Murder, He Says

I'm 52, and, along with my younger sister and brother, saw this movie, when I was a kid. It remains one of the funniest movies I've ever seen, and I've seen an awful lot of movies. After seeing it the first time, and literally screaming and crying with laughter at much of it, my siblings and I would search the TV Guide as soon as the magazine arrived at our house hoping to find Murder He Says among the listings for the coming week. Once or twice a year, we would be beside ourselves with glee to find it. It was an absolute treat for us.

Many of its scenes are indelibly etched in my memory: Fred MacMurray with Grandma; the scene at the large, lazy-susan dinner table, with everyone trying to move the table one way or another to get the poisoned food away from them; the scenes in the basement toward the end of the movie, and, especially, the scene when Fred MacMurray is caught in the basement coal bin by Bonnie Fleagle (unquestionably, one of the funniest scenes in movie history.

It's a movie that is both frightening and extremely funny. Directed by George Marshall, who also directed several other favorites of mine: Destry Rides Again (Jimmy Stewart and Marlene Dietrich; a 1939 classic); Fancy Pants (Bob Hope) and The Mating Game (Tony Randall, Debbie Reynolds).

Yes, it's improbable and, I'll grant you, silly. It is also, IMHO (in my humble opinion) a great movie. Yes, great...so there!!

Classic comedy starring Fred MacMurray as a pollster who shows up at a hillbilly family's house looking for another pollster who went missing in the area. He finds himself knee-deep in trouble with the hillbillies, who are a clan of criminals looking for some money that only their dying grandmother knows the location of -- and she only wants to tell Fred. Things get even more crazy when Helen Walker shows up, claiming to be the Bonnie Parker-esque member of the family who recently escaped from prison.

It's a very funny movie with MacMurray in rare form as the poor guy who stumbles into a weird situation and can't wait to get out of it. The bit where he pretends to talk to a ghost to fool the dumb twins is priceless. At one point in the movie there's a clever gag where MacMurray's character comes upon an idea involving an organ because he saw the same bit in The Ghost Breakers, which was another Paramount comedy directed by George Marshall. Another great scene has MacMurray doing his version of Dorf decades before Tim Conway. Helen Walker is lovely and does a fine job but her part is mostly a straight one with few laughs. Marjorie Main is wonderful as a sort of dark version of her famous Ma Kettle character. Peter Whitney is lots of fun playing a set of dimwitted but violent twins. The rest of the cast includes Porter Hall, Jean Heather, Barbara Pepper, and a scene-stealing Mabel Paige as the grandmother. It's a good comedy with a terrific cast. Probably could've trimmed ten minutes in the middle but it doesn't hurt the pace too much. Definitely worth a look.

I had always wanted to check out this black comedy – a rare thing for Hollywood during this era (off-hand, the only other one I can recall is ARSENIC AND OLD LACE [1944]). However, it's never been available to me until now…so that, in compiling a list of lightweight titles I most wanted to watch throughout the Christmas season, it's no surprise the film ended up at the top of the list. Even so, this has more of a cult than classic reputation – but it was certainly a delight: incidentally, while I'm usually somewhat queasy watching movies centering around hillbillies, their inherent eccentric nature works perfectly within the context of MURDER, HE SAYS' bizarre plot.

By the way, the greedy/homicidal-family-after-a-sum-of-money involved harks back to the popular 'old dark house'-type comedy-thrillers – which undoubtedly gives the whole added appeal. With this in mind, the location of the loot being hidden within the nonsensical verses of an old ditty is a much-used device in this kind of picture – as is the presence in the house of both a secret passageway and a mysterious assailant (whose identity actually isn't hard to guess). Similarly, the fact that the moribund crone (justifiably) suspects her relatives' motives and opts to confide in a stranger is particularly reminiscent of the wonderful Sir Roderick Femm scene in my favorite subgenre entry – the appropriately-titled THE OLD DARK HOUSE (1932).

That said, the original elements here are no less engaging – with the unlikely albeit effectively-handled 'glowing poison' expedient a recurring motif (which reaches its zenith in the hilarious dinner sequence around an inconveniently revolving table). The most side-splitting visual gags, then, both feature bodily contortions: the hero being tied up in a most awkward position to be grilled by the Fleagles and his own later pretense as a midget in order to conceal one of their two identical sons lying unconscious at his real feet! For the record, there's even an amusing in-joke in the film's reference to THE GHOST BREAKERS (1940) – the marvelous Bob Hope comedy-horror vehicle, also made by director Marshall at Paramount!

