A Shriek in the Night (1933)

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

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.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Rating is a B/B+, about 8 stars. 10 stars given to balance out the loser reviews. Current 5.4 rating is a joke. Here's the deal. We have a convoluted mystery, which was a bit tough to follow. Beyond that we have some decent acting all around. Good humor. The best was when the black maid didn't was sitting in a convertible outside the morgue, and she asked why they were there. The cop said, you're here to identify a dead person. She said no she won't go. The copy says it's either that or I'll put you in jail. She says, I'd rather be in jail with live people than in the morgue with dead people. Then, the boss cop comes in and says we have someone else to identify the dead person and that you can go. The maid hightails it out of the car and runs back up the street and almost gets run over by another car. This scene alone is worth watching this film. There are tons of intelligent dialogue here. The terror element comes from the Janitor as the killer. We see him bring Ginger Rodgers to the basement to the basement and to put her in the furnace. This is all great stuff. The movie is slow in parts. And as mentioned the mystery is a bit convoluted with different murders. But it all works well. It's entertaining. It is a comedy thriller mystery. It works. They could have made this full on thriller mystery without the convoluted story by just concentrating on a psycho janitor. That could have worked too. But this is what we have.

This is a good mystery-thriller from the 1930s... it's got enough comedy in it to bust up all the drama unfolding on the screen to keep the film more interesting. There is quite a bit of dark humor in this tale.This is one of Ginger Rogers cutest roles; she plays Pat Morgan a reporter that is getting the scoop on the murders taking place while her rival reporter, Ted Kord (Lyle Talbot), works on the same case to report. These two rivals find themselves working closer together to help solve the crimes while falling in love.What is big scoop? Who is killing people in the apartment building and why? If you like comedy mystery-thrillers then I would recommend watching this movie to find out the answers - it's an entertaining film.8/10

This film begins with the sound of a man screaming as he is falling from a high-rise building to his death. It turns out that the man is a millionaire living in a penthouse and the police aren't sure if his death was due to an accident, suicide or murder. However, three weeks prior to his death he had hired a new secretary by the name of "Ms. Terry" (Ginger Rogers). At least that is what he thought. It subsequently turns out that she is a reporter by the name of "Pat Morgan" and she is working for the "Morning News". Her reason for masquerading as his secretary was to investigate whether this millionaire had underworld dealings with a mobster by the name of "Josephus Martini" (Maurice Black). Unfortunately, she accidentally gives the scoop to her rival "Ted Kord" (Lyle Talbot) who works for the "Daily Express". She is subsequently fired but it just so happens that there is much more to the case than either Pat or Ted realize at the time. Anyway, rather than divulging any more of the story I will just say that this was a decent little film that was probably rather good for its time (1933). It had an intriguing plot with a good measure of both comedy and mystery thrown in. On the other hand, the lighting was really bad and I thought that the script was a bit arcane and abrupt as well. In any case, this is clearly a grade-B movie which was only made watchable by the presence of Ginger Rogers who puts in a decent performance all things considered. Overall, I rate it as average.

Some rich guy takes a spill off a block of flats to the pavement below. The detective involved in the case thinks it isn't just a normal accident, especially when it turns out that the dead guy's secretary, Ginger Rogers, is really an investigative journalist. It seems the guy had mob connections (the gangster also has an apartment in the same building), but, if the mob whacked him, what's the meaning of the business cards that have a picture of a snake and the words 'You will hear it' written on them?I'll say no more about the plot as it works quite well up to a point, until the film non-chalantly reveals the killer about three quarters of the way through. Even though the mystery element is dispensed with, the film works well as our killer now targets the people getting close to discovering his identity. There's a lot of noir elements here as we see the killer's shadow a lot, and a lot of intrigue as two rival journalists try to outdo each other before joining forces. I almost got a giallo feel from this one (even though the giallo was far off in the future), what with the calling cards and such like. It's only an hour long so shouldn't tax your patience in any way. I'm beginning to really enjoy these old mystery films.