MR. MOTO'S GAMBLE (1938)

Director: James Tinling

Writers: Charles Belden, Jerry Cady, based on the Mr. Moto character created by John P. Marquand

Producers: John Stone, Sol M. Wurtzel (uncredited)

Cast: Peter Lorre, Keye Luke, Maxie Rosenblum, Harold Huber, Lynn Bari, Dick Baldwin, Douglas Fowley, Jayne Regan, John Hamilton, George E. Stone, Bernard Nedell, Ward Bond, Charles Williams, Pierre Watkin, Lon Chaney, Jr., Paul Fix, Adrian Morris, (and uncredited cast) Olin Howard, Lester Dorr, Gladden James

Japanese sleuth Mr. Moto (Peter Lorre) is in San Francisco, California teaching a course in criminology. Among his pupils is Lee Chan (Keye Luke), the son of famed Honolulu, Hawaii Police Detective Charlie Chan. While Mr. Moto and Lee Chan attend a boxing match that will determine the next challenger to the current heavyweight champion, the knocked-out fighter dies. It is soon determined that the dead fighter (Russ Clark) was poisoned. As there were many heavy bets placed on the outcome of the fight, there is no shortage of suspects for Mr. Moto to sort through to help the police solve the case.

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This third film in the Mr. Moto series from the 20th Century-Fox studio has a rather convoluted production history. This was originally intended as an installment in Fox’s popular series of Charlie Chan detective films starring Warner Oland. Charlie Chan at the Ringside began filming in January of 1938. Oland was going through a contentious divorce and was becoming more disenchanted with the studio. Production was halted when Warner Oland left the set never to return, either due to illness or a temperamental act of rebellion. Unfortunately, Oland caught pneumonia and passed away on August 6th, 1938. Without their star to finish portraying the Chinese detective hero, the studio salvaged their investment in the unfinished film by changing it to feature another East Asian sleuth, namely Mr. Moto of their burgeoning series starring Peter Lorre.

Now retitled Mr. Moto’s Gamble, this film was a change of pace for the Moto series. There are no international criminal schemes to foil or globe-hopping intrigue for Moto to deal with here. This time around, Mr. Moto is concerned with solving a murder mystery. The repurposed plot is a Charlie Chan case that is slightly reconfigured to have Moto do all the detective work that Chan was originally intended to do. To accommodate this, Mr. Moto is introduced instructing a criminology course in San Francisco. In an early instance of popular culture series crossovers, none other than Lee Chan (Keye Luke), Charlie Chan’s number one son, is one of Moto’s pupils.

In the first two Mr. Moto films, we were not made immediately aware of Moto’s goals and ethics. He seemed polite and mild-mannered while employing devious and deadly means to achieve his objectives. With this entry in the series, it is immediately established that Mr. Moto is one of the good guys. As a respected international detective, Moto is not only teaching a criminology course, but he is also assisting the police on this case, just as Charlie Chan had in numerous films.

While the action and scope of the plot have been dialed down for Mr. Moto to pinch hit for Charlie Chan in a more conventional murder mystery, we are still in good hands with Peter Lorre as our hero. In addition to his intelligence and criminology expertise, Lorre’s Mr. Moto still displays his usual humility stating that he and others are amateurs in comparison to the absent detective Charlie Chan. I have always felt such mild-mannered grace on Moto’s part demonstrates his confidence in his abilities far more effectively than all the bad boy antics of many so-called heroes in modern films. Moto’s humble attitude also sets up his enemies, as well as the audience, to be surprised by his tactics.

The need for Charlie Chan to be referenced at all is due to the inclusion of Chan’s son in the story. Keye Luke is very likable as he portrays Lee Chan’s typical youthful enthusiasm for crime-solving in this case of prizefighting homicide. As I recall, the master detective Charlie Chan would always try to reign in his well-meaning offspring’s rash actions, yet Lee always seemed to idolize his “pop.” It is amusing that, despite his father not being around, Lee is still contending with his father’s dismissive authority by pretending he went to San Francisco to study art instead of criminology.

Along with Lee Chan is his fellow criminology pupil and comedy relief figure, Horace “Knockout” Wellington. As played by former prize fighter Maxie Rosenbloom, Knockout is quite funny. His comedic role is immediately established as an ex-boxer and kleptomaniac taking criminology to help him solve cases of his own larceny, because he can’t remember who he steals from. Knockout becomes a handy plot device when he swipes an overcoat containing an important clue. Luke and Rosenbloom are a fun duo and play well off each other as they compete with Mr. Moto to solve the murder case. They would be the first of the comical cohorts to assist Moto in some of his adventures.

