I have now seen five of the eight Whistler films Columbia Pictures made in the 1940’s. By now, I thought I would have memorized the incredibly strange tune The Whistler whistles at the beginning and end of each installment. Instead, I find myself increasingly frustrated by the piece. It seems to start with the first three notes of “Here Comes The Bride” before each additional note seems to be what I least expected from the one before it, even if all of them are in the same key. It must take some kind of twisted genius to write something so weird, but still musical, that is so unmemorable after hearing it ten times.
Richard Dix is once again the star and, once again, in a different role than any of the preceding entries in the series. This time around, he is a private eye. His latest client is Paul E. Burns, an elderly man is looking for a girl from his building who disappeared seven years before. She was fourteen at the time, and nobody knows where she went after her mother died.
Anybody who is on the fence as to whether this series of films is noir will have those doubts are dispelled in this scene where Burns tells his story to Dix. The room is unlit, except for a single neon light outside the office. Anybody who thinks Dix will deliver a less weird performance is also mistaken. Consider his schizophrenic turn when he thinks Burns doubts his abilities. He barks, “I may not be the greatest detective in the world…”, only to suddenly, creepily, break into a smile: “…but I am the most unusual.” True that, Dix.
Burns can only pay $100 for the investigation, but tells Dix that, if he can find the missing girl, she can pay him any amount she wants. That is an intriguing set-up. What is even more bizarre is why she will be able to pay so much, and that is the two wax cylinder recordings belong to her mother which are now in his possession, each of which is worth one hundred thousand dollars. In 2024 dollars, that would value each at roughly two and a quarter million dollars. I’m a record collector, and I don’t think any record would command such a price now.
Dix advises Burns to place an ad in the paper. Three days later, Helen Mowery shows up, claiming to be the missing girl now all grown up. Burns doesn’t specify what he has of her deceased mother’s that is so astonishing, but that there is something he needs to give her that is immensely valuable. While Burns goes to phone Dix, noir thug staple Mike Mazurki has broken into his music shop. Mazurki kills the old man and abducts the young woman.
Two things happen in quick succession which surprised me. First, Mowery isn’t dead, though it is never adequately explained how she managed to escape the house in which she was held captive. Second, she isn’t even the missing girl, but was hired and trained by Dix to play that role.
I liked how Dix and Mowery get to where she was held all night. She had been blindfolded on the way there, but she can recall the feel of different road surfaces, and remembers elements such as the overwhelming smell of chocolate when they first exited the car. Turns out there is a candy factory near what is revealed to be Mazurki’s house. I was hoping she had instead been inexplicably abducted by Willy Wonka.
Dix breaks into the house. The first thing he does is take off his shoes, which I thought was a clever idea, though he almost crushed an empty liquor bottle underfoot in the hallway. There’s actually two bottles there, which made me wonder why the thug chose to get blottoed there instead of a room. And he killed two bottles there?!
The P.I. narrowly avoids running into Mazurki when the guy goes to answer the door, and the big man is shot dead by two police officers (Barton MacLane and Charles Lane). Fleeing through a series of back yards, Dix loses a shoe without realizing it, which I think is the surest sign one has been running for their life.
Pamela Blake eventually enters the picture as the true inheritor of those precious cylinders. She’s oblivious to the efforts to find her, having been in a sanitorium since an accident, the nature of which we never learn. I also found it baffling she is in such a facility, but is very well-dressed and made-up. It appears they also have quite a hair salon on the premises. When she is found, she says she’ll be ready in a minute. I was disappointed she didn’t return in a full-flowing ball gown and tiara.
Dix manages to rope her into his scheme, though she is righty doubtful of his intentions. She may not realize what she is in involved in is a sort of con game, yet she makes this astute observation regarding the trust he expects of her: “The confidence all seems to be on one side.”
In order for his plan to work, he secludes her in the house of Kathleen Howard. This woman appears to be old, dowdy and harmless, and resides in a house like something out of Arsenic & Old Lace, but is revealed to have a cunning intelligence honed on the streets. She takes in boarders for usually short periods of time. “It’s more profitable that way.”
This film is full of odd, if not quite believable, surprises. Towards the end, Dix manages to sneak into a place where police have been watching for him. He just walks on crutches right past an officer, his face obscured in some thick bandaging. He looks like he is in a community theatre production of The Elephant Man.
Mysterious Intruder continues the streak of strange and flawed, yet curiously compelling, Whistler films. I look forward to the next installment. Maybe in that one I can finally wrap my brain around that goddamn theme tune.
Dir: William Castle
Starring Richard Dix, Helen Mowery
Watched as part of Powerhouse/Indicator’s UK blu-ray box set Columbia Noir #6: The Whistler (Region B)