From Headquarters (1933)

Wow! Such a good movie.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

This is quite a good film, certainly better than I usually expect from 1933.First off, it is fast-paced. You won't get bored.Second, the premise is that modern technology (such as it was in 1933) can solve any crime...provided you have open-minded police investigating the crime. This "new" technology is constantly featured as the story progresses.Third, there's some pretty good acting here.On the negative side, this isn't a story where they give you clues so that you can begin to figure out who the murderer is. Instead, it's one of those where you learn facts right along with the police. That may sound good, but it always makes me wonder if they are just making it up as they move forward, rather than that they have it all planned out when they started the script. So are they plot twists, or are they screenwriters just saying, "Okay, what do we do next?" George Brent is very good here as a thinking detective. Margaret Lindsay was good as a murder suspect and love interest or Brent. Poor Eugene Palette...an amusing character actor who, in this film, plays a sort of dumb detective; not his best role, but okay. Always glad to see Henry O'Neill, a fine character actor who played a police inspector here. A different role for Hugh Herbert, still an odd ball, however, as a bail bondsman. Unfortunately, Ken Murray is here as a newspaperman; I never understood the attraction; he's a drag on the film.This is as good a crime drama as I've seen from these days. Less stereotypical as I film than most crime dramas of the era. I liked it.

From Headquarters is a rather contrived and convoluted murder mystery but its brisk running time of 64 minutes and economic cross cut editing give the film more of a vitality than one would expect with the stolid George Brent in the lead. Clichés abound but a gallows humor among the precinct set nullifies them much of the time as the cops turn the screws on the suspects and the supporting cast steals most of the film.It's another day down at headquarters of processing common criminals and chasing leads while reporters slovenly lie about waiting for a big story which comes in the way of the murder of a lecherous, blackmailer. Detectives Stevens (Brent) and Boggs (Eugene Palette) are given the case but approach it differently. Forensics meanwhile jumps into high gear gathering evidence through devious means and the killer as well as the victim remains in doubt until the final moments.With the exception of the retiring Brent From Headquarters entire cast plays it broad and over the top. Margaret Lindsay's suspect and also the ex of Steven's divides her time between being stilted and hysterical while Palette's Sgt. Boggs spends the entire film lunging like a mad bulldog at all the suspects. In the same respect Hugh Herbert's overzealous bail bondsman, Robert Barrat's unctuous rug dealer and Edward Ellis's dark humored pathologist fit well into the spirit of the film.Director William Dieterle and cameraman William Rees provide a decent look and rhythm to From Headquarters most of the way evoking in moments comparison to His Girl Friday and The Detective Story but its incredulous story line can only elevate it at best to a decent Charlie Chan.

GEORGE BRENT doesn't display much enthusiasm for his role as a police detective who finds that his ex-sweetheart (MARGARET LINDSAY) is the chief suspect in the murder of a wealthy playboy. There are several suspects under police grilling and all of them tell their stories in brisk flashback technique that keeps the plot spinning in all directions so that all options are on the table in guessing "who done it." It's a ploy that doesn't work well here. A more straight-forward approach would have worked better in keeping the plot from getting too cluttered. By the time we reach a conclusion, the viewer is left hoping the story is over once and for all. What does work is showing the behind-the-scenes methods the crime labs perform in solving a case.It's a programmer given what little life it has by a capable cast of Warner supporting players including Ken Murray, Hobart Cavanaugh, Dorothy Burgess, Eugene Palette, Theodore Newton and others and benefits from brisk direction by William Dieterle.Summing up: A more polished script would have helped and George Brent seems too detached on this occasion to make much of his detective role.

As a mystery, From Headquarters isn't very challenging, but it might hold your interest as a behind-the-scenes glimpse of police procedure. The film is at its best when showing the details of a typical murder investigation, including two scenes that prove how little ballistic testing has changed in more than five decades. Another plus is the photography, which generally rises above other programmers of its ilk. [In one set-up, the camera establishes a shot of an autopsy in progress and then takes the vantage of the corpse looking up at the doctors.] There is also a pre-code reference to drug addiction, personified by a murder suspect (Dorothy Burgess) who is a riot of facial ticks, jitters and hysterical laughter. The cast is competant, if largely uninspired, with leads Brent and Lindsay their usual drab selves. Some of the supporting players--Hobart Cavanaugh's non-comic safe cracker, Hugh Herbert's pesky bail bondsman, Edward Ellis's enthusiastic forensics man and Robert Barrat's eccentric rug importer--are decidedly better. Not one of director Dieterle's best, but an interesting curio all the same.