Stometer
Save your money for something good and enjoyable
VeteranLight
I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.
Matialth
Good concept, poorly executed.
MartinHafer
"The Canary Murder Case" is a problematic film to watch. Apparently after it was made, the studio decided to re-shoot a few scenes and dub others in order to make this silent film a talking picture. This happened quite a lot in the late 1920s. But what made it tougher is that the temperamental Louise Brooks refused to return to re-shoot or re-dub so the studio had to make due with another lady's voice and re-shooting a few awkward scenes (such as having Ned Sparks' character talking to a screen and pretending she was behind it). Well, their gamble worked and the movie was a big success. When seen today, however, it's obvious that the film has issues! Now I am NOT saying it's a bad film but, like "Saratoga" (where the leading lady died in the middle of filming and they awkwardly had her stand-in do the missing scenes...with her back to the camera!), the ruse clearly shows.The 'Canary' in the title of this film is a nickname given to a horrible chorus girl, Margaret O'Dell (Brooks). She uses her sexual wiles to blackmail men..LOTS of men. The first 20 minutes of the film is used to establish MANY times MANY different potential murderers and SOMEONE croaked the 'lady'...but who?! Philo Vance (William Powell) and a dopey detective (Eugene Palette) investigate.When you watch this film, you need to cut it some slack. Films from 1929 simply aren't as polished as films made just a year or two later. The incidental music we take for granted is missing--which is normal for 1929 but not 1931 or later. It makes for a strangely quiet film. Also, unlike the bazillions of detective films of the 1930s and 40s, this one is remarkably talky and relies a lot on the detective's intuition instead of concrete facts. Not a great mystery movie by the standards of later films but watchable nevertheless.By the way, if you DO watch this film (and it's currently posted on YouTube), look at one of the potential murderers--he looks JUST LIKE LENIN!!! It wasn't--I checked.
Robert J. Maxwell
One of the best lines in the movie: Louise Brooks, with her signature do and a voice that sounds like a yelping Chihuahua, calls up a newspaper editor and announces that she's going to marry the scion of a prominent family. "Well, well, may I send you my congratulations." Brooks: "You bet you can -- and send them from Tiffany's." (PS: Kids, Tiffany's is a very expensive jewelry store and also the name of the family that owns every diamond mine in Africa, not that the last observation matters here.) Brooks is the "canary", a sluttish nightclub performer who has her hooks into young Spottwoode and intends to marry him and improve her social station. Old Spottswoode objects, of course, but Brooks threatens to tell the press that Young Spottswoode has embezzled money from his old man's bank.She's been around and has something against everyone, the kind of woman you wouldn't want to get to know. Well, maybe you would, but you should never permit her to get to know YOU. So she's extorting old Spottswoode. She's also extorting the newspaper editor. She's extorting others. And every extortee wishes her grievous harm."Listen, baby, a little thing like a divorce don't mean nothing to me. I just heard you taking those suckers down over the phone." That's Brooks' husband or ex husband, recently released from the Crowbar Hotel. "Say, I oughtta bump you off." This woman makes enemies of everyone.Of course, somebody offs her mysteriously in her flat. It's at this point, twenty minutes into the movie, that we discover that William Powell is Philo Vance, detective. He and the police work together to solve the canary's murder.The police act as if mentally hobbled. Somehow their suspicions fall largely on young Spottswoode and his girl friend Alice. It's odd because the two of them have been together before and after the canary's murder. Jean Arthur is a brunette Alice and has the same curiously appealing nasal voice that she would have ten years later, but not yet the acting chops. She shows up only for a few seconds.The movie is strictly routine. Powell has his usual clipped pronunciation, but nobody else brings much to their roles. The direction is terrible. Dynasties rise and fall, Eons come and go, while actors stand looking at one another in silence. And the plot isn't really worth carrying on about.Powell was enchanting in the Thin Man series. Here, he's just another sober sleuth, putting together the jigsaw pieces of a puzzling crime.
Bucs1960
This film typifies the problems the studios were having adapting to sound in 1929. The characters talk and talk and talk and nothing much happens. Being a great Philo Vance fan, I had to purchase this film even though it is a pretty rough transfer to tape and is very stilted in style. The obvious post-dubbing of Louise Brooks' voice is comical since it comes out as a nasal Bronx accent. William Powell, just beginning to develop his persona as a sophisticate, really doesn't stand much of a chance here. However, for historical value, it is worth a try. It is the last film that Brooks made before she went to Germany and her greatest triumphs(Pandora's Box, Diary of a Lost Girl); thus the voice dubbing. The film started out as a silent and was converted to sound....by that time she was in Germany and refused to return to dub her own voice. If you are a Philo Vance buff and can't work your way through this film, see "The Kennel Murder Case" instead.
gerdav
I have been a fan of S.S. Van Dine's "Philo Vance" novels since I was a kid. I have recently purchased the first editions of most of his catalogue. I have read about this movie for years, and being a HUGE admirer of Louise Brooks, I could not wait to see this film.Although I have always been fascinated by early sound films, this is one is a textbook case of the problems encountered by the studios at the time. It is slow beyond belief. It is more than obvious that Louise's speaking parts are dubbed. The editors chose long shots so it wasn't as noticeable----it didn't work! Powell's Philo Vance bears no resemblance to the colorful character in the novels. I give this film a "3" rating simply for Brooks' beauty.
