Pluskylang Great Film overall

Intcatinfo A Masterpiece!

TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Numerootno A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

JohnHowardReid Copyright 20 November 1933 by Warner Bros Pictures, Inc. New York opening at the Strand: 16 November 1933. U.S. release: 2 December 1933. U.K. release: 12 May 1934. Australian release: 14 March 1934. 7 reels. 63 minutes. SYNOPSIS: Playboy gun collector is found murdered in his New York apartment — shot through the eye with a dueling pistol.NOTES: This film bears no relationship at all to Warner Bros 1929 movie of the same title.VIEWER'S GUIDE: Adults.COMMENT: A engrossing police procedural mystery thriller, well produced in all departments, and featuring as nice a range of suspects as any aficionado of the genre could wish. Led by the wonderful Dorothy Burgess (who, alas, has only the one scene — but with what brilliance she plays it), and Robert Barrat (in his sinister element — and what a perfect accent), our potential heavies include such skilled operators as the lovely Margaret Lindsay (who looks absolutely smashing in her Orry-Kelly evening gown), the oddly-named Theodore Newton (a Donald Woods look-a-like, but twice as personable), the ever-reliable Murray Kinnell (a gentleman's gentleman except for the fact that the killer didn't qualify), and Hobart Cavanaugh (in one of his best of many such little-guy performances) as a hard-pressed, too helpful safe- cracker.The police line-up are no slouches in unforgettable characterizations either. Brent is okay, a little flat, your typical 'tec; Palette makes with the heavy accusations, but he's no dumb- bell; O'Neill seems competent, if unimaginative; best of all, is Edward Ellis, rubbing his hands with glee at every turn of the laboratory screws.On the sidelines we discover fast-talking Ken Murray as a lazy reporter, Frank Darien as a fussed executor and Hugh Herbert as a too pushy bail bondsman. (Whilst it seems at first that Hugh is enacting his usual comic relief idiot, this proves far from the case as the story progresses. In fact, Hugh has a startling dramatic scene which he plays most effectively).I found all the introductory procedural touches absolutely fascinating, though I must admit some people at our Film Index video-showing, thought them all superfluous and kept wondering out loud when the story itself was going to start. I thought the writers and Dieterle handled these sequences most creditably by giving them a lot of humanity and humor rather than opting for a dry, documentary approach. I also much admired Dieterle's inspired use — no doubt he followed the writers' instructions — of a first-person camera during the various flashbacks.

kapelusznik18 ***SPOILERS*** Murder and blackmail is on the menu of this crime flick that takes place mostly in police headquarters with Lou Ann Winton, Margared Lindsey, accused of killing rich antique gun collector Gordon Bates, Kenneth Thomson, with one of his antique guns. There's no denying that Bates had it coming with him drunk and on drugs trying to force himself on Lou Ann but she claims she had nothing to do with his death and seems to be covering up for the person who in fact did it.In trying to find Bates's killer Let. Stevens, George Brent, soon comes up with a number of suspects who have as much reason to have killed Bates as Lou Ann did including her hot headed and red haired,a strand of red hair was found at the murder scene , brother Jack Ted Newton, who doesn't deny that he was there. But it's later found out with blackmail letters written in invisible ink there was another reason to knock Bates off that had someone very close to him who just have enough of his actions and took the law into his own hands.***SPOILERS***The big surprise in all this is that yes another murder was committed that really had nothing at all to do with who murdered Bates. That was when the blackmailer feeling he was going to be exposed had his flunky murdered to keep him from talking. The big mistake on the blackmailer's part was that he murdered him, like the Lee Harvey Oswald killing by Jack Ruby, right inside the police station and was spotted by someone there hiding the murder weapon, a straight edge razor, in a spittoon. Razor sharp and restored black & white photography as well as crisp sound recordings not only makes the movie, now over 80 years old, watchable but we also get to see the back then state of the art police science-fingerprints ballistic and blood-work-that helped in solving the case.

kidboots After a couple of years of exciting, stylized gangster action usually depicting the mobsters as colourful, quirky individuals - enough so that a poll taken in the early 1930s showed that gangsters were high on the list of who the man in the street wished he was, J. Edgar Hoover got involved. He was alarmed that his F.B.I. department was not looked on with the proper respect and went about changing the way the public viewed officers of the law. By 1932,33, it was all about law and order with gangsters playing a very supporting role: new characters made their mark - reporters, gossip columnists and lawyers!!"From Headquarters" was exactly that, with an emphasis on police procedure and forensics and fortunately Warners was able to make it a showcase for their bevy of character actors - Henry O'Neil is the stolid Inspector Donnelly, Hugh Herbert is the used car salesman for the bail bond business, Murray Kinnell is Horton the enigmatic butler, Eugene Palette in another of his gallery of irascible detectives, Ken Murray a fast talking reporter and henpecked Hobart Cavanaugh, playing against type, as Mugs Manson, a crime boss who knows something vital about the crime but is not listened to. He is a "person of interest" in the murder of Broadway playboy Gordon Bates (who else but Kenneth Thomson). George Brent (at his very dullest) is Lieut. Jim Stevens called in to investigate and shocked to learn that his old flame, showgirl Lou Winton (lovely Margaret Lindsay)is the girl in the picture, supposedly engaged to Bates although she strenuously denies it. Forget Brent and Lindsay, Edward Ellis is terrific as the forensic officer with a mad gleam in his eye who is just itching to get his hands on a good old fashioned murder!!Just to relieve the procedural tedium and to show you that it is really a pre-coder, Bates is discovered to be a drug addict and Dorothy Burgess has a "way out" scene as Dolly White, an agitated hop head (whose performance of crazy laughter is worthy of "Reefer Madness") - she also saw Bates at his apartment and clocked him on the head with a statue. This fellow was knocked on the head by so many people, did he really need to be shot as well?? Robert Barrett was just a fantastic character actor, equally at ease playing detectives, butlers and in this case Mr. Anderzian, a shifty foreign importer who is involved in the most exciting scene in the movie. Also interesting how the police obtain his fingerprints - he thinks he is pretty nifty but he doesn't reckon on an ungloved hand on a polished wooden desk!!

chris-48 As a mystery, From Headquarters isn't very challenging, but it might hold your interest as a behind-the-scenes glimpse of police procedure. The film is at its best when showing the details of a typical murder investigation, including two scenes that prove how little ballistic testing has changed in more than five decades. Another plus is the photography, which generally rises above other programmers of its ilk. [In one set-up, the camera establishes a shot of an autopsy in progress and then takes the vantage of the corpse looking up at the doctors.] There is also a pre-code reference to drug addiction, personified by a murder suspect (Dorothy Burgess) who is a riot of facial ticks, jitters and hysterical laughter. The cast is competant, if largely uninspired, with leads Brent and Lindsay their usual drab selves. Some of the supporting players--Hobart Cavanaugh's non-comic safe cracker, Hugh Herbert's pesky bail bondsman, Edward Ellis's enthusiastic forensics man and Robert Barrat's eccentric rug importer--are decidedly better. Not one of director Dieterle's best, but an interesting curio all the same.