I'm taking a look at the 5th disc in the Charlie Chan set that I got a while back. It's got 42 Chan films on 14 discs. This disc, like the rest, has 3 films but this set contains the films that end the appearance of. Warner Oland as Charlie and the first appearance of Sidney Toler. Their characters are a bit different but not enough for me to care much. The formula is still the same.
Charlie Chan On Broadway was the 15th Warner Oland film playing the Honolulu detective. It came out on October 27 1937 and Charlie is joined by his #1 son Lee (Keye Luke) for a spot of detecting in New York City. We see the Chan men on a ship, heading for New York, when a sneaky gal puts something into Lee's dresser. She follows Lee and his dad to the same hotel. The police throw a nice dinner for Charlie. The sneaky gal tries to get her package back but Lee catches her trying to get into the Chan hotel room. There are some newspaper folks and gangsters running around. They want the package which turns out to be a diary with all sorts of juicy facts. The sneaky gal winds up murdered. Charlie starts digging into the murder and there are the usual antics. Harold Huber plays a New York police inspector. He's in a couple of the Chan movies and plenty of other films of the 1930's and 40's. He often plays a crook. Lee gets tossed into jail briefly. He's always acting on impulse and getting in trouble. Charlie puts him down pretty often. Charlie figures out who the murderer and everything is pretty much a-ok. About average for the series.
Charlie Chan At Monte Carlo is the last of the Warner Oland Chan films and it was released January 21 1938. Keye Luke plays Charlie's son Lee. It would be Keye's last Chan film for 10 years. Oland would start a new Chan film and then walk off the set in a dispute with the management of the studio. Oland passed away shortly after and the film was reworked into a Mr Moto film. Weird, huh. In CCAMC Charlie and Lee are traveling to Paris and they've stopped at Monte Carlo. Harold Huber plays the Monte Carlo chief of police. He's good for a laugh or two. That night Charlie and Lee plan to travel by taxi to the train at Nice. HTey leave and the taxi breaks down. The Chan men decide to walk and leads them to a dead guy in a car. The police pick them up and toss them into jail. Harold gets them out and asks Charlie to help with the investigation. There are some shady businessmen and their shady women and some other creeps interested in a million dollars worth of bonds. Charlie has a lot to dig through before he uncovers the truth. Of course he does and it's all about average.
Nearly a year would pass before Charlie Chan in Honolulu came out on January 9 1939. It premiered at the Hollywood theater Grauman's Chinese in late December. Sidney Toler was selected to play Chan and Victor Sen Young plays Jimmy Chan. Victor would appear in 18 Chan films over the next 10 years and later he would play Hop Sing on Bonanza for over a decade. Layne Tom Jr returns to the series but now he's playing #5 son Tommy Chan. CCIH opens with the Chan family having dinner with his huge family. The honorable son in law comes over to announce that his wife is at the hospital and the baby is due soon. There's a commotion and everyone runs off. Tommy is the last one out the door and he catches the phone. It's the homicide bureau and they are looking for Charlie. Tommy passes the message on to Victor, hoping to get involved with some brotherly detective action. Victor tells Tommy he can't go along and goes down to the ship instead of telling his dad. Tommy sneaks onto the back of car that Victor drives down to the ship and then sneaks aboard the ship. The police catch up to Charlie at the hospital and Charlie heads out to the ship. There's the usual suspects and a dead guy. There's a goofy animal trainer and his tame lion for comic relief. I don't get much enjoyable CR from Eddie Collins who plays the animal trainer. If Eddie was made up of his acting ability the lion would eat that ham in a second. Eddie's jokes aren't anywhere near as good as that lousy joke. It's sad for me, havin' to watch him. I did like George Zucco as the odd scientist who has some brains in his luggage. Toler's Charlie is a good replacement for Warner Oland. The series continues with it's winning formula and I'll continue working through the stack of films.
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