Murder in the Fleet

If you enjoy such WWII promotional movies as "Your Navy At Work Today" (hypothetical title), you will enjoy this movie. Otherwise, you probably won't.

There are only two things that raise it even slightly out of the muck: Nat Pendleton and the girl he is chasing, Una Merkel.

Nat Pendleton, of whom I am a fan and have enjoyed as the dumb cop in many other films, is funny here, but not given much to work with, even though his part is bigger than usual. Mostly he grumpily gives orders to the enlisted men. His "repartee" with Ted Healy is without exception annoying. In fact, the main idea of "comedy" in this movie seems to be sailors yelling at one another, something that happens again and again.

Una Merkel, who was wonderful in The Bank Dick (1940), is the other highlight, although she is quite different here from the sweet innocent she played in that film. Her rough, low-life character is not particularly likable (although it is very enjoyable to watch), and she has too little on-screen time to come anywhere near saving the film.

Robert Taylor, at the peak of his youthful handsomeness, doesn't do much except stand around looking macho and break up the sailors who are yelling at each other. His girlfriend, played by Jean Parker, is repulsive throughout. I couldn't imagine what he saw in her. Money, I guess.

Arthur Byron is also good as the captain, but it is barely more than a cameo role. He does manage to give the spoiled Jean Parker a good lecture, though.

Taylor doesn't solve the case. He literally stumbles on the perp, who, to my sorrow, turned out to be one of the only other likable characters in the film.

A few great wisecracks from John Hyams as a fed-up husband. He has the only line in the whole movie that made me laugh out loud.

All in all, not worth the time it takes to watch it.

I thought it was just me. I wasn't going to review 1935's Murder in the Fleet, directed by Edward Sedgwick, but then I found out others had the same reaction, so I wasn't just having an off day.

This film is awful. And as much as my dear departed mother worshipped Robert Taylor, it's a miracle MGM kept him on after this. Up and coming stars were trained on B films, but he has very little to do here. I mean, come on, a columnist sat through Girl's Dormitory twice to get Tyrone Power's name - and he had a little cameo. This was a supporting role and he barely registered.

The navy ship as to meet a government assignment deadline for some procedure. However, it seems that someone wants to keep it from happening. After a crew member is stabbed, the ship becomes a floating Holiday Inn. Anyone who boarded cannot leave. And it's a lot of people.

Una Merkel plays Nat Pendleton's girlfriend. Hers, Pendleton's, and Ted Healy's high-pitched, yelling voices and fighting throughout nearly broke my eardrums. They NEVER shut up.

Jean Hersholt, Mischa Auer, Walter Byron, and Jean Parker are also on board for various reasons. Too many people. Robert Taylor stands around and is not very interesting.

I stopped caring. It's rare for me to want to turn off something. I didn't. I wanted to.

The plot is ordinary, but the movie has snappy dialogue, excellent as opposed to wooden acting, good direction and a great cast, including Robert Taylor, Ward Bond, Una Merkel, Jean Hersholt, and Nat Pendleton. It pulls off the comedy part very well. I always like 30s movies because of the witty dialogue and fast-paced, sly insults. Watch it for that if not for the story. It's the combination of acting and dialogue that shines. Many comedies of this or any other era just don't pull it off. The quality of filming is also very good. Look for other familiar faces among the actors. You can see them while they're relatively young.

Robert Taylor is an officer aboard a US Navy ship getting ready to test some new equipment. It's all rather hectic, with strangers aboard, his girlfriend Jean Parker trying to convince him to quit the Navy and come work for her father, a competitor of the firm manufacturing the equipment offering him $25,000 to ensure it fails, and oh yeah, a murder.

It's directed by Eddie Sedgwick from an idea of his, and there's plenty of comedy, with Nat Pendleton and Ted Healy competing for the love of Una Merkel, ambassador Mischa Auer onboard, and so forth. Taylor is stiff in the role, which is a reasonable acting choice, but not terribly interesting. Spig Wead is one of the people credited for the script; this was undoubtedly intended to make sure it has the appropriate navy air, butsome one should have told the art department, because the details on the uniforms are not right. Neither is the mystery aspect particularly good. For Metro it's definitely not an A production despite the large cast, but it was inexpensive enough to show a profit, which is always a plus for the powers-that-be.

This film, made in 1935, is a true reflection of the time. There was something for everyone in this picture: patriotism, a bit if romance and romantic comedy (Una Merkel) and some slap stick. All of the actors performered well and you do find yourself wondering "who done it". OK, I could have done without so much slapstick but I recently saw a film with Crawford and Gable that had The Three Stooges! Robert Taylor, only, 24 years old at the time, was very fine, as always. He made many pictures in 1935, at the time when the studios could roll them out like hot cakes. Some, like Camille, are very famous. He was not in these films only bc he looked good. A number of other commenters here heavily panned RT. For those folks, please remember that what you see on the screen is not the persona of RT but the character he is portraying. This was not an Oscar worthy PART but he does it with such great ease you have no idea he is acting. Part of what made him so exciting on the screen was his extraordinary good looks BUT it is his acting that is the most important. Had he been a total dud in Camille, he would not have continued to have an acting career of more than 30 years....maturing as an actor as he aged, prematurely dying at age 57.