Incendiaire par jalousie

A good whodunit should have a bit of originality in the plot, and the solution should not be too easy to guess. And it shouldn't be too long. Under those criteria, this last episode in the "Crime Doctor" series holds up very well.

The plot is about a convicted arsonist who gets an early release from prison. The agent of his good fortune is the Crime Doctor himself, who believes the man is guilty but considers him redeemable. Ignoring the advice of the doctor and others, the man rashly sets out to prove his innocence. Soon he's in bigger trouble than ever, and it all looks just a bit too convenient.

Warner Baxter, whose career was drawing toward an end, is considerably grayer than in his previous "Crime Doctor" films, and he doesn't get involved in much action. But he doesn't seem frail. He has a stylish presence that compensates for the movie's fairly spartan production values.

The two women in the ex-con's life, who turn out to be important to the mystery, are played by Lois Maxwell and Adele Jergens. Maxwell is better remembered today, because of her later role as "Moneypenny" in the James Bond films. But in 1949, Jergens, a former burlesque queen, was a much bigger name in movies. She certainly gets the more glamorous treatment here.

In his final case Dr. Ordway (Warner Baxter) attempts to solve a murder in a highly interesting place: a sort of call-in jukebox where bar customers may request a particular record to be played. (The same gimmick, incidentally, used in the 1945 Republic serial "Federal Operator 99.") Although Baxter looks near exhausted (the veteran actor died less than 2 years later), the whodunit zips along nicely and the solution to the puzzle is not telegraphed too far in advance. Acting honors this time go to Whit Bissell as a slightly demented song-writer and, especially, future Miss Moneypenny of 007 fame, Lois Maxwell, as the decidedly active ingénue. Based on a popular radio show by Max Marcin, the 1943-1949 "Crime Doctor" thrillers were typical of series-happy Columbia, produced with economy but generally well-written and peopled by the studio's great (and very busy) stock company.

... and that is understandable because by this time - 1949 - Warner Baxter was pretty much in constant pain due to his arthritis. It's painful for me to watch this film not because it isn't good but because you can clearly see the man is suffering.

Thus the usually supporting players take up the slack here, with Baxter really not participating that much in the action. Here we have a man, Steve Carter, getting paroled after serving three years for an arson he says he did not commit. The advice from the warden is for Steve to stay out of trouble, but with nothing but revenge on his mind for whoever it was who framed him, Steve isn't listening. The ever loyal Jane is waiting for him at the prison gates even though Steve threw her over for the more elegant Inez. Inez is now involved with tough guy George Goldie Harrison, played by Robert Armstrong, but that doesn't mean the two don't get locked in a passionate embrace the first time they meet after Steve's release. The news of this infidelity does not amuse Goldie.

It isn't long before one of the guys on Steve's short list of people who could have framed him turns up dead. Since Dr. Ordway (Baxter) recommended Steve for parole in the first place and Steve is acting quite guilty by running from the police, will the good doctor wind up with egg on his face? Watch and find out.

Making sure the mood doesn't get too heavy is Whit Bissell as a song writer who is obsessed with recording and performing just one awful tune. Is he harmless but annoying or is he the red herring villain that has ruined Steve's life for some reason real or imagined? Again I say, watch and find out.

Warner Baxter, (Dr. Robert Ordway) gave his final appearance in this role and I found this film had improved over all the other Crime Doctor Series. In this film, Dr. Ordway is called by the warden of a prison to visit him as he was going to parole a man called Steve Carter,(Stephen Dunne) who was a former patient of Dr. Ordway's. Steve Carter was sentenced to prison as an arsonist who burned a music recording studio. Dr. Ordway tells the Warden he really does not believe that Steve Carter committed this crime and is going to help him prove his innocence. Jane Darrin,(Lois Maxwell) meets Steve Carter as he gets out of prison and drives him home and talks about him going back to work with the music recording company. It is not very long before a murder is committed and Steve has become a likely suspect for another crime. Jane Darrin and Doctor Ordway come to Steve's assistance and a very strange recording is discovered that solves the crime. Lois Maxwell who played Jane Darrin was also "Miss Moneypenny" in most of the older James Bond Films. Great film Enjoy

As has earlier been commented, Whit Bissell's performance here as an aspiring and mentally challenged composer is a scene-stealer. He intuitively takes the film to another plane with a blissful unawareness that is inadvertent and yet elevating. Along with the tragic end of his character Tom Lister in "Brute Force" this is one of his most affecting performances of the forties. Probably the second most affecting. He seems to inhabit this role as opposed to the other actors in the film who seem to just be going through their paces robotically and quite superficially with little or no special touch of humanity other than to move the story along so they can pick up their check. The film stops when he comes on the screen and you do a double take because you sense this performance is a silk purse in a sow's ear of a film. His character Pete Bellem, touching, halting and muddling along, stays with you when everyone else in the film just fades away into cardboard kitsch heaven. And that song of his so conscientiously crumbles upon itself that it takes on a profound, sad and yet sweet resonance which belies its silliness. Whit was a talented pianist, by the way. He puts that to use here (and in some other roles through the years). He was also a fencing enthusiast in real life. His character Pete Bellem, harmless and hampered and even harassed here by those who have no time of day for him and, in their self-anointed intellectual superiority, belittle what they feel are his mental limits, may be in a world of his own but in this world of charlatans and floozies and hucksters, his seems a better, kinder world. His fingers are his intellect. He loves his ditty no end and to the exclusion of all critique. He is a man-child in this not so promised land and (toot-toot) one you root for. He is the heart and very much the only soul of this film and definitely the only one who stays with you as the credits roll. Great job. Rest in peace, Whit.