The Crime Doctor's Strangest Case

There's some films that I saw over 20 years ago that if I ever get back to them after such a gap I wonder why I stayed away for so long. I think the Crime Doctor series is like that - I've had copies getting dusty for ages, and yet it's really too good to be treated like that. They were on a production par with the other Columbia stalwarts of Boston Blackie, the Lone Wolf and the Whistler - all well worth watching.

Avuncular type Warner Baxter playing Robert Ordway aka the Crime Doctor gets involved in the case of the murder by poison of a wealthy industrialist insofar as he tries to clear the name of his suspicious friend played by skinny and intense Lloyd Bridges. He leisurely sorts through a houseful of suspects much to cop Barton MacLane's irritation and who has a job keeping up with him throughout the picture. It can get a bit complicated with red herrings, a surreal dream sequence and a long flashback to precisely 31 years previous but all of it was necessary stuff. Favourite bits: Mrs Keppler's quick change vamoose; Jeremy Cowan's disposal of the fiery wastepaper basket through his window; Baxter's general imperturbable confidence; Lynn Merrick's towering hairstyle.

For those of us who mine this seam it's another fine example of the 1940's b&w detective comedy-mystery genre.