Boston Blackie's Rendezvous

This one is almost the stuff of noir with some black comedy mixed in.

The film opens with Blackie's wealthy friend, Arthur Manleder, paying him a visit one night. Arthur is seeking Blackie's help in discreetly returning his insane nephew to the asylum from which he escaped. Blackie agrees to help. What Blackie doesn't know is that the insane nephew, Jimmy Cook (Steve Cochran) has crawled into his apartment through an open window and heard everything. Jimmy knocks Blackie unconscious after Arthur leaves, changes into Blackie's clothes and leaves.

Here's where the black comedy and noirish elements begin. Jimmy is running around town masquerading as Blackie and strangling girls although his actual objective is to meet just one girl in particular - Nina Foch as Sally Brown, with whom he's been corresponding via letters. In one case Jimmy leaves Blackie's monogrammed hat at a murder scene, in another he dumps a body in Blackie's apartment. Of course Inspector Farraday believes Blackie did it, and so, as usual, Blackie must work around the police to catch Jimmy before he can murder any more women.

This is an unusual entry because in almost every other Boston Blackie film a robbery of some kind was at the root of the crime wave. This one is different because the murders of a madman are involved with no theft behind any of the killings. You can see why Farraday would doubt Blackie where theft was concerned - it was once his trade - but it would quite be a stretch to believe Blackie would become the murderer of random women and that The Runt, Blackie's rather timid pal, would just go along for the ride! As for Steve Cochran, he is pitch perfect as the killer with those dark eyes and expression that goes from hopeless romantic to crazed maniac in the blink of an eye.

Highly recommended as an entertaining and unusually complex entry in the Boston Blackie series. Just expect things to be a little more on the heavy and tense side than usual for the series. What does the lighten the mood in this one, probably unintentionally? An autographed picture of Boston Blackie prominently displayed in his own apartment turned what should have been a tense moment in the film into a laugh out loud one, at least for me. Enjoy.

When his pal "Manleder" (Harry Hayden) almost breaks down the door one night, he regales "Blackie" (Chester Morris) and "Runt" (George E. Stone) with a story of his nephew who has been in a sanatorium accused of being a strangler - and that he has escaped. Assuring him things will be fine, "Blackie" is soon face to face with the rumoured throttler - "Cook" (Steve Cochran) then left wondering if there might be truth to the allegations. "Insp. Faraday" (Richard Lane) and his sidekick "Matthews" (Frank Sully) are quickly on the case and, as usual, they jump to a series of wrong conclusions that makes the search for the killer and the protection of the damsel in distress "Sally" (Nina Foch) all the harder as the body count starts to mount. It's good fun this one, with plenty of action and a decently witty script that provides for plenty of banter as the chase hots up. The denouement itself isn't up to much, it's a bit flat actually, but Morris is on good form and his impersonation of the woman's elderly grandmother does raise a smile. Not the best of these mysteries, but it's enjoyable for an hour.

Boston Blackie movies have some strengths -- mostly in that the pacing is swift and the hero is cheerfully unfazed in even the worst circumstances. But the plotting is frequently atrocious, and the unrelenting comic bits often kill the pacing (if the plot happens to be atypically good) or are just unfunny and inappropriate.

This one involves Blackie chasing an escapee from the asylum (Steve Cochran in a really poor performance) who has become fixated on beautiful Nina Foch (who puts in a nice, rather subtle acting job). Inspector Farraday, of course, believes Blackie has gone homicidal maniac (he at least has some evidence in this one for that), and is incompetently trying to jail him as Blackie goes after the real killer. The plot has possibilities, but any time any real tension gets going, we a get a not funny comedy routine. It doesn't seem like anyone at Columbia understood that, in a movie about a pursuit of a really dangerous maniac, cute little comedy scenes about hiding an inconvenient body from the inspector disrupt any willing suspension of disbelief. (One just concludes our clever hero is an idiot -- deadly for a film like this.)

This one is not worth the time. For a well plotted episode of this series, see Alias Boston Blackie.

The one constant thread in the Boston Blackie series is Richard Lane's obsession with nailing Chester Morris for some big crime. And of course Morris has to go to work to nail the real crooks to prove his innocence.

But Inspector Farraday's obsession with Boston Blackie is a bit much in Boston Blackie's Rendezvous. Whatever else he is society crook Blackie is no homicidal maniac and Farraday should know that. Still the writers here think he's a strangler.

This all begins when Blackie's playboy friend Arthur Manleder calls late at night on Blackie and the Runt to find his nephew Jimmy Cook who has escaped from an asylum for the hopelessly insane. Cook is played with sardonic brilliance by Steve Cochran in one of his early films. Cook breaks in on Blackie after Manleder leaves and nearly kills him, but does rob him of one of his suits for a disguise.

Then he goes after an obsession of his, taxi dancer Nina Foch. Quite frankly if Farraday wasn't so obsessed with Blackie the film might have been over in 15 minutes.

Arthur Manleder is played in this film by Harry Hayden taking over from Lloyd Corrigan. The Manleder character was dropped from future Boston Blackie films. And Iris Adrian is at her brassy best as Foch's roommate and general protector.

Boston Blackie's Rendezvous is good for the presence of Steve Cochran and Nina Foch and bad for Richard Lane's obsession taken to truly silly lengths.

Boston Blackie's Rendezvous (1945)

*** (out of 4)

Ninth film in Columbia's Boston Blackie series once again features Chester Morris in the role. In this film, a psychopath (Steve Cochran) escapes from an asylum and begins to strangle various women. It appears he's working his way down a line until he can meet a dancer (Nina Foch) he became obsessed with in the asylum. Blackie (Morris), The Runt (George E. Stone) and Inspector Farraday (Richard Lane) are once again hot on the case. This is a step up from the last couple films I've seen in the series because it's unlike anything that came before it. Cochran is very good as the killer and the screenplay doesn't shy away from his evilness. Morris, Stone and Lane are as entertaining as ever. Morris gets to do a couple nice magic tricks in the film and the twist involving the killer trapping him was well written.