Sinister Hands

A group of zillionaires is gathered in a mansion to witness Swami Yomurda (Mischa Auer) demonstrate his mystical powers. Two minutes into the seance the lights go out, and when they come back on someone lies dead on the floor!

Almost everyone in the room has a motive for killing the victim.

SINISTER HANDS has the standard "old dark house" plot, set up, and rogue's gallery of suspects. There's even a tough-talking detective and his goofy sidekick!

Fans of this sub-genre won't find anything groundbreaking here, but it's nonetheless entertaining...

The lights are turned out during a seance, When the lights come back on, Phillips Smalley is dead with a knife in his back. Detective Captain Jack Mulhall comes to investigate and soon discovers that almost all present had motives to kill him and, given the dark, had opportunity. So who did it?

It's a typical cheap mystery directed by Armand Schaefer and not, alas, a well constructed one. Although I figured out whodunnit before it was revealed, vital clues were not shown to the audience until Mulhall begins his summation -- with all the suspects in the room, natch -- which is not playing fair with the mystery aspect of the movie. Also, despite some good lighting by William Nobles -- his first movie was a Mary Pickford vehicle, but he soon sank into the ranks of B cameramen and never recovered -- is there much in the way of interesting action. Instead, it's a nearly constant stream of talk, pausing only to show a clue to the mystery.

Apparently this was an early "talky" and that might account for the long pauses between speeches and the stilted acting. It's a typical who done it, with the long list of suspects. There are two points where the head detective stops the show and explains who each of them is and what they did. It has the last drawing room thing which is kind of fun, actually. I wouldn't want this on a regular basis, but it's kind of cool. The plot involves a murder during a séance (which the detective pronounces "see ons." There is a swami and a silly detective who is continuously being called Watson instead of Watkins. He is incompetent and no help. It's as if the police trained in a guy for his comedy relief. There are a couple gangsters (one named Lefty Louie), and a bunch of other saps, including a virginal secretary with horn rimmed glasses and a prissy suit. Anyway, they are all kept in place so one has to have done it. It has a somewhat satisfying conclusion. As with most of these stories or books, we need to keep rethinking things. It's an OK film with an interesting cast.

There is nothing super-special about this ensemble murder mystery -- a rich man is killed and everyone is a suspect -- but it is notable as one of a number of detective films of its era to feature mid 20th century depictions of mystics, seances, seers, fortune tellers, fake physics, and the like. Misha Auer has a nice turn as Swami Yomurda, and therefore the movie joins my collection of B-Movies with occultism themes. There is something intriguing to me about this sort of exoticism -- it is rarely respectful of the occult, but it always spices up the proceedings and can also provide an excuse for some nifty set dressing and costuming.

It's a no-name cast in a thoroughly pedestrian whodunit. In fact, in my view the high point comes unscripted, at the beginning with the high-living crowd around the mansion's pool. They look like they're genuinely having fun, and given the swimsuit clinches, we know it's pre-Code. As the swami, I guess "mad Russian" Mischa Auer is supposed to supply the exotica. Trouble is he projects the height but not the gravitas to be really compelling. Of course, sleuth dramas of the 30's had to have a hare-brained assistant to supply the comic relief. Here it's Watson, oops, I mean Watkins supplying the silliness.

Probably the production didn't cost more than a buck eighty since it rarely leaves the drawing room or hallway. Then too, the whodunit part remains too underdeveloped by a crowd of suspects. Looks like the screenplay realized this in the reveal part. Also looks like the production company, Willis Kent, went later into cheap exploitation films. I guess that's not surprising. Anyway, I wish there were something to recommend here, but to me, the result rarely rises above the blandly forgettable.