Category Archives: Courtroom

TRIAL AND ERROR (1937) by Anthony Berkeley

Posted on 9 June 2017 by

It’s time for a guest post from my blogging buddy Livius, who writes about movies at his marvellous blog, Riding the High Country. And now it’s over to the man himself: The inverted crime story is one where the perpetrator … Continue reading →

Posted in 2017 Golden Age Vintage Mystery Scavenger Hunt, Anthony Berkeley, Columbo, Courtroom, England | 29 Comments

Hitchcock in the 1940s – vote now!

Posted on 18 April 2016 by

With the success of The Lady Vanishes, Hitchcock got a contract with producer David O Selznick and headed to Hollywood to make the Oscar-winning Rebecca – and never looked back. This period saw the director blossom as he got to … Continue reading →

Posted in 'In praise of ...', Alfred Hitchcock, Amnesia, Anthony Berkeley, Australia, California, Cold War, Courtroom, Daphne Du Maurier, England, Espionage, Film Poll, Francis Beeding, London, Los Angeles, New York, Noir, Patrick Hamilton, Philip MacDonald, Screwball, Spy movies, The Netherlands, World War II | 59 Comments

INNOCENT by Scott Turow

Posted on 11 August 2015 by

I don’t read a lot of modern legal thrillers, despite a) being a confirmed mystery addict, b) loving courtroom dramas on film and TV and c) someone who got a law degree at university. Why? Well, despite several notable examples of … Continue reading →

Posted in Courtroom, Tuesday's Overlooked Film | 23 Comments

HOSTILE WITNESS (1968) by Jack Roffey

Posted on 9 June 2015 by

Simon Crawford is a highly successful barrister whose world comes crashing down when his daughter Joanne is killed in a hit-and-run accident. He suffers a nervous breakdown when he is unable to find out who was responsible and spends months … Continue reading →

Posted in 2015 Vintage Mystery Challenge, Courtroom, London, Ray Milland, Tuesday's Overlooked Film | Tagged | 28 Comments

BURY ME DEEP (1947) by Harold Q. Masur

Posted on 12 December 2014 by

This was the first in the series featuring New York lawyer Scott Jordan. It opens with a great screwball variant on that hardboiled cliché of a man waking up with a hangover and an unknown dead blonde in his bed. … Continue reading →

Posted in 2014 Vintage Mystery Challenge Bingo, Courtroom, Friday's Forgotten Book, Harold Q. Masur, New York | 23 Comments

THE LETTER (1927) by Somerset Maugham

Posted on 16 November 2014 by

At night on a Malaya rubber plantation a gunshot rings out. A man stumbles out of a bungalow, pursued by a woman, who empties all the chambers of her revolver into him. The moonlight reveals a distraught, gun-toting Bette Davis … Continue reading →

Posted in 2014 Book to Movie Challenge, 2014 Vintage Mystery Challenge Bingo, Courtroom, Malaysia, Singapore, Somerset Maugham | Tagged , , , | 60 Comments

Conduct Unbecoming (1975) – Tuesday’s Overlooked Film

Posted on 22 April 2014 by

This highly unusual military drama is set in 1880s India and stars Stacy Keach, Richard Attenborough and Christopher Plummer with Susannah York as the widow of a regimental hero who accuses an unpopular new recruit of assault. Michael York is the … Continue reading →

Posted in 2014 Book to Movie Challenge, 2014 Vintage Mystery Challenge Bingo, Bryan Forbes, Courtroom, India, Scene of the crime, Tuesday's Overlooked Film | Tagged , , , , | 35 Comments

IF I DIE BEFORE I WAKE (1938) by Sherwood King

Posted on 29 November 2013 by

Later adapted by Orson Welles into The Lady from Shanghai starring Rita Hayworth, this was one of a pair of pre-war mysteries by Raymond Sherwood King. Set among the wealthy elite of Long Island, it is narrated by Laurence Planter, … Continue reading →

Posted in 2013 Book to Movie Challenge, 2013 Vintage Mystery Challenge, Courtroom, Friday's Forgotten Book, New York, Orson Welles, Sherwood King | 24 Comments

Sergeant Rutledge (1960)

Posted on 26 February 2013 by

John Ford was one of the great directors of the studio system, winner of four Oscars, a tyrant on the set, and maker of many classic Westerns – but he also made dozens of films in other genres including comedies, … Continue reading →

Posted in Arizona, Courtroom, John Ford, Scene of the crime, Tuesday's Overlooked Film | 49 Comments

The Perry Mason movies (1934-37)

Posted on 30 October 2012 by

Before the hugely popular TV show of the 1950s and 60s starring Raymond Burr and Barbara Hale (not to mention the long running reunion TV-movies they embarked on two decades later), the cases of Erle Stanley Gardner’s ultra-sharp defence attorney … Continue reading →

Posted in Courtroom, Erle Stanley Gardner, Michael Curtiz, Perry Mason, San Francisco, Scene of the crime, Tuesday's Overlooked Film | 29 Comments

The Case of the Curious Bride (1935) – Tuesday’s Forgotten Film

Posted on 17 April 2012 by

This stylish and fast-paced thriller, adapted from the eponymous Perry Mason novel by Erle Stanley Gardner, was just one of the fifty movies made in the 1930s by Warner Bros. auteur Michael Curtiz, a director still under-appreciated despite regular periods … Continue reading →

Posted in Courtroom, Erle Stanley Gardner, Michael Curtiz, Perry Mason, San Francisco, Scene of the crime, Tuesday's Overlooked Film | 40 Comments