Bureau of Missing Persons

BUREAU OF MISSING PERSONS (First National Pictures for Warner Brothers, 1933), directed by Roy Del Ruth, is a fast-paced, pre-code production that has the distinction pre-dating those police shows on television by twenty or so years. The basic premise of what's to be shown is best described by its opening passage: "All over the world thousands of persons disappear every day. New York City alone reported over 27,00 missing last year. Why people prop from sight, where they go, and how they are found is the problem of a special and little known department of police – The Bureau of Missing Persons. Many incidents in this picture are taken from actual cases in police records." Or so they say.

Based on the story "Missing Men" by John Ayers and Carol Bird, the first half hour follows the day by day routine of what employees of the bureau go through on a daily basis. Joe (Allen Jenkins) checks the morgue to see if any one of the missing people on his list happens to be one of the deceased; Hank Slade (Hugh Herbert – in a straight non-comedic performance) has been looking for Gwendolyn Harris for the past six months, with no clue in sight. "Butch" Saunders (Pat O'Brien), a breezy detective with plenty of nerve (with catch phrase, "I bet you dollar six bids"), has been transferred to the bureau under Captain Webb (Lewis S. Stone), head of the department, where Saunders is to discipline himself by using common sense rather than his strong arm method. One of his first assignments is to locate Burton C. Kingman (Clay Clement), a married businessman having an affair with Alice Crane (Noel Francis). His next assignment is locating Caesar Paul (Tad Alexander), a famous boy violinist of 12, missing for ten days, who'd rather disappoint his parents (Marjorie Gateson and Wallis Clark) by being a regular boy with the fellas than having a concert career. Butch's biggest problems occur as Belle (Glenda Farrell), his wife with whom he's been separated for a year, coming to the scene demanding her allowance; and Norma Williams (Bette Davis), a former private secretary, whom Butch helps to locate her husband, Therme Roberts (Alan Dinehart), unaware that there's more to what Norma's been telling him to solve the case that involves a murder. Featured along with a huge assortment of Warner Brothers stock players (except for Lewis Stone on loan from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer), include Ruth Donnelly (The Receptionist); Henry Kolker (Theodore Arno); George Chandler (Homer Howard); and Hobart Cavanaugh (Mr. Harris).

Although Bette Davis name heads the cast, she basically a supporting character whose character doesn't appear until 31 minutes into the start of the movie, which very much belongs to the third billed Pat O'Brien, making his Warner Brothers debut. Coming off best is the wisecracking Glenda Farrell as the gold-digging ex-wife whose three or four scenes add much to the antics at the bureau as she enters the scenes yelling for "Butchie Wutchie," yet there's one scene alone, involving Farrell, meant for laughs in 1933, might come across as a little disturbing today.

While basically serious when it comes to police methods, BUREAU OF MISSING PERSONS does have its share of unintentional laughs, especially where Lewis Stone seriously and with a straight face orders his men to hire an airplane to follow a carrying pigeon to the location of a hideout of kidnappers. Interestingly, Bette Davis, looks years older to her true age here, especially later when she changes her hair color from blonde to brown. Her character also comes and goes throughout the story, with at one point showing up at her own funeral to see how she looks in a coffin after being reported dead.

Could it be possible some of the scenes depicted are based on actual incidents? Or is it possible that the writers just simply added doses of their own originality to embellish what actually happened? For O'Brien's debut for Warners, he showed great promise to become the studio's stock player, often opposite James Cagney later on. While O'Brien worked with Davis earlier in an independent reform school melodrama of HELL'S HOUSE (Capital Films, 1932), their paths would never meet again at Warners.

