood clients, a blue blood wife, and a blue blood social life. All of this blue blood is making Francis feel tired and run down, so he leads a double life to spice things up. At night and at odd hours during the work day he concocts murder mysteries and covers his absences at home by telling his wife that he was at some board meeting. His most recent publication - under a pen name of course - has his wealthy friends aghast because he used them as characters in his book and only slightly changed their names. The town's whole social register is looking for the real name of this author so they can sue him for damages. Francis' antics begin to catch up with him when he is blackmailed by someone who knows about his double life.Pretty soon Francis is involved in a real murder mystery involving stolen diamonds, a burlesque queen, threatening letters from an anonymous person, and clues that seem to point back to his own wife as a suspect. On top of everything, his wife and mother-in-law become suspicious of his behavior and have him followed, with the detective drawing all the wrong conclusions.This is a very different kind of role for Flynn, but he brought to it all of the things that made his swashbuckling films such fun. As Robin Hood he was continually laughing in the face of danger, here he just grins at it, but he still seems to get the upper hand in every situation - always suave and in control. If you want to watch something that is just plain fun I highly recommend this one.