Murder in the Private Car

Charles Ruggles, Mary Carlisle, and Una Merkel star in this crime thriller on a train, made just as the Hays Production was starting to be enforced. Merkel and Carlisle are telephone operators, Ruth and Georgia, but when circumstances change, they end up on a train, in a private car, with the absent minded, stuttering Ruggles as Godfrey Scott. He "deflects" crimes before they occur....(?) And of course, a 35 year old Sterling Holloway (voice of Winnie the Pooh) as an office boy. Keep a quick eye out for Walter Brennan, the railroad switch- man, in a real brief appearance. They pack a lot of action into the 63 minute shortie from MGM. Good photography with the train "chase scenes", in spite of all the back mattes and sped up film scenes used. There is a confusing scene near the beginning, before they all get on the train, but it becomes quite an entertaining film. Appears to have been remade in 1942 as Grand Central Murder (?) also by MGM.

This is the sort of B thriller that made movie-going fun back in the thirties. Mary Carlisle is a hard-working telephone operator at a stock brokerage who suddenly discovers that she's the long-lost daughter of a railroad tycoon. With best pal Una Merkel in tow, she's tricked into boarding a private railway car en route to a reunion with her father. But neither the car nor her fellow passengers are what they appear to be.

Some of it is sorta' silly. There's a circus train wreck thrown in for padding. And Charlie Ruggles' as a "deflective" detective has a few too many goofy bromides. But the climactic chase sequence, as a runaway car roars down miles of twisting mountain track, is superbly directed, shot and edited. And that was back in the days before CGI when you had to film the real thing.

While "Murder in the Private Car" isn't in the same league as "The Narrow Margin" (the gold standard among railroad mysteries,) it's well worth a look. Especially for train buffs. And in just a bit over an hour, it moves along like...well...like a speeding train.

An amateur crime ‘deflector' finds his skills put to the test aboard a transcontinental train when there's MURDER IN THE PRIVATE CAR.

All of the much-loved elements of the Old Dark House spook films can be found in this regrettably obscure little thriller -- damsels in distress, mysterious legacies, strange disappearances, hairy clutching hands, sudden death, terrible menace (and, for a few delicious moments, a rampaging gorilla)-- except here it all takes place in the fancy carriage car of a swiftly moving train. The plot moves just as quickly, catapulting the viewer along, with the climax especially fast & furious.

The delightfully quixotic humor of comic actor Charles Ruggles is highlighted as his offbeat character relentlessly pursues the solution of the mystery. His bemused encounter with the denizens of a smashed circus train--camel, kangaroo and MGM's Leo the Lion--is especially funny. The teaming of Ruggles with pert & perky Una Merkel is inspired. Her sarcastic wisecracks, uttered in that wonderful Southern drawl, are the perfect counterpoint to Ruggles' wry utterances.

The rest of the cast offers good support: Mary Carlisle as a terribly endangered rich girl; Russell Hardie as her stalwart boyfriend; Berton Churchill as a slightly stuffy millionaire who's about to face enormous peril; Porter Hall as a protective lawyer; and Fred ‘Snowflake' Toones as a terrified train porter.

Movie mavens will recognize Sterling Holloway as a gossipy office boy and Walter Brennan as a train yard switchman, both uncredited.

In his career during the 30s Charlie Ruggles was a master of silly and non-sequitar comedy. No one could mix a metaphor quite like Ruggles as he proves in Murder In A Private Car.

The film concerns two switchboard operators and best friends Una Merkel and Mary Carlisle. Just one day private detective Porter Hall contacts Carlisle and tells her she is the missing heiress to a fortune and millionaire Berton Churchill's daughter. As a toddler Carlisle was kidnapped and placed in an orphanage by nefarious forces unknown.

Those same nefarious forces are determined to see she doesn't get to be reunited with dad. Let's say there's a lot of money at stake.

So begins an eventful trip with a few deaths, an escaped gorilla, and romance developing between another private detective Ruggles and Merkel. Ruggles is kind of shoehorned into the plot. He's not a detective, Ruggles calls himself a deflector one who prevents crime rather than solve it. That was in fact the premise of the TV series Checkmate back in the day.

Even with 'murder' in the title, Murder In The Private Car is still an amusing little item. Listen carefully to Ruggles, you may have to watch this film one or two times to catch all the bon mots he utters.

They and he are worth catching.

Silly mystery that almost compensates with a white-knuckle finale. Ruggles plays an addled "deflector" who can't seem to get his sayings right—"The early worm gets the bird"! All in all, he's an imaginative twist on the usual sleuth in that he bumbles his way before getting moments of brilliance. Sort of like a mix of Sherlock Holmes and Inspector Clouseau. Too bad his shtick is not funnier. At the same time, the incoherent mystery part is submerged beneath Ruggles and two loud blondes Merkel and Carlisle who keep the decibel level peaking. They're cute, of course, and understandably get most of the screen time. Overall, I'm not sure what MGM was reaching for, but the parts don't blend that well. Still, the bang-up finale is worth the price, with scares galore and no models for the runaway trains. I'm not sure how they did it with real locomotives and passenger cars, but it comes as a stunning surprise after 50-or-so minutes of blah. Anyway, much of the cast—Ruggles, Merkel--thankfully went on to better material. Meanwhile, no more trains for me, I'll be taking air travel from now on, for sure.