Fred MacMurray makes for an ideal lead – suitably bewildered and out-of-his-depth at first, but who eventually contrives to outwit the crazy clan by employing his 'superior' city-slicker ways. Apart from a whip-cracking Marjorie Main (perhaps the quintessential female hick) and mad scientist(!) Porter Hall as the respective heads of the backwoods brood, the remaining cast members were unknown to me – though all enter gleefully into the offbeat spirit of the thing. The twins were obviously played by the same actor and, unsurprisingly, leading lady Helen Walker turns out not to be vicious/demented after all (since she's only impersonating a convicted member of the dysfunctional family, with the real character herself surfacing towards the end).

Maintaining a frenzied pitch virtually for the entire duration (leading to an extended chase finale that's capped by an inventive come-uppance for practically the entire main cast) makes the film seem longer than its 94 minutes – but it's an inspired ride all the way, and great fun to boot. The quality of the copy I acquired (derived from VHS) isn't optimal if still quite passable under the circumstances…at least until Universal (who now owns the film) sees fit to give it a decent – and much-deserved – release on DVD. I guess HD-DVD is out-of-the-question for such an obscure little item and, in any case, I'm not yet willing to give in to the format just yet owing to the undue hassle and expense this would clearly entail!

"Murder, He Says," is a comedy from 1945 starring Fred MacMurray, Helen Walker, Marjorie Main, and Porter Hall.

MacMurray plays Pete Marshall, a pollster who goes looking for another employee who disappeared. He soon finds himself at the mercy of a bunch of inbreds who are looking for money hidden by a relative, Bonnie Fleagle, who is in prison. The matriarch, Ma (Marjorie Main) walks around with a whip to keep everybody in line. Everybody includes twin brothers, Mert and Bert, one of whom has a crick in his neck. This leads to a funny scene later.

Pete can't seem to get away from them, and they make him pretend he's Bonnie's boyfriend, hoping that grandma, whom Ma poisoned with something that makes her glow in the dark, knows where the money is.

Grandma gives Pete a sampler with a song on it, and something to quote for Bonnie. Meanwhile, another relative, Elany, seems to know the song, but the words she sings are nonsensical.

Things become more complicated when Bonnie (Helen Walker) escapes from prison and shows up. Except she's not Bonnie. Her father was accused of helping Bonnie Fleagle steal $70,000, and she wants to find it to clear his name. Pete is all for hightailing it out of there, but she wants to stay and find the loot. Everyone knuckles under to her until the real Bonnie (Barbara Pepper) shows up.

I perhaps wasn't in the mood for this comedy, but it was very funny anyway, if a little long. The scene at the dinner table is hilarious. I just don't understand how this glow in the dark stuff was supposed to work.

Anyway, the house is filled with hidden passages that everyone disappears in and appears from.

Fred MacMurray was perfect for this, a normal guy caught up in complete insanity. Helen Walker, whose career would suffer so badly later on, is terrific. Marjorie Main - off the wall with that whip. Brilliant.

The denouement is clever and a riot.

Helen Walker gave a ride to three soldiers on New Year's Eve 1946, and had a terrible accident where one soldier was killed and the other two injured. The surviving soldiers accused her of driving drunk and speeding, and she was put on trial. She was cleared, but her career was basically over. She died at 47.

In this film, she's on the verge of stardom and after "Murder, He Says," she was cast as the lead in a big film, "Heaven Only Knows," but the producers replaced her.

She's very good here -- if you get a chance to catch this film on TCM, don't miss it.

I've seen Murder He Says many times and it's a pretty funny film. Fred MacMurray had never done that kind of belly laugh comedy before and I'm sure that Walt Disney must have screened this film and that he was certainly capable of it when he made him Disney's number one male star starting with The Shaggy Dog.

But every time I watch it, I keep thinking this was a property developed for Bob Hope. All of the mixed up adventures with this rube Fliegle family are pure Hope. Imagine Hope instead of Fred MacMurray in the lead and I'm sure you'll agree with me.

My guess is that Hope was busy entertaining the troops and Paramount had this thing ready to go and prevailed upon another of their contract players to step in.

As a pinch hitter though, Fred MacMurray batted in a big old home run with this one.

By the way that tune that is the key to where the buried treasure is will be rattling around in your brain for weeks.