Charlie Chan en el barrio chino

This episode is a bit edgier. First of all, the murder being investigated is much more vicious than others. Charlie is working for an insurance company and is investigating this death but also is working on a personal interest missing persons case. We have here the reappearance of the Charlie's Number Two Son, Jimmy, who has much more personality than son Tommy. Mantan is there again to provide zaniness. That aside, there are several twists and turns in this plot that make it pretty entertaining. Charlie seems to take more of a personal interest in the results of this case because of the brutality of everything. As is always the case, there are some excellent suspects and a love story to boot

Charlie Chan, Jimmy and Birmingham are on a bus trip to San Francisco, where he's about to investigate for an insurance company the strange and gruesome deaths of a couple of newly wed young women - all 'torso killings', where the head's been cut off from the body; and now another victim has been found, and the lady who sits next to him on the bus explains to him that she makes the trip in order to find out if it's her missing granddaughter. Meanwhile, the bus has got motor trouble, and the passengers are forced to spend some time in a little shack - where a shot is fired at Charlie from outside, and it's only the watch Jimmy had given him for his birthday that saves him from the bullet! Then, a young man shows up who declares he's on leave from the Marine Corps to see his girl in San Francisco; but it's obvious that he left WITHOUT a leave... Then, when they arrive and Charlie goes to the morgue to see the body (whatever's left of it), he can reassure Mrs. Conover that the dead woman is NOT her granddaughter, because of a scar from an appendectomy which 'little' Mary has never undergone. And the same day, in the hotel restaurant, Charlie recognizes in the pretty young waitress the missing granddaughter, who's dyed her hair blond - and is obviously hiding from something or someone...

As it turns out, Mary is also the girl Joe, the young Marine corporal, is searching for: he'd fallen in love with her, but she'd turned him down because she was afraid - and at last, when Charlie gets hold of her, we learn the reason for her fear: she'd been working for an escort bureau, and she'd become suspicious when her boss had suggested to her to marry Joe whose father is rich, and if she'd get him to take out a high life insurance policy, they'd soon make her a rich widow! And now, it's up to brave little Mary to play the decoy in order to find the boss of the 'torso murder gang'...

A very unusual and suspenseful entry in the 'Charlie Chan' series, with an excellent cast (what a shame that most of their names are almost forgotten by now...), and as always some wonderful jokes and mishaps from Jimmy and Birmingham; a great piece of good, clean crime entertainment!

I was generally a fan of the "Charlie Chan" movies with Sidney Toler and this is one of the better ones. To San Francisco he and fairly hapless No. 2 son "Jimmy" (Victor Sen Yung) travel to assist their police with a mysterious murder investigation. That's not all, though. There's a missing person to be found too. "Mary" (Tanis Chandler) has gone awol and her doting mother (Mary Gordon) and her rather drippy fiancé "Jeff" (Bruce Kellogg) are at their wits end. It doesn't help that our sleuthing genius quickly discovers that this absentee once worked with his original victim. The plot thickens and the pair - assisted ably by the cowardy custard, and only sparingly used, "Birmingham Brown" (Mantan Moreland) - must get to the bottom of things before "Mary" comes a cropper. The plot here is a bit more internecine and sophisticated than with many of these adventures. That said, there is a maybe just a little too much coincidence as the thing progresses but I'm sure "Charlie" would have a profound ancestral adage for there being no such thing as luck! There's the tinies of twists at the end and en route it moves along well for an hour. It's always nice to see the original and best Holmesian "Mrs. Hudson" in a film, too!

Sidney toler is charlie chan, and as usual, victor sun yung is his son, with mantan moreland as birmingham, the faithful but easily scared butler. Listen for a similar bit to who's on first about fourteen minutes in. When widows disappear after collecting the insurance payouts, chan and the local coppers try to find suspect(s). Chan's son and butler play large roles in this one... pretty much stealing the show from chan himself. It's okay. Another chapter with sidney toler as chan. In the later chapters, it was roland winters as chan. Directed by terry morse. He directed a bunch of monster and other miscellaneous films in the 1940s and 1950s... godzilla, fog island, jungle hunter.

Charlie Chan (Sidney Toler) investigates insurance fraud and a series of murders. Another Monogram Chan film that is helped by the return of "Number Two Son" Jimmy Chan (Victor Sen Yung), last seen in the 1942 Fox film Castle in the Desert. Up until this point at Monogram, Charlie had been saddled with dull-as-dirt Tommy Chan, played by bland Benson Fong. Victor Sen Yung is a breath of fresh air for this stale series. That being said, he can only do so much. It's still Monogram so it's still cheap. Also, there's still obtrusive comic relief Birmingham Brown, played by bug-eyed Mantan Moreland. The good news is that Moreland doesn't overpower Sen Yung like he did Fong. So it's a watchable effort but nothing special. But when it comes to the Monogram series, watchable is about as much as you can hope for.