From the previous Thank You, Mr. Moto (1937), Jayne Regan returns to the series as a different and less central character, the spoiled rich girl Linda Benton trying to tempt aspiring boxer Bill Steele (Dick Baldwin) away from his gal, newspaper reporter Penny Kendall (Lynn Bari).

It is a nice touch that Bari’s Penny is concerned about the physical risks associated with her beau’s profession. We get reminders of how grueling and unglamorous the fight game can be.

Two Perry Whites are in the cast. John Hamilton is featured as Philip Benton, Linda Benton’s father and head of the corporation that owns the boxing arena. Hamilton was much more likably gruff as The Daily Planet newspaper editor Perry White in the 1950s Adventures of Superman television series (1952–58). Pierre Watkin, the first on-camera actor to play Perry White in the serials Superman (1948) and Atom Man vs. Superman (1950), has a bit part here as a district attorney.

Even if you don’t know his name, any vintage film fan will immediately recognize George E. Stone. He was a prolific character actor often turning up in old movies being sneaky, suspicious, or associating with the wrong crowd. Stone’s shifty screen persona was tempered a bit by his recurrent role as “The Runt,” the sidekick to the crime-solving hero Boston Blackie in a series from the Columbia Films studio. Here Stone plays Jerry Connors, the shady manager of murdered fighter Frankie Stanton.

Another hard-working actor at the time that would become quite a name was Ward Bond. Here he plays reigning heavyweight champion Biff Moran, who is scheduled to defend his title against Bill Steele. Bond was a USC college football teammate of John Wayne’s and would go on to co-star in plenty of The Duke’s films. Bond’s enormous filmography was capped off starring as Major Seth Adams in the Western television series Wagon Train (1957–61).

Keep your eyes peeled for Lon Chaney, Jr., allowed only two lines in his role as Joey, the intimidating-looking thug accompanying gambling gangster Nick Crowder (Douglas Fowley). After appearing in a ton of films as bit parts, supporting players, and occasional low-budget leads during the 1930s, Chaney was just one year away from his most acclaimed film role as Lennie in Of Mice and Men (1939). Of course, in the 1940s, Chaney would become a horror film staple for Universal Pictures.

Despite the unlucky hand dealt to 20th Century-Fox, their Mr. Moto’s Gamble must have paid off. The change of tone for this third Mr. Moto movie did not derail the popularity of the series. A fun cast helps this installment play well with its own distinctive charm. It is a fine example of the polished entertainments that the movie factories of classic Hollywood could crank out, even while improvising around unexpected production challenges.

THANK YOU, MR. MOTO (1937)

Director: Norman Foster

Writers: Willis (later Wyllis) Cooper, Norman Foster adapting John P. Marquand’s novel

Producer: Sol M. Wurtzel

Cast: Peter Lorre, Thomas Beck, Jayne Regan, Sidney Blackmer, Pauline Frederick, Philip Ahn, John Carradine, Sig Rumann, Nedda Harrigan, John Bleifer, Wilhelm von Brincken 

Japanese detective and international importer Mr. Moto (Peter Lorre) has recovered one of a set of seven ancient Chinese silk scrolls. The complete set of scrolls would reveal the location of the tomb and treasure of the 13th-century Mongol emperor Genghis Kahn. Moto contacts Prince Chung (Philip Ahn) and his mother Madame Chung (Pauline Frederick) in Peiping, China. The Chung family has long been entrusted to safeguard the scrolls and keep the treasure’s location a secret. While Moto tries to encourage them to let him use their scrolls, there are others who will use any means to acquire all of the scrolls and take the Genghis Kahn treasure. 

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Peter Lorre will probably always be associated with unsavory characters ever since he achieved international fame playing a serial murderer of little girls in the German film M (1931). His small stature, unusual features, and soft Hungarian accent make him seem both harmless and distinctive. That impression abetted Lorre as a film menace. This is the kind of guy who would not seem threatening to most, yet the viewer finds him odd enough to be interesting and unsettling. That quality also made Peter Lorre a great choice for the devious and dangerous Mr. Moto. 

Think Fast, Mr. Moto (1937) had been a big B-film hit for 20th Century Fox, which led to the series that the studio surely hoped for. The adaptation of novelist John P. Marquand’s popular Japanese secret agent maintained the character’s mystique and the popular formula of danger and mystery in exotic places. The main changes to the Mr. Moto film character made him a more central player in the story and his vocation became more international than strictly Japan-directed. 

