An Abbreviated Trip: Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise (1940)

Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise (1940) was the sixth film starring Sidney Toler in the title role of the great Chinese detective; five more Toler Chans were made before Fox dropped the franchise in 1942, so it came midway in the Toler series.  It was the second Chan film based on Earl Derr Biggers' penultimate Charlie Chan novel, Charlie Chan Carries On (1930), recently reviewed here.  

Susie Watson (Cora Witherspoon) gets a shock

The first film adaptation, which retained the book's title, premiered back in 1931 and starred Toler's predecessor Warner Oland; it was, indeed, the very first Warner Oland Chan film.  Unfortunately, it was one of the four early Chan films lost in the Fox studio fire of 1937, though a Mexican version, using the same sets, survives. 

The original English language 1931 film version of Charlie Chan Carries On evidently closely follows the novel, crucially retaining the full world tour plot, while Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise substantially abbreviates it, starting the story in Honolulu with the tour about to commence the last leg of the tour, by boat to San Francisco.  

After a comic bit where No. 2 son Jimmy (Victor Sen Yung) and No. 7 son (Layne Tom, Jr., who played sons of Charlie in two previous Chan films) are caught by Charlie himself in his office while trying to swipe No. 7's bad report card from the mail piled on the great detective's desk, we are introduced to Charlie's old pal from Scotland Yard, Inspector Duff, who has stopped by, halfway around the world, to pay Charlie a visit.  

Charlie's back!

that American slang again

Uh-oh!

Willie in trouble

Inspector Duff makes a brief appearance.  

Inspector Duff informs Charlie that he's hunting for a strangler on board a docked cruise ship among the travelers on a world tour that started in New York, along with the tour leader Dr. Suderman (the redoubtable Lionel Atwill, in full pompous stuffed shirt mode).  A New York judge was murdered by strangulation on the Atlantic leg of the journey and Duff joined the tour in England to investigate, though what his jurisdiction over the case would have been I can't see.  (It's all better rationalized in the book.)  

Duff has a plan to catch the killer and wants Charlie to come along with him to the boat.  Charlie goes alone to get his superior's permission, rather than bring Duff along with him, conveniently leaving Duff to be murdered (strangulation again) by the bearded man with glasses, obviously disguised, who was eavesdropping through a conveniently open window.  Why, it's the strangler!  

Here, in for the killer to get his strangling in, Duff had to go by the window to knock the ashes out of his pipe and then turn his back to the window.  Seems kind of a roundabout way to murder him!  (Duff suggests that the strangler might be a woman, but come on.)  

What's this?

Duff snuffed by strangler!

When Charlie returns to his office and finds his friend dead, he vows to catch the killer himself.  Jimmy and No. 7 son Willie are still hanging around the station too and you can bet dollars to donuts that Jimmy will also be showing up on that cruise ship, "helping" his Dad.

The suspect passengers on the cruise are:

Beautiful Paula Drake (Marjorie Weaver), the female half of the love interest

Handsome Dick Kenyon (Robert Lowery), the male half of the love interest, who is traveling with his wealthy uncle

Susie Watson (Cora Witherspoon), an excitable middle-aged lady boarding with Paula

James Ross (Don Beddoe), a wealthy middle-aged jewelry dealer

Professor Gordon (Leo G. Carroll), a middle-aged scholarly archaeologist

Mr. and Mrs. Walters (Charles Middleton and Claire Du Brey), who seem to be spiritualists (I was never quite sure what their religion was.)

An obviously terrified man named Gerald Pendleton, who won't come out of his cabin (Leonard Mudie).  Could he be our next murder victim?

When Charlie gets on board he finds that Dick Kenyon's uncle has been murdered (strangled!) upping out cruise body count to three already.  After the ship sets sail, Jimmy is caught as a stowaway and put to work, which Charlie allows (denying he knows him) so that Jimmy can hunt for clues at his father's direction. He actually proves pretty useful in this one.  

Some of our suspects: Paula, Dick, James, Susie and the Walters

Nothing to hide here!  Dr. Suderman and Mr. Walters

a pair of master thespians (Lionel Atwill and Leo G. Carroll)

Susie gets dramatic

Jimmy gets manhandled

Gangway!  Jimmy finally got a clue. 

Murder Cruise changes the plot around from the book quite a bit, although the basis of it--another revenge from the past deal--is the same.  Suspense is pretty well-maintained, with a shift of culpritude in the last fifteen minutes or so to three different people.  However, disappointingly for me, the film steals a device from an older Warner Oland Chan film and if you have seen that film you are going to know almost immediately who the killer is.  I'm surprised not to see reviews mention this.

On top of that the main clue to the killer is one of the verbal slip-up variety, where the killer stupidly says something that reveals himself.  Any practiced mystery fan can tell right off when it's happening, even if they do not have knowledge about the subject.  

Despite all that the film is still an enjoyable mid-range Toler Fox Chan, nowhere near the best of them, but not the worst either.  Certainly it's fun to see those fine, frequent film villains Carroll and Atwill in the same film in the same film; they even have a scene briefly just to themselves.  Marjorie Weaver, her southern accent only slightly discernible, and Robert Lowery, both 26 at the time of filming, are stronger than your usual juvenile love interests, though there's only so much you can do with those roles.   

jinx ahoy

Susie gets asked to dance

Uncle Charlie dispenses relationship advice like Papa Poirot

Then there's Charles Middleton and Claire Du Brey as the gloomy religious couple, both of whom have great presence.  Middleton is famous for having played Ming the Merciless in the Flash Gordon serials; out of makeup he looks and sounds a lot like John Carradine, though he doesn't have the latter's charisma.  Claire Du Brey gets all the best lines between the two, however, as his wife who is always portentously spouting spiritualistic hoodoo.  

Du Brey is enjoyably paired off against the film's primary comic relief, Cora Witherspoon, who spends the film either screaming or getting off catty one-liners.  She's a lot of fun and reminded me a lot of Mrs. Howell from Gilligan's Island, the late, great Natalie Schafer.  Unsurprisingly both women frequently played haughty society matrons on film in the Thirties and Forties.  

at the mortuary

Gotcha, biatch!

At the end of the film when Witherspoon tells tells Charlie he can find her at the San Francisco YWCA, day or night, there's a real poignancy to her delivery.  She's had fun on this cruise, even with (or perhaps because of) all the murders, and now it's back to the boring everyday life of the unmarried woman of a certain age.  (On the cruise she even got to dance with hunky Lowery, an actor almost half her age.)  

The lengthy resolution of the film (where a new character is brought in to give necessary exposition) takes place at the San Francisco morgue, allowing Susie to get off her best zinger to Mrs. Walters.  There's also a nice comic turn by Harlan Briggs as the coroner, who just wants to get this all done with and eat his sandwiches.  Jimmy has his best comic "bit" at the very end, taking both the coroner and his pop by surprise.  Detractors can say what they will, I think Sen Yung was a terrific actor.  

Sidney Toler did eleven Chan films for Fox and it seems to me the clear standouts from that tenure are Charlie Chan at Treasure Island (1939), Charlie Chan in the Wax Museum (1940), Dead Men Tell (1941) and Castle in the Desert (1942).  Pretty close to these are Charlie Chan in Reno (1939) and Charlie Chan in Panama (1940).  All but Reno were written by John Francis Larkin, who really seems to have blossomed with his quintet of Chan films.  Murder Cruise is not in the same league as those but it's still an enjoyable B mystery trip, particularly if you are a fan of the genre, and of the inimitable Charlie Chan.