L'ombre qui frappe

Rod LaRocque stars in "The Shadow Strikes" from 1937.

La Rocque plays Lamont Cranston, known to the underworld as "The Shadow" - a shadow who appears when a crime is being committed and stops it in its tracks.

I must say first that this is not my idea of The Shadow. I thought the Shadow was just that, a shadow on a wall who could talk. Not here. He's a person in dark clothing with his face covered and wearing a black hat. Big disappointment.

Anyway, in this film, The Shadow stops a robbery at an attorney's office. He then is forced to impersonate the attorney, George Randall, when someone runs in with an urgent message that one of his clients wants to see him.

It appears, to me anyway, that no one had ever seen this attorney because everyone believes Lamont is Randall. I started wondering if The Shadow appeared to people in a different face and used a different voice to impersonate someone, and we were just to assume that.

Lamont as Randall is summoned to the home of a Mr. Delthern, who wants to immediately change his will as he fears for his life. As he's in the process of changing the will, he's shot through an open window.

Lamont identifies himself as Randall to the police and helps work through the mystery.

This is pretty lame. However, how can you miss out seeing Rod La Rocque, one of the great silent film names, and in a talkie, no less? A trained stage actor, he survived talkies until he quit in 1941 to become a real estate broker, working with his wife - Vilma Banky! Another silent name! And they were married for 42 years. All pretty impressive.

Worth it to see La Roque, an old-fashioned type of leading man in the style of Warren William, William Powell, etc., mustached and smooth.

This is a fast-paced B feature with Rod La Rocque, in the role of "The Shadow", getting involved in a fairly interesting and unpredictable mystery. In several respects, it doesn't really have the expected feel that goes with "The Shadow", but in itself its not bad at all. La Rocque works all right as a mild-mannered, secretive hero, with his manner and even-toned voice conveying calm.

The story in this one starts with "The Shadow" breaking up what seems to be just another petty crime, but quickly becoming involved in a wider and more serious mystery. He must assume additional extra identities, playing a risky game with the various suspects and witnesses.

La Rocque's restrained style makes it come off naturally enough, and while the rest of the characters are mostly one-dimensional, there is enough going on to keep things interesting. While it has a noticeably different feel from the "Shadow" of stories or radio, in itself it's a fairly entertaining way to pass an hour for anyone who enjoys these old B-movies.

Former silent screen matinée idol Rod LaRocque stars as the famous radio detective The Shadow in The Shadow Strikes. Modern fans will remember the film with Alec Baldwin in the Nineties playing criminologist Lamont Cranston aka The Shadow.

The Shadow has a real bag of tricks and the power of illusion at his command. He's not a superhero as such with any real superpowers, but his knack for remaining inconspicuous while waiting to strike was what radio audiences thrilled to.

Unfortunately this film was made by the short lived Grand National studios, a B picture company with limited budget and consequently limited production values. At a major studio even in their B picture unit The Shadow would have fared better.

As it LaRocque is fine in the part and in this case as The Shadow he foils a robbery at a lawyer's office. When the police come he pretends to be that lawyer and the police captain accompanies LaRocque on an errand to a rich man's home who called and wanted the attorney to draw up a new will. But before that could happen John St. Polis playing the rich Mr. Delthern is shot by a sniper.

The plot gets thicker than an Irish stew. But the story was a serviceable murder mystery without the whole Shadow gimmick which wasn't utilized to the max. That must have disappointed fans back in 1937.

Always good is Cy Kendall who plays a gambler/racketeer who has a vested interest in that will. The heavyset Kendall is always playing bad guys in modern dress and in westerns.

Still bad production values from Grand National don't augur well for viewers who might want to see The Shadow Strikes.

With veteran heavy Cy Kendall and versatile movie cop Kenneth Harlan in support, and the extremely experienced and suave Rod LaRocque in a popular product "The Shadow", this film is somewhat of a disappointment in comparison to what it could have been. LaRocque gives us a supremely confident Cranston in a poised performance. LaRocque, a large, very tall man, wisely had perfected the art of downplaying since his entrance into talking pictures and he is fine here. But he should be surrounded with a vigorous director and some more active styled performers. This film falls into the unfortunate detective- filmmaker's pitfall namely: lack of energy.

Whatever Colony Pictures was or wasn't, it certainly was a cheap outfit. While competent and watchable, this film lacks any spark in cinematography, editing or overall direction, apparently due to lack of funds. The plot is a basically solid detective mystery, but the execution of it was sort of loosely thrown together for filming in as few days as possible.

Considering LaRocque's strong screen presence and the generally adequate efforts of the mostly discount cast, a fan of the black and white mystery/detective genre will find this film OK and representative of the genre in the bargain-basement sense.

The Shadow has a mustache?!

The film doesn't really introduce either Lamont Cranston or The Shadow, but seems to assume the audience knows them already. Editing and cinematography are pretty poor, as is the writing and acting. Cranston/The Shadow is surprisingly careless, doesn't laugh, doesn't say "Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men...The Shadow knows," or "the weed of crime bears bitter fruit," and appears to lack "the power to cloud men's minds." He evidently has only one servant, not a whole network.

A subplot involving the mystery of Cranston's father's death is barely explored and seems an afterthought, despite the film's suggesting this may have been the reason for the genesis of The Shadow.

Still, it's sort of fun.