Inclubabu Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

ReaderKenka Let's be realistic.

Micransix Crappy film

Teddie Blake The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Hitchcoc I just chanced upon this Blackie episode without having seen others since I was very young. It is a cut above most of the series of its time. Chester Morris, not unlike his counterparts like William Powell, the Thin Man, had a sparkle that carried the series. He also has a set of quite funny sidekicks. In this one, a man creates a phony first edition of Dickens' "Pickwick Papers." It is auctioned off for more the 60,000 dollars and later discovered to be a fake. Blackie gets framed for the business. It's always interesting how a policeman like Detective Faraday can constantly assume that Blackie is responsible for every crime committed in the city. Even though he has apprehended numerous bad men. There is an interesting Femme Fatale in this one to keep things interesting. Pretty good work for Morris.

mark.waltz There are a ton of books pulled off the shelves of used book stores and thrift shops to be used as props in this intellectual entry of the "Boston Blackie" series. It's all about the theft of a first edition of Charles Dickens' "The Pickwick Papers" and a murder that follows. Blackie's in disguise for a great auction sequence, one of the best, along with 1941's "All Through the Night" and Hitchcock's "North by Northwest". Blackie is in cahoots with Richard Lane's inspector, losing the buffoonish quality of earlier episodes when they were more foes. George E. Stone and Lloyd Corrigan are once again featured, with Lynn Merrick an excellent femme fatale. Some clever use of shadows and very tight editing make this one of the better later entries in the series. This entry doesn't throw its intelligence in the viewer's face, but grabs them, pulls them in like a great novel, and keeps them involved. Is it any wonder that later screenwriters, directors and technicians point to the B films of the 1940's as to why they got into the film industry?

calvinnme Up to now in the Boston Blackie crime drama series, the police could double for the Three Stooges and Blackie confidently and effortlessly sees through every mystery and dilemma. In this entry in the Boston Blackie series, the ever-suspected Blackie is not quite so omniscient - it takes hims some time to figure out who the real villain is - and the police are much more capable - they do figure out some things on their own.The mystery revolves around a forged first edition of a copy of the Pickwick Papers sold at auction in a store owned by Blackie's good friend, the wealthy Arthur Manleder. When the police burst in on the storefront of the man who put the forged book up for auction, they find him dead with Blackie standing over his dead body, gun in hand. By this time in the series, Inspector Farraday has begun to believe that it's possible for Blackie to change, but he can't ignore what he sees with his own two eyes. However, the police can't find the 50000 dollars for which the book was sold. The problem is, the real crooks can't find that money either and they're not leaving town without it. This gives Blackie a chance to solve the crime and clear himself, handled with great charm, wit, and confidence as always by Chester Morris as Blackie.

Neil Doyle One of the more enjoyable Boston Blackie entries with CHESTER MORRIS disguising himself as a bookseller and getting mixed up in a murder case right under Inspector Farraday's eyes. The story centers around a counterfeit first edition of Charles Dickens' "The Pickwick Papers" sold for $50,000 at a book auction. LLOYD CORRIGAN is his usual bumbling self as Blackie's friend."I'm in trouble and I'm the only one who can get me out of it," says Blackie--and therein lies the nub of the plot. When Blackie turns up at the murder scene just as Inspector Farraday arrives, he has to spend the rest of the film eluding the police until he can pin the crime on the guilty ones. STEVE COCHRAN is Merrick's accomplice/husband.LYNN MERRICK is the pretty blonde bookseller who turns out to be not quite the helpful innocent she pretends to be. The story is more smoothly written than most of the Blackie films and moves at a fast clip at an hour and six minutes.Merrick makes an attractive femme lead and Cochran struts his tough guy stuff showing why it became his screen persona.Summing up: As a straight crime drama, it's not bad at all.