Thank You, Mr. Moto was the second film released in the eight-film series. Once again Lorre’s Mr. Moto is the soft-spoken and enigmatic character that we join in the midst of an adventure, and we have to try to keep up with him for a good stretch of the picture before we know just what he is after. As in the first film, Mr. Moto seems vaguely sinister. For those who had not seen that first Moto movie, they may not be sure that he is supposed to be the good guy. He continues to nonchalantly dispose of people and, while they certainly seem to deserve it, we are not immediately sure of just how noble Moto’s objectives are. 

Also returning are Thomas Beck and Sig Rumann as different characters fulfilling more or less the same purpose as they did in the first film. Beck plays Tom Nelson, the male half of the young couple caught up in the danger. As Colonel Tchernov, Rumann is another baddie, though in a much smaller part this time around. 

In her first starring role, Jayne Regan plays Eleanor Joyce, the love interest of Tom Nelson. She would be cast as a different character in the very next Moto film to be released, Mr. Moto’s Gamble (1938). 

Genre film favorite John Carradine appears as the shady antiquities dealer Periera. As was the habit in this film series, Carradine was another actor who would play a different character in a later entry. He shows up for a larger role in Mr. Moto’s Last Warning (1938). 

The main heavy is Herr Koerger, a real bastard that is so intent on getting his greasy mitts on treasure that he’ll even resort to punching out an old woman. If Herr Koerger seems familiar, that’s because Sidney Blackmer plays him. Blackmer had been a prolific character actor appearing in films since 1914. He would also make many guest appearances in various television series. Blackmer memorably starred as another villain in “The Hundred Days of the Dragon,” the second episode of the classic science fiction television series The Outer Limits (1963-65). He is probably most remembered as half of the elderly, eccentric Castevet couple who room next door to Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse in Rosemary’s Baby (1968). 

While the Mr. Moto movies were always fun, this adventure is probably the grimmest in the series. As the film approaches its climax, Moto makes a vow of vengeance to a dying man and the film ends on an unusually somber note.

THE COMEDY OF TERRORS (1963)

Director: Jacques Tourneur

Writer: Richard Matheson

Producers: James H. Nicholson, Samuel Z. Arkoff

Cast: Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, Basil Rathbone, Joyce Jameson, Rhubarb (the cat Cleopatra), Beverly Powers (as Beverly Hills), Linda Rogers, Joe E. Brown, Luree Holmes, Alan DeWitt, Buddy Mason, Douglas Williams, (and uncredited cast) Paul Barselou, Harvey Parry, Charles Soldani 

In 19th century New England, underhanded undertakers Waldo Trumbull (Vincent Price) and Felix Gillie (Peter Lorre) are so destitute that they have used a single coffin for the last thirteen years. Once the mourners leave the graveside after each funeral service, Trumbull and Gillie dump the corpse into the hole and bury it to keep reusing the same casket. In spite of such economizing, their rent is a year overdue. Trumbull decides that they must resort to murder to generate more business. 

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During American International Pictures’ heyday of Edgar Allan Poe story adaptations, they followed up their Poe-inspired horror-comedy The Raven (1963) with The Comedy of Terrors. The latter film is not a Poe-based project and, surprisingly, not even contrived to be marketed as one. After all, AIP was the studio that tried passing off an adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s novel The Case of Charles Dexter Ward as a Poe adaptation by calling it The Haunted Palace (1963), merely using the title of one of Poe’s poems. Despite The Comedy of Terrors taking place in the Poe-appropriate setting of 19th century New England and dealing with that Poe-story peril of premature interment, AIP were content to just deliver another comedy dealing with period piece horror situations without a Poe reference. They probably thought that, between the gothic horrors of Britain’s Hammer Films and their own Poe adaptations, the popularity of classic horror was now firmly established and would contrast enough with humor for The Comedy of Terrors to create an interest all its own. 

The Comedy of Terrors has the talent to make it an absolute joy for the classic horror fan. Genre film stalwarts Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, and Basil Rathbone are given the chance to play comedy to the hilt. It is clear that they are enjoying themselves bringing to life the morbid slapstick, crass behavior, and bumbling antics in Richard Matheson’s fun script.

Another surprise is that Roger Corman was not this film’s director. Corman had directed all of the previous Matheson-scripted Poe films. That team seemed to be a safe bet at the box office for AIP’s period piece horror films, including the recent horror-comedy The Raven. Matheson had suggested that Jacques Tourneur direct. Best known as the director for several of producer Val Lewton’s atmospheric and thoughtful horror classics of the 1940s, one of the greatest film noirs with Out of the Past (1947), and the intense British supernatural thriller Night of the Demon (1957), Tourneur may seem like an odd choice to direct a comedy, even if it has macabre aspects. Matheson had been impressed with Tourneur’s thorough preparation and efficiency when directing the Matheson-scripted episode “Night Call” of The Twilight Zone television series (1959-1964). Matheson’s instincts paid off. Tourneur’s direction must have agreed with the entire cast who give spirited performances that result in plenty of laughs. 

