THE CRIME DOCTOR’S COURAGE
US, 1945, 70 minutes, Black and white.
Warner Baxter, Hilary Brooke, Jerome Cowan, Mark Roberts, Lloyd Corrigan, Emory Parnell, Stephen Crane, Anthony Caruso, Lupita Tovar.
Directed by George Sherman.
The Crime Dr series was very popular during the 1940s. It was based on a radio program.
Warner Baxter, Oscar-winner for in In Old Arizona, plays the doctor, a psychiatrist, who becomes involved in many mysteries and who has to do his own detective work.
The audience is introduced to a manic man on a cliff explaining that his first wife died in an accident and then his second wife falling to her death. His third wife, played by Hilary Brooke, approaches the doctor, inviting him to observe her husband. There is confrontation at the dinner, the husband confronted, his exit, his being shot.
The doctor has a novelist friend, played by Jerome Cowan, who takes him to see an exotic Spanish pair in their performance at a nightclub. It emerges that he is investigating them, about to expose them as vampires – but their living up to the publicity, sleeping in coffins…
There are more killings, including the novelist, and the doctor finally exposing the murderer.
1. The fourth in the Crime Doctor series? The popularity of the character, his origins, investigations?
2. The opening, Gordon Scott, manic, his wife, the clifftop, the story of the death of his first wife, his explanations, her fall?
3. Kathleen, encountering the doctor on his holiday, her story, marriage, Gordon, the invitation to dinner to observe? The servant, confronting Gordon, his exit? His murder?
4. Kathleen, her father and his leather making, the attraction to the dancer, her disappearance?
5. Jeff, writing novels, taking the doctor to the night club, the dancers, their performance, the disappearance with the bright light? Jeff’s apartment, his books and vampires, his encouraging the dancers to come to America, their routine being over 300 years old, in the old mansion, the huge box, the ropes, the explanation of their act? The suggestion they were vampires? The conference, the rescue, the truth? Janet death?
6. The waiter, not a waiter, the brother of the first wife, his charm, his vengeance?
7. The doctor, the investigations, the solution?