Decades before Turner Classic Movies would acquire the rights to this and other nearly forgotten Warner Brothers programmers from the thirties to forties, BUREAU OF MISSING PERSONS did have its share of broadcasts prior to 1974 on WPHL, Channel 17, in Philadelphia (where I initially viewed this rare find), the now former home of the Warner Brothers classic film library. Distributed to video cassette in the 1990s, and DVD a decade later, this 75 minute programmer is never dull through its actions and performances. Remade by Warners as THE MISSING WITNESS (1937) with John Litel and Joan Dale, this original is much better, "I bet you dollar six bids." (***)

This movie really can only be enjoyed if the viewers turn off their brain. That's because although the movie is unique and diverting, at times the plot and writing is abysmal. The plot has holes and improbabilities galore and the character played by Pat O'Brien must be most the stupidest and most unbelievably violent cop of the 1930s. If policemen had REALLY been this dumb, I don't know how we ever could have made it through the decade! Plus, if you combine all his civil rights violations (kicking in doors without warrants, arresting people recklessly and savagely beating his bigamist wife at the end of the film), you get a truly annoying character.

However, if you turn off your brain and watch the film JUST for its entertainment value, it's pretty good stuff. Plus, while it didn't do a lot to make Bette Davis a star, it did give her top billing AND her character was a lot better written than O'Brien's.

Entertaining AND stupid--that about says it all!

The Missing Persons Department is inundated with cases. Police Capt. Webb (Lewis Stone) deals with different kinds of outcomes. Butch Saunders (Pat O'Brien) from the robbery department is shocked to be transferred. He joins Joe Musik on the case of missing married man Burton Kingman. They think that he's shacked up with his girlfriend. Norma Roberts (Bette Davis) comes in looking for her missing husband.

A modern audience would be shocked with what Webb does with Kingman. It does highlight a different time. It is also a more raw depiction of police. In that sense, this is interesting. I'm not saying that this is somehow realism on film. It is more aligned with a modern TV police procedural where we're given several cases and the police work to solve each one while some detectives deal with personal issues. Bette Davis may be the headliner, but most would be disappointed with her minor role. Most police procedural fans will recognize the basics of this movie.

Pat O'Brien, Lewis Stone, Bette Davis, Glenda Farrell, and Allen Jenkins star in "Bureau of Missing Persons," a 1933 film from Warner Brothers. I noticed that one person who posted said that this was an extremely fast-moving film. I thought it would never end.

O'Brien plays Butch Saunders, a detective who is thought to have been a little too violent in his police work, so he is assigned the Bureau. He turns out to be good at his job.

Davis plays a young woman whose husband is missing. Normally in her early films, Davis is very blond, and very glamorous. Here she's not. Her role is an interesting one, with a couple of twists. She's very good, of course, but I doubt she would have been happy in this type of role for her entire career.

There are some other plot lines going on, with Lewis Stone a kindly man who tries to help people, and Glenda Farrell gives a fun performance as Belle. It's a familiar cast in their very young days and worth seeing for that reason. I admit I found it dragged a little.

...In fact, Warner Brothers seemed very confused as to who they wanted to play the hothead with a (usually) good heart until the production code era. Then it was O'Brien's level headed guy to Cagney's hothead. But here O'Brien is still in hothead mode, as he is Butch, a detective assigned to NYC's Bureau of Missing Persons - the part of the NYPD that tracks down missing persons or sometimes their corpses - because Butch has gotten to be too rough as a regular detective. Hopefully here he will learn to use his head.

Lewis Stone takes a vacation from MGM to play Captain Webb, head of the bureau, with a Judge Hardy style of leadership. It's interesting to see his humane treatment of people who must be informed that the missing is deceased, and how he tries to restore the deliberately missing to their families with minimum embarrassment to the missing or the families. Here we get into precode territory a couple of times.

Bette Davis plays Norma Roberts, a woman who comes to the bureau looking for her missing husband. But to be married to the guy she knows ridiculously little about what he looks like and his habits when Butch questions her. What goes on here? Watch and find out.

This is a great Warner Bros. precode in the Warner Bros. tradition that has an unusual setting. With Ruth Donnelly as the bureau's secretary with mouth and attitude to spare as usual, Glenda Farrell with a cameo role as Butch's estranged wife who is always coming in to clean out his pockets (it was the Depression, a girl's got to eat, you know?), and Allen Jenkins as a bureau detective who for once plays a capable guy who is in the know.