Detetive Kitty O'Day

I love seeing Monogram movies. They don't have a pristine look. They look down and dirty -- which they were.

It seems as if someone must have said, "Get me Jean Arthur!" and it was misunderstood. Parker plays a flighty girl along the lines of many an Arthur role. She also resembles the sublime Gracie Allen at times.

But Parker was a fine actress in her own right. She shoulders this picture and carries it to great success.

Veda Ann Borg is also on-hand for some cheesecake. But it's Parker's movie all the way.

(The sequel, "The Adventures of Kitty O'Dea," is a retread of the same movie. It's pleasant enough but breaks not ground at all.)

I mostly know Jean Parker from movies of the early 1930s (LITTLE WOMEN springs to mind) and I mostly associate her with teary-eyed victims of tragedy or sweet young romantic interests. Bland supporting roles in mostly dramatic pictures. The sweet daughter, the poor sister, the hometown sweetheart. DETECTIVE KITTY O'DAY (1944) showcases Parker as a comedienne. She goes for broke in the name of comedy and I was impressed. Jean Parker is the whole show.

Made for B-level Monogram Pictures, DETECTIVE KITTY O'DAY is an inconsequential hour-long comedy-mystery programmer. There are no big names in the cast. The most recognizable actor after Parker is Edward Gargan, in the dumb police sidekick role he'd played countless times at the major studios. Veda Ann Borg lends sex appeal to the supporting cast.

Kitty O'Day (Jean Parker) is a secretary who drags her boyfriend Johnny (Peter Cookson) around as she tries to solve her boss's murder. Every time the police run into the amateur sleuths a dead body turns up.

Parker, pretty as always, handles the comedy with aplomb. Kitty O'Day is plucky and bright, in her own silly screwball way. She delivers zingers with a smile, uses accents and props, faints, crawls on the ground, and even wears a disguise. With Johnny along for the ride, the investigation is full of slip-ups, goofs, and misunderstandings, but Kitty somehow seems to land on the right track.

For the sake of comedy the script allows for some lapses in logic, but they are easily overlooked. The film is enjoyable silliness from start to finish. Strictly a low-budget, small-time affair, but Jean Parker is fun to watch at the center of it all. It's neat seeing a different side to the actress a decade after the 1930s roles I know best.

Jean Parker is fast-talking Kitty O'Day, a spunky secretary who sets out to solve a murder. Peter Cookson tries to keep up as Johnny Jones, the boyfriend who assists in her investigation. Together they track a murderer….but they have a couple of problems: 1) more dead bodies keep turning up, and 2) the cops think they did it.

Tim Ryan, who co-wrote the script, has many of the funniest lines as wise-cracking police detective Clancy. (Finding Kitty and Johnny in a room with yet another dead body: ""The butler! Every time I see you with somebody, they're dead.") Edward Gargan is also fun as the usual dumb assistant cop who goes through the picture saying "Yes, Chief." B movie regulars Douglas Fowley and Veda Ann Borg are also along for the ride.

The plot isn't much, and the situations are all pretty familiar….hiding behind apartment furniture, sneaking out on a window ledge, stumbling over dead bodies in the dark—all the usual dangers and dilemmas are here.

However, it's all done in such good humor! It looks like they slapped together a few sets, glanced through the script, and shot it with no rehearsal, just kind of seeing how it would turn out—and having a great time. It's sloppy and goofy—but somehow it clicks in a way few of these B comedies manage to do.

The enthusiastic cast is apparently the key. Led by Parker, the whole gang roar through the proceedings with great gusto. It won't make you think, but it's lots of fun.

The other reviews I've read are too harsh. There are far worse movies rated way higher.

This movie succeeds in being light, funny, and entertaining with a dash of mystery. If you were expecting a gritty film noir or a complex mystery from a B-movie titled "Detective Kitty O'Day" then you watched the wrong movie. That's on you.

It's purposefully slapstick and goofy. The cops are completely useless. The boyfriend keeps threatening to walk out until Kitty ropes him back into her antics again. It's great.

I can't think of many other films of the era with a female detective headliner, so in that way it is ahead of its time. The film also reflects the sexism of the time, as they all treat her as hysterical, which makes sense as it was made in the 1940s. That said, there is a nice moment where Kitty's boyfriend sticks up for her.

It was a fun hour spent for me and I didn't feel like my time was wasted.

Detective Kitty O'Day played by Jean Parker in the first of two films she did as Kitty O'Day who with her reluctant boyfriend Peter Cookson goes around solving crimes and generally getting into all kinds of mischief. If I didn't know any better I'd swear I was watching Bonita Granville and Frankie Thomas in one of the Warner Brothers Nancy Drew series albeit a bit older.

Parker is working for a millionaire who winds up dead with a widow who was already stepping out with Douglas Fowley. Veda Ann Borg was the merry widow and she's the main reason to see this as she usually is the main reason to see any film she's in.

Bodies start piling up in this 'mystery' until it is fairly obvious who could have done it.

One more film and there was no more demand for Kitty O'Day.