Vincent Price is every bit as accomplished in his comedy here as he had been with the horror that is a large part of his cinematic reputation. He is hilariously despicable as the unprincipled, sarcastic, and ill-tempered drunkard Waldo Trumbull. My favorite aspect to this comedy is the oh-so-refined manner that Price’s Trumbull knowingly affects that contrasts with the true crassness of his character. One of the funniest line deliveries I have ever heard is when Price says, “Remove the carcass.” 

As Felix Gillie, Waldo Trumbull’s oppressed and bumbling lackey, Peter Lorre has our sympathy while still earning laughs. Gillie’s lack of ability is apparent at all times. Whether trying to build a coffin, breaking into a house, or even correctly pronouncing Trumbull’s name, Gillie never manages to accomplish much more than irritating his employer. Trumbull keeps Gillie under his thumb because he knows of Gillie’s criminal past and thinks that Gillie has no choice but to remain as Trumbull’s unscrupulous, undertaking assistant. 

Boris Karloff makes a seemingly thankless role as a doddering and ineffectual old man into another comedy highlight. As Amos Hinchley, he is the senior partner of the Hinchley & Trumbull Funeral Parlor. Being hard of hearing, tired, and senile, Hinchley is oblivious to the treachery of his partner. Trumbull’s favorite drunken game is trying to offer the old man “medicine” from a clearly labeled bottle of poison. When Hinchley’s daughter, Trumbull’s neglected wife Amaryllis, keeps preventing her father from being poisoned, Hinchley whines that nobody cares whether or not he lives or dies since he can’t take his “medicine.” 

Making the despicable Waldo Trumbull even more unreasonable is his disdain for his voluptuous wife. The beautiful blonde Amaryllis tries to be faithful to her habitually drunk husband despite his insults and ill temper. Apparently, Amaryllis is stuck in this marriage to her father’s amoral business partner. It must be said that her ear-splittingly awful attempts at operatic singing would test anyone’s patience except her nearly deaf father and the love-struck Felix Gillie. As Amaryllis, Joyce Jameson adds to the silliness with her character’s total lack of self-awareness regarding her terrible singing voice and her ambition to be an opera singer. 

It is interesting to consider that in the 1962 AIP film Tales of Terror, during the segment adapting Poe’s “The Black Cat,” the acting trio of Price, Lorre, and Jameson also played out the situation of the destitute inebriate not appreciating his luscious wife who is charmed by an associate. Price and Lorre are actually almost playing reversed roles in The Comedy of Terrors. Peter Lorre’s role in “The Black Cat” was that of the crude, drunken lout neglecting Joyce Jameson as his wife who falls for the refined and appreciative wine taster played by Vincent Price. Lorre and Price were in fine, if more subdued, comic form there, as well. 

Another cast member from Tales of Terror is Basil Rathbone. Here his John F. Black is the landlord threatening Waldo Trumbull with eviction, which inspires the unsavory undertaker to commit murder to get paying customers in a hurry. Rathbone’s Black is a devotee of Shakespeare and indulges himself acting out with hammy excess scenes from the Bard’s plays. In Poe fashion, Black is afflicted with frequent deathlike spells from catalepsy that keep the audience and the shifty undertakers wondering if he is ever really going to die. 

I can’t recall ever seeing a film where it was more evident that everyone involved must have been having a great time making it. The Comedy of Terrors is a farce that should also give every fan of classic horror a great time watching it.

THINK FAST, MR. MOTO (1937)

Director: Norman Foster

Writers: Howard Ellis Smith, Norman Foster, Wyllis Cooper (uncredited), Charles Kenyon (uncredited), J. P. Marquand (based on his original story)

Producer: Sol M. Wurtzel

Cast: Peter Lorre, Thomas Beck, Virginia Field, Sig Rumann, Murray Kinnell, John Rogers, Lotus Long, J. Carrol Naish, Geoge Cooper, Frederick Vogeding, George Hassell, Bert Roach, Charles Tannen, Howard Wilson 

Mr. Moto (Peter Lorre) is a small, soft-spoken, Japanese gentleman that befriends Bob Hitchings, Jr. (Thomas Beck), aboard a steamship leaving San Francisco and bound for Shanghai, China. Hitchings is the son of the owner of the steamship line that is being used by smugglers. Young Hitchings has been sent by his father to look into the problem at the Hitchings Shanghai branch. Mr. Moto also accompanies young Hitchings to Shanghai. Hitchings is unaware of Mr. Moto’s interest in this smuggling operation and Moto’s motives are unknown. 

