The Drums of Jeopardy (1931)

just watch it!

Good concept, poorly executed.

Best movie of this year hands down!

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Totally implausible/ridiculous but good fun. A pre-Charlie Chan Warner Oland, a Swede, is Russian this time. He's bent on revenge and hams it up all the way.Neither Oland or the other Russian characters utter a word of Russian. The fleeing royals reach New York and bump into an ingenue and her peppery aunt who, of course, shelter the strangers in their country house. Wouldn't you?The lights go out more than once. The phone is dead. A claw-like hand jumps out of the curtain to grab the girl. Stuff used a thousand times. The plot creaks and the print used for the DVD is battered, but you could do worse for an early talkie.Mischa Auer lurks around in a pre-screwball role.

I like the movie, for what it is. I would like to see the earlier version, and compare. I've always thought of Warner Oland as kind of a ham. But it's impossible to judge by 1931 standards in 2007, so what do I know? The Karlov question had me curious. This is what Wikipedia had to say (yeah, I know-- it's Wikipedia, so who knows if it's true?): "In 1922 the book was made into a Broadway play and the following year a motion picture. A second film version appeared in 1931. It is said that a young Boris Karloff, who previously had a few uncredited film roles, chose his stage name for his first screen credit in 1920 from a Russian mad scientist character named "Boris Karlov" in this novel. The name 'Boris Karlov' was used from MacGrath's book for the 1922 Broadway play, but by 1923 with actor Boris Karloff using the similar sounding variation, the film version renamed the character, played by Wallace Beery, 'Gregor Karlov'. In the 1931 film version, however, with Warner Oland playing the character, the mad scientist's name is restored to 'Boris Karlov', less than a year before Frankenstein would make Boris Karloff a household word for generations. Ironically, Boris Karloff would play many mad scientists on screen, but never 'Boris Karlov'."As a side note for those interested in original sources, the Harold MacGrath novel "Drums of Jeopardy" is available as a free e-text download at Project Gutenberg.

Warner Oland stars as Dr Boris Karloff, a man out to avenge his daughter's suicide by killing off a Russian noble family that he holds responsible for her death. Warner Oland soon after this movie became famous in his portrayal of Charlie Chan in a series of movies about a famous Chinese detective and the mysteries he solves. Clara Blandick, the future Auntie Em in the Wizard of Oz plays a great character in a supporting role and is excellent in bringing comic relief to this little known drama from 1931. I saw this movie on a DVD by Alpha video. The film does have some scratches and the sound has some problems during the opening credits. It's a short movie at 66 minutes but seems to be right for the pace of the movie. The Drums of Jeopardy is a decent movie. I would call it a murder drama. It's definitely dated though. You can sure tell you're in the 30s both by the dialogue, and situations. You really have to be a fan of older movies to get the most out of this film.

Since I don't know when this movie was made one can simply assume the name of the character that Warner "Charlie Chan" Oland plays was chosen simply by chance, but its true he does play Boris Karloff, er... Karlov.The plot of this movie has Oland getting revenge one of the Russian Royal families for the death of his daughter. It seems that his daughter was in the Royal Ballet and was the lover of one of the princes who sent her away causing her to attempt suicide. Oland finds a piece of the crown jewels, a necklace called the Drums of Jeopardy, in her possession. In her weakened state she runs to warn her lover only to die in his arms moments before her father arrives and attempts to wipe out the family. He's sent to the gulag vowing revenge. Years later, after the family has been displaced by the revolution, they head to America where Oland begins sending drums from the necklace to the family members before killing them.(Legend says, if some one gets one of the separated drums, they will die with in 24 hours)This is a great movie that is hampered by the fact that it now seems rather static.Its one of the movies from the early days of sound films, when there would be little music and long moments of silence that played fine then, but now seem to slow things down to a crawl. The first half of this film is dynamite and moves like the wind as we go from Russia to New York and out to the country in a breezy 30 or thirty five minutes. There's lots of action and complications. The trouble comes in the second half where the movie is locked in the country house and its surrounding area as the surviving members of the royal family wait for Oland's attack. Its not bad its just too slow compared to the first half.I give it 7 out of ten over all, the first half scoring 9 and the second a 5, purely because it seems so slow after the first half.