Ticket to a Crime

Ralph Graves is a PI who hasn't had a client in so long he owes secretary Lola Lane six weeks in pay. Jeweler John Elliott comes ot him with an offer of a job, but before he can explain what is going on, he is shot dead, which triggers Graves' long-running rivalry with police detective James Burke.

Not only does this mystery make no sense and its solution less, but Graves gives a peculiarly weightless performance in which everything he says is spoken in the same tone. Miss Lane is good, if stock; Burke tries hard with his comic role, and Lois Wilson as one of the principal suspects gives a performance that borders on hysteria; it's a welcome variation from everyone else. Charles Ray stalks through the proceedings in a wan attempt to offer another suspect.

"Ticket To A Crime" is a quickie on several levels. It is a quickie in that it is over in 64 minutes, and there is a rush to a conclusion which leaves the viewer unsatisfied. Additionally, it is evidently a quota-quickie, rushed into production to meet the enormous appetite of a public attuned to double features.

I thought Ralph Graves and Lola Lane played off each other well, but the relationship was unfulfilled due to the rush to end the picture. The rest of the cast was inconsistent, but this was a Poverty Row production and the studio was probably under cost restraints and had to cast accordingly. James Burke's character was particularly irksome as the dim-witted police Sgt., a role he played many times in his career, but he was primarily a character actor and may have had too much of a part here.

The plot was interesting and there were several suspects to choose from but those in charge took the easy way out, maybe to bring the picture to a quick close. As I said, the outcome is ultimately unsatisfying, and you can't help thinking how much better it could have been if handled by a major studio.