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American author John P. Marquand wrote a series of stories for The Saturday Evening Post about mystery and intrigue in foreign locales featuring the Japanese secret agent Mr. Moto. In those stories Moto remained an enigmatic presence. The tales were not told from Moto’s perspective but from the viewpoint of American characters somehow entangled in trouble and romance in exotic places. Moto was a mysterious figure drifting in and out of the narrative to ultimately help save the day.

20th Century Fox was already enjoying great success with their Charlie Chan film series. Since the Mr. Moto stories were very popular, Fox must have thought that another Asian hero in another series of mystery films would go over just fine. However, their eight Mr. Moto films were very different from the Chan series. In contrast to a friendly police detective hero with a large family of offspring, Mr. Moto is a mysterious loner with a vague and changing affiliation to organizations that he operates for. In the film series, Mr. Moto is not an agent for the government of Japan but an international detective. In this first Moto film, he refers to his detective work as a hobby while conducting an investigation on behalf of the Japanese trading company he manages. In the later films, Moto is an agent of Interpol.

Hungarian actor Peter Lorre had earned a lot of accolades for his talent. However, when he arrived at Fox the studio did not seem to know just what to do with this distinctive personality. Starring Lorre in a B-film series may have seemed like a professional dead end, but the Moto films proved to be very popular. It is Lorre’s presence that elevates these films and makes them the great fun that they are. Lorre’s Mr. Moto is a hero you can believe in because he is so unusual. Like Sherlock Holmes or Tarzan, it requires a character with a very offbeat background and personality to be capable of the extraordinary feats and behavior that are required in these adventures. I do not believe for one minute in the derring-do, steely nerve, and lightning-quick aptitude of the generic and conceited louts that so many contrived and bloated action movies now pass off as heroes. Those snarky clowns may be goal-oriented to achieve what society deems success, but they demonstrate with every contemporary catch phrase that they are never going to have the exceptional character to become heroic in ability or motivation.

Think Fast, Mr. Moto is the first of the eight Moto films starring Peter Lorre. It is interesting to realize that for most of this story we never really know what Mr. Moto is after. He seems mild-mannered and pleasant, but is revealed early on to be capable of stealth and violence. In addition to being a master of disguise and jiu-jitsu, he is bilingual, demonstrates incredible sleight-of-hand dexterity with cards, and can instruct a bartender how to mix a hangover cure (I really ought to write that one down). Moto’s array of talents is not only impressive and intriguing; it is believable due to the unique dynamic of Peter Lorre in this role. His Mr. Moto is a character unlike any other. It is only someone this unusual that could achieve so much prowess and intelligence.

Nowadays, we take for granted the brutality and cold-blooded behavior in our favorite movie heroes. But this was not something that Sean Connery’s James Bond or Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry pioneered, though they both were controversial in their day. In this very first Mr. Moto adventure, we are presented with a hero that will kill without hesitation or regret. It is not done with a sense of bloodthirsty machismo, but just as a matter of necessity required to survive and accomplish his mission. Indeed, a title appropriate to many installments in this series would be Don’t Mess with Mr. Moto. 

The Mr. Moto films were distinct from their prose source by making the Mr. Moto character much more central to the stories. They wisely still maintained Moto’s mystique. Usually we are introduced to Moto already in the midst of his mission, and we have to get brought up to speed in later scenes to find out just what Moto is after. In this first film of the series, we are not even sure if Moto’s motives are just. Mr. Moto keeps his adversaries and his audience guessing. 

In addition to the Mr. Moto action and intrigue, there is the romance provided by handsome Thomas Beck, as Bob Hitchings, Jr., and beautiful Virginia Field, as Gloria Danton. Beck is a likable enough presence that doesn’t wear out his welcome and ogling Field is always a pleasure. Both Thomas Beck and villain Sig Rumann would return as different characters in the next Moto film. Virginia Field starred as two other characters in two later entries of the series. 

Speaking of romance and returning performers, Lotus Long portrays a switchboard operator that Mr. Moto seems to put the moves on. It turns out she is some sort of operative working with Moto on this case. Later billed as Karen Sorrell, Long would portray another similar character in Mysterious Mr. Moto (1938). 

I was completely won over with Peter Lorre and Mr. Moto with the very first Moto film I saw. Here was a formidable character with the humility, humor, intelligence, and ability that make him likable and intriguing. His stories were brisk entertainments that were free of the artifice and posturing of the modern action movie. Mr. Moto and his adventures are both exotic and believable. That is what makes them fun.