(4 of 4)
Keeper of the Keys (adapted by Valentine Davies; Sigourney Thayer producer). This vehicle for the late Earl Derr Biggers' famed Detective Charlie Chan largely goes to prove that the wily inspector and his ponderous Chinese proverbs are better off on the screen or between book covers than on the stage. An ex-husband of a leering opera singer assembles her and three of his marital successors in his Lake Tahoe hunting lodge. Actor William Harrigan, a younger, sleeker, slightly more occidental Chan than cinema's Warner Oland, gets a head start when he is added to the party, to find out what happened to a son whom the host believes the singer bore him. The femme fatale is shot almost under the inspector's eyes, but an airplane crash occurring simultaneously outside creates confusion. After more shooting has reduced the suspects from seven to six, Chan lurks omniscently on the set while the guests take turns popping in & out. He pins things at last on the most disarming member of the cast, after a sentimental interlude with another Chinese (recognizable as such by black pajamas, bent knees, croaking falsetto, handscraping). All this is capably strung together but will take the breath of none but rabid Channists.
* For news of the rediscovery of Vice President Garner (see p. 13).
* No connection with Louis Bromfield's novel.