The Thirteenth Hour

1st watched 5/29/2000 - (Dir-William Clemens): Interesting story that keeps you attached till the end in this obvious "one in a series of films" surrounding mysterious things that happen around a whistler that shows up in shadows.Very much like "The Fugitive" TV series and movie that followed.

The penultimate entry in Columbia's Whistler series and the last to star Richard Dix. This final Dix Whistler movie isn't one of the best but it's still worth a look. The story is fairly straightforward with Dix playing more of a typical protagonist than in other entries where he played more morally ambiguous characters. This time he's a truck driver out to clear his name when he's framed for killing a policeman.

Karen Morley is good as Dix's girlfriend. Regis Toomey plays a small but important part as the cop Dix is accused of killing. Mark Dennis is unintentionally funny as Morley's son, who reads books on necrophobia and warns cops "That's mama's and my bedroom. We don't like anybody going in there." John Kellogg, Jim Bannon, and Bernadene Hayes round out the significant roles in the cast. For his part, Dix is solid as usual.

As I said, this is the last Whistler movie that Dix made, but it's also his last film period. He retired after this and died two years later. With a career stretching back over twenty years into the silents, he's probably best remembered for his Oscar-nominated role in Cimarron or for playing the crazy captain in Val Lewton's The Ghost Ship. Lantern-jawed with a somewhat stiff line delivery, Dix may not have challenged Gable or Grant or Flynn in charisma or sex appeal but he had an interesting screen presence all his own. He certainly made his mark in the films I mentioned, as well as many others including this fine series based off the popular radio series The Whistler. His last film may not have been an example of "going out on top," but it was definitely nothing to be embarrassed about. Which is, unfortunately, more than you can say for some of his contemporaries' final films.

... is how I describe Richard Dix's final film and the last of the Whistler series of B films in which he starred with twists and turns like the California roads over which his trucks roll.

Dix plays trucking company owner Steve Reynolds, who has just gotten engaged to diner owner Eileen Blair. He has a single alcoholic drink to celebrate his engagement and, while driving his truck, picks up a hitchhiker simply because he is in a good mood. That less than a minute it took to pick up the hitchhiker causes Steve to be at a point on the road where he has a near collision with a reckless driver who simply keeps on driving. Steve crashes into a gas station to keep from hitting the reckless driver. But Steve is readily written up for drunk driving by a cop who is resentful of the fact that Steve got Eileen. Steve says the hitchhiker can verify what happened, but he is gone. Nobody at the site of the wreck saw the reckless driver, and nobody else saw the hitchhiker. It is like he disintegrated. This is the Twilight Zone part of the film.

From there things just go horribly wrong for Steve. He is framed for murder, runs away making himself look guilty, and in attempting to clear himself runs across a major criminal enterprise. To tell you more would be to tell too much, but it is a very entertaining B film. Dix was great in this Whistler series of films, here playing somebody who is not a gray character, but a straight shooter who just got caught up in events.

The seventh 'Whistler' movie and Richard Dix's last screen performance has him as an independent trucker. He's just cleared all debts and is about to start making money and to marry Karen Morley when he gets involved in an accident. It's not his fault, but his witness vanishes. He winds up paying compensation and having his license suspended. He continues taking jobs, but when a driver fails to show up, he drives the truck himself; a mysterious stranger saps him and kills motorcycle cop Regis Toomey. Dix panics and runs, but realizes that he has to prove his innocence, with no clue but a glove.

It's also the last film directed by William Clemens, a decent journeyman, He had entered the movies as an editor, switched to directing in 1936 and made 33 features in a dozen years. He would die in 1980 at the age of 74.

Like the other movies in the series, it's a decent little B feature, taking advantage of Dix's longtime star power. He had been a middling star at Paramount in the silent era, then shifted to RKO with the coming of sound, as one of their major stars. His career began to decline in the middle of the 1930s. When RKO let him go, he switched to Columbia and settled into the comfortable routine of this series. A series of heart attacks caused his retirement, and he would die in 1949 at the age of 56.

Truck-firm owner Steve Reynolds (Richard Dix) gets involved in a feud with a rival firm, and shortly thereafter is slugged by a masked assailant who steals the truck he is driving. The assailant runs down a policeman in the truck and leaves other clues pointing to Reynolds as the cop killer.

With only a glove, with diamonds stuck in the thumb, as a clue, and while evading the police and other characters after him and the diamonds, Reynolds, with the help of his fiancée and her son, finally runs down the guilty party and clears himself.

Richard Dix stars in this seventh instalment of the Whistler series and, sadly, it's his final film. Always a likeable presence, Dix does a great job as always and bolsters this standard thriller somewhat. Not the best Whistler, but enjoyable enough, if a little convoluted.