Kattiera Nana I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Spoonatects Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

Baseshment I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

Usamah Harvey The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

kevin olzak For another Chesterfield indie produced at Universal (like 1933's "Strange People"), 1935's "A Shot in the Dark" benefits from the presence of studio veteran Edward Van Sloan, here reunited with his "Dracula" co-star, Herbert Bunston (who died a month after completion). Based on a popular serial of the day, "The Dartmouth Murders," top billing goes to former gridiron athlete Charles Starrett, now 31 and soon to shift into Westerns, where he would play The Durango Kid until 1952 (he had co-starred opposite Boris Karloff in MGM's "The Mask of Fu Manchu" three years earlier). The actual sleuthing is done by dependable Robert Warwick, as Starrett's deductive father, who is quickly aiding the local sheriff when a student, Byron Coates, believed to have hanged himself, is revealed to have already been murdered before he was hung. Another student drops dead at the memorial service for Coates, who turns out to have a lookalike fellow classmate whom he despised, John Meseraux (both roles essayed by James Bush). The interesting supporting cast includes another Universal regular, Doris Lloyd ("Waterloo Bridge," "The Wolf Man"), as Byron's mother, and Eddie Tamblyn, father of Russ, grandfather of Amber, soon to retire from pictures (he died in 1957 at age 50). The killer might have been more difficult to spot were it not for a certain cast member's disappearance from the film halfway through.

Case While many of the era's murder mysteries incorporated elements of other genres, such as comedy, action or those beloved old dark house kind of horror movies to shake things up a bit (or to make you forget about plot holes), this one uses no such things, which results in a quite serious tone and a very plot centered script. Which could be a good thing, but unfortunately the movie (which is now in public domain) fails in so many ways.The budget was pretty low (the movie was produced by Chesterfield, shortly before it was merged into Republic, to avoid closure due to their debts), which would not be a problem itself, but the whole film is way too talkie, while the confusing plot drags around quite slow, with not much going on: the incompetent, but unfunny police officer admits that they don't know much about murder and do not really wish to be in charge (just what!?) and the son-and-father duo that ends up handling the case does not do much detective work either, as they often simply run into important evidence accidentally.The acting is also pretty weak with people reacting to events in totally unlikely ways. For example when they discover the body of Byron, the first victim or when later others are told about his death, they are all like "Oh, really?" with almost zero emotion shown. Even when his mother learns about his death, we see her smiling, showing childhood pictures of the boy just moments later. The way the other murders are committed is rather unrealistic, the actors that are supposed to play collage boys are quite obviously much older than they should be and the plot, which revolves around some complicated family matters and a lot of money is just too muddled and uninteresting to keep up your attention for 70 minutes. Still, it is not a complete waste of time, but not really recommended either.

csteidler Midway through this Chesterfield mystery, I found myself wondering: Is this plot awfully complex, or just awfully muddled? A suicide that is a murder; a stolen letter; an old photo in an album; odd family relations and relationships….Various characters guard strange secrets of the past and present. But I'm still not sure how much sense it makes.Three male leads are at the center of the story. Charles Starrett is of course the rather upright and dashing young student whose roommate is bumped off in the film's opening moments. Starrett immediately calls for assistance from his criminologist father, played by Robert Warwick in the best Holmesian style. It seems like a promising setup—a father-son team parsing clues, nabbing bad guys. But, for me at least, Starrett's character came across as overly deferential and Warwick's as annoyingly smug. Third-billed is the great Edward Van Sloan as a professor (naturally) interested in the parties involved; his character is darkly appealing but, alas, not on screen often enough.Overall, it's not a bad film, exactly, but I just couldn't feel it gain any momentum. The comic relief supplied by the moronic sheriff and his deputy is rather lame, and the rest of the cast seem to take things altogether too seriously. And there's one large red herring that would have added intrigue had it been a "real" clue....Anyway, early practice, I guess, for director Charles Lamont, who would go on to bigger and better and less serious things.

Red-Barracuda One night in a college campus a man commits suicide. Or rather he is murdered and left for dead as if he had. From here on in his friends try to piece together the mystery and discover who the killer is.A Shot in the Dark is yet another 30's mystery film. These types of films were ten a penny in the decade for some reason. I can't say I thought too much of this one though unfortunately. While it does move through its plot-line fairly methodically and logically, and while it also mercifully does not have an annoying comedy relief character I just found myself somewhat bored to tell you the absolute truth. It was slow and quite uneventful, relying on detective staples rather than thriller ones. Although one thing is for sure, college students have certainly changed a lot in the past 75 years.