The Mind Reader (1933)

To me, this movie is perfection.

Simply Perfect

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

The premise of Warren William as a "supernatural" con man, with the gorgeous Constance Cummings by his side, looks tantalizing on paper, but the script of "The Mind Reader" is not particularly well-thought-out. The continuity is abrupt, and the story raises all sorts of little questions, like why is Cummings asking for forgiveness (!) when she discovers William's trickery or how can the skeptic sheriff turn into a believer so easily or why do they arrest Cummings for murder with absolutely no evidence against her, and so on. Director Roy Del Ruth does his best with this script; the tilted camera angles are interesting to see. ** out of 4.

A con-man works his way up the fortune-telling ladder only to find his life is not made better.The con-man role is tailor made for the commanding Warren William. His Chandra The Fortune Teller is such a masterful stage presence who in the audience would dare challenge his psychic gift. Never mind that his shifty confederate Frank (Jenkins) is feeding him answers telephonically. It makes for a heckuva show, and the rubes keep coming, sometimes ruefully so. Oddly, I found myself being anxious when there's problems with the messaging relay from Frank. That is, do I really want Chandra to succeed in his criminal con job. Yet I couldn't help being torn. Anyway, notice in passing, how the map shows Chandra first touring smaller border state towns, nothing big yet. That will come later, once he hones his act. Cummings (Sylvia) makes an attractive love interest, even if the script presents her flip-flops in a pretty implausible light. Also, the familiar Allen Jenkins plays his part pretty straight, unlike many of his comedic side-kick parts. Now, you might think, courtesy the screenplay, that every upper-class husband in New York has a silken mistress, leaving a broken-hearted wife behind. Then too, I suspect that dark suspicion played well with Depression era audiences. But once Chandra goes big-time, there are no more rubes, only the sleek and well upholstered. Frankly, I didn't like the big turnaround that comes last. After all, this is pre-Code, so abject mea-culpa endings aren't required as they soon would be. Up to that point, the story really deserves a climax more ironic than the implausibly conventional. (Check out the similar Nightmare Alley {1947} for a more apt ending.)Anyway, William has to be one of the neglected delights of that long ago period. Passing away in 1948 means he had no post-war credits to speak of. Thus he's largely unknown even to many old movie fans. It's that pre-Code period, before his serial programmers (Perry Mason, the Lone Wolf), where he really shines, usually as an ethically challenged big-wig (Employee's Entrance {1933}; Skyscraper Souls {1932}). And there's no one better. Plus, he's good enough here to make even the flawed, albeit interesting, script well worth watching.

The idea of having Warren William play this part was an inspired choice--he was perfect for this part. However, no matter how interesting the idea was and how good William was, the plot just kind of fizzled--and late in the film the picture really lost its way. It's a shame, as the movie could have been very good.The film starts with William selling a variety of bogus products throughout the country. Eventually, he hits on the idea of becoming a fortune teller. He pretends to read the future but mostly just makes things up or has his assistant (Allan Jenkins) investigate and dig up information on people so he can appear psychic. After a while, he learns that a lot of people have been hurt or even killed because of his 'predictions'--culminating in a terrifically harrowing altercation with Mayo Methot (one-time wife of Humphrey Bogart). In the process, he ends up losing his wife--a woman who had thought William COULD predict the future but has since learned he was a phony.Now, at this point of the film, I really liked the movie. The scene with Methot was intense and wild. But, somehow, the great script with the sociopathic leading man lost its way...very badly. First, while William continues to hurt people again and again, even after he loses his wife, he eventually and completely out of the blue announces during one of his shows that he's a fake!! Why would such a selfish and despicable man do this?! People had already died because of him and he knew it--yet kept on lying and swindling people. So why later announce you are a fraud?! In addition, although William's wife (Constance Cummings) left him because he was such an evil man, why did she later in the film love him so unconditionally--even after she knew he had shot someone (and she had no idea whether it was premeditated or an accident)? And, why at the end of the film did William turn himself in to save Cummings when the police thought she was the killer?! This made zero sense--and the film just spiraled into an incomprehensible mess in every possible way.The movie is like a movie that began without a finished script. The first half was good but they just fudged the ending--and it sure looked bad! Pathetic and irritating, as the film had been so good in the first half--darn good.For a much better film about fake psychics, try watching "The Clairvoyant" (1934) with Claude Rains. While the plot is similar, what they do with the story in the second half is satisfying and worth seeing--"The Mind Reader" isn't!

William Warren plays a fraud who must choose between his girl and his fraudulent - but lucrative - profession. Interesting use of crooked camera angles to depict crooked dealings. Warren displays a wider acting range than in other movies.