One Body Too Many (1944)

The greatest movie ever made..!

Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

Charming and brutal

Brilliant and touching

Old dark house comedy starring Jack "Tin Man" Haley as an insurance salesman who goes to a creepy old mansion to sell a millionaire some insurance and gets mixed up in some murderous shenanigans with the recently deceased millionaire's heirs. Most people who see this today are likely doing so because Bela Lugosi is in it and is advertised on DVD covers and the like as being the star. Unfortunately, Bella's part is small and certainly beneath him, no matter his personal demons. He's basically playing a butler. Just a regular butler, not a "The butler did it!" kind. He has a couple of scenes where he gets his red herring on but nothing comes of it. It's not a bad watch for what it is but nothing impressive. Somewhat amusing. The conscience stuff is cute. Pretty Jean Parker is slumming even more than Bela. Doubt I'll ever understand how her career went this far south in the 1940s but it did. Rest of the cast includes Lyle Talbot, Douglas Fowley, Fay Helm, and Dorothy Granger. Surprising this is from Paramount as it has all the earmarks of a poverty row production.

One Body Too Many is a production from Pine-Thomas Paramount B picture unit and after seeing it I'm convinced it was a script and story that was meant for Bob Hope. But old ski nose either rejected this one or was out entertaining the troops during the second World War. So Paramount gave the project to its B unit and got Jack Haley to play the lead.Pine-Thomas assembled a nice cast in a project that was unusual for them, normally they did economical action/adventure stories. This is a comedy involving a late millionaire who was a firm believer in astrology, so much so that he requested to be buried in a glass covered mausoleum like Lenin at the Kremlin so that he would be always under the stars at night. After that the living relatives of whom he didn't have too good an opinion of would split up the estate. Until then they had to live at his house until the burial was done.Poor Haley plays the Bob Hope like schnook who is an insurance salesman and keeps an appointment that he made with the old guy before he passed away. Haley arrives just in time for the reading of the will and the lawyer for the estate thinks he's a bodyguard he hired. Never mind Jack takes the job and the fun starts. If you think a couple of murders that follow is fun.Also in the cast are Bela Lugosi and Blanche Yurka who are the butler and maid. I wish the film had a lot more of them. They look and act so sinister with some lovely eye twinkles. Lugosi had a nice gift for comedy that was too rarely seen on film.The lovely cast of relatives of whom one is a murderer include Lyle Talbot, Jean Parker, Maxine Fife, Lucien Littlefield, Douglas Fowley and Dorothy Granger. Now who do you think is our killer in the cast?One Body Too Many has some funny moments, but a lot of it is a rehash of material from better films. So do you think Hope was busy with the USO or did he pass on this one?

I won't go into the plot too much as it has already been relayed by several contributors here; but all the friendly clichés you'd expect are present - so much so you tend to welcome them as you're ticking them off.This is not a Lugosi star vehicle - he merely plays support as the butler; but he has a fine flair for comedy and plays on his sinister image with aplomb. The real star of the film is the personable Jack Haley, who plays an insurance salesman mistaken for a detective who is to guard the body of a millionaire. The heirs are gathered, and they have to wait out the satisfying of a condition of the rather curious will...Haley's character, while a bit of a buffoon, is not an outright caricature and remains likable. This is a movie, of course that owes a lot to The Cat And The Canary. It does contain one neat little sequence slightly reminiscent of Vampyr, in which Haley is trapped in coffin, which is then carried to the garden pond and dropped to the bottom. It's still quite chilling today.Enjoyable film and recommended by this 30s and 40s horror fan.

The biggest reason I watched this film is because it co-stars Bela Lugosi. Sure, he made a lot of totally wretched films during his long career (there are too many to list, but would include BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA, PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE and BRIDE OF THE MONSTER). However, even his bad films are usually fun to watch--sometimes because they are so bad!! However, I was greatly disappointed to see that Lugosi's part was so small and undeveloped. He played a butler and had NOTHING to do other than to keep offering people coffee! That's really it!! Despite this, the film is pretty good because it doesn't take itself seriously and there are many deliberately funny moments. Now this isn't the most sophisticated humor (as evidenced by its star being Jack Haley), but it has a certain charm that help it to transcend the genre and make it more than just another murder mystery or scary old house film. Not great, but still it's an agreeable time-passer.