Here is another post on a Horror Classic which turned out to be less cheesy than anticipated. To recapitulate for readers who just tuned in: 50 Horror Classics is a DVD set I gave my husband Steven, and we have been enjoying some pretty cheesy old movies. So naturally I’ve been blogging about them. Yesterday I did a post on one that was less cheesy than others. Likewise the one I’m going to talk about today.
A Shriek in the Night (1933) stars Ginger Rogers, who famously did everything Fred Astaire did only backwards and in high heels (just had to throw that in). This is apparently one of her first movies, and, alas, she does not dance.
The movie starts right out with a shriek. I was a little worried the movie was over already. I mean, hello, there’s the shriek, now what? But there are more shrieks as we go along. Not too many, though. After all, it’s not a ’70s slasher flick.
A man has jumped or been thrown from a penthouse balcony (hmmm… which do you suppose it is?). When we meet Ginger Rogers, she is being questioned by a cop, because she is secretary to the dead guy. Such an attractive live-in secretary raises some officers’ eyebrows, but she assures them there is a dumb, utterly respectable maid to chaperone. The maid, the cop decides, may be respectable but is certainly dumb. She was my favorite character. She added some comic relief and a few shrieks, but they came later. My other favorite character was a hapless cop who couldn’t seem to do anything right.
We soon discover that Ginger is really an intrepid girl reporter. I was glad to hear that. I love intrepid girl reporters, like Fay Wray in The Mystery of the Wax Museum (see post back in, I think January). Ginger is perhaps not as intrepid as Fay and she doesn’t crack as wise, but she helps unravel the mystery. Ginger butts heads with a brash boy reporter, who seems to want to both scoop and marry her. The plot thickens with another shriek and another murder.
It seems the victims all receive a card with a snake and the words, “You will hear it.” What they will hear is the hissing of the steam pipe. I bet the writers rubbed their palms together when they came up with that one. Imagine watching a scary movie where the steam pipe hisses before the murderer strikes, then going home and hearing your steam heat whistle. Do people still heat their houses with whistley steam pipes? I’ve never heard it, with or without a murder.
The movie is fairly scary and suspenseful. And the solution to the mystery holds up. At least, I didn’t wake up in the middle of the night saying, “Wait a minute!” Well, maybe one thing. I’m not clear on how Ginger Rogers escaped the deadly peril she inevitably found herself in. Oh, I saw the cops and boyfriend rush in, but the bad guy had already lit the incinerator. Where was she that she didn’t burn up or die of smoke inhalation?
Oh dear, now I’ve gone and revealed the climax. At least I didn’t say who the bad guy was or how Ginger ended up in the incinerator. And I’m sure nobody really thought the main girl would succumb to the deadly peril, so you can’t really ding me on revealing that she was rescued.
It was a fun watch. It held my interest, which some of the cheesier movies in the collection have not. I’ll let you know how I enjoy the next one. After all, the weekend’s coming.
Mohawk Valley Girl 