BroadcastChic Excellent, a Must See

Solidrariol Am I Missing Something?

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

classicsoncall I've always wondered why a movie dust up in a restaurant or saloon between a couple of patrons has to eventually involve the entire place. It happens all the time in pictures and it happens here as well. Oh well, I guess it helped to stir things up when there was a lull in the action.They say the Thin Man movies got weaker as the series progressed but I think this one holds up pretty well as the fourth entry in the line up. That's not to say that I thought all of it was credible. In a real life situation for example, who would ever be led to believe that there was a discarded gun in the bottom of a shower drain? Really? Nick Charles came to that conclusion by eyeballing the angle of a bullet that killed a jockey? Sorry folks, I'm just not buying that one at all.And gee, what was Major Sculley (Henry O'Neill) thinking when he brought Nick in on the murder case? The Charles reputation by now was well known far and wide, so why even take the chance? Goofing up on Whitey Barrow's room number was just the icing on the cake for old Nick to finish up this story Charlie Chan style, pulling the resolution out of his hat with some panache and flourish that not one viewer could have figured out in a month of Sundays.But you know, that's what made the Thin Man series so much fun. The repartee and chemistry between William Powell and Myrna Loy was never better, and even Asta got to show off his acting chops with a meatier role than he'd had in the past. Where the shadow business of the title comes into play I'm still thinking about, but not that much.

binapiraeus A new decade has begun, Nick Jr. is growing bigger - but Nick and Nora still are FAR from being 'normal' American parents: Nick reads the horse racing news to his son instead of fairy tales, Nora prepares her husband a cocktail to 'lure' him home... But Nickie Jr. has also already developed QUITE a stubbornness: he forces his father to drink... MILK! Nick, on his part, exceeds the speed limit once again; and so they are escorted by the police to the racetrack where they were heading for - but when they arrive there, the whole place is packed with cops: a jockey has just been murdered...Of course, Nick can't resist helping poor, slow-witted Lieutenant Abrams with the case, which inevitably soon leads them to a big-scale gambling ring, which government official Major Sculley is trying to break, with the help of a brave young reporter, Paul Clarke, an old friend of Nick's an Nora's. And while Nora drags Nick to a wrestling event (!), where the gambling ring is of course also involved, Paul gets some information from his girlfriend, who's the secretary of one of the crooks, and he decides to break into his office to search for evidence - and stumbles upon his 'bad' colleague Whitey there, who's working and writing for the gangsters. A fight for the incriminating notebook ensues; and the result is that both reporters are found on the floor - Whitey shot, and Paul unconscious with a pistol next to him, as the number one murder suspect...Now, for the sake of his friend, Nick starts investigating for good, of course, and we soon get to know a whole bunch of shady types who are all more or less involved in the whole thing - but where's the notebook, and who's the head of the ring?? With the atmosphere being nicely balanced between a tough crime yarn and a hilarious spoof throughout the movie, we certainly won't get bored until Nick enlightens us in the end...This forth entry in the 'Thin Man' series (and the last one being directed by W.S. van Dyke, who died two years later) really almost equals its 30s' predecessors concerning suspense as well as fun; William Powell and Myrna Loy once again play Hollywood's most unusual couple - and by now parents, too - in a most wonderful and charming way, the plot is very clever and twisted (but not too much for those who keep paying attention!) - it could maybe be called the last 'classic' one of the 'Thin Man' movies. Not that the last two films that followed during and after the War were that much inferior, but the style definitely changed due to the circumstances and the generally changing attitudes in the American society...

Spondonman Another good series entry [4/6], more sedate than its predecessors but still a quality funny whodunnit, again set in Red Herring City.Nick finds himself embroiled in a murder case after a racetrack killing leads to another implicating an "obviously" decent guy, trying to unravel the murderer from a long list of "guilty" suspects. Nick's deductions again spring a surprise, culminating with a detail only discovered near the end of the picture. The funniest scene is the outbreak of fisticuffs in the restaurant - I'm glad I never got a dog, cute as Asta was! Again Nick Jr. was sidelined for the second half, probably so as not to complicate the plot further. Donna Reed's second film.With a beautiful print and the chorus of "Why, It's Nick Charles!" ringing in my ears I found this one to be almost up to par with the first three and one I certainly hope to watch again.

AbeStreet SHADOW OF THE THIN MAN offers nothing really new but it does offer exactly what fans of the franchise expect. Nick and Nora get dragged into another murder mystery. They continue to bicker in their loving way. Nick and all his old street contacts help Nick do what the police cannot. Lt. Abrams (Sam Levene) last seen in AFTER THE THIN MAN returns. He is to Nick what Inspector Lestrad is to Sherlock Holmes. It's a treat to see a young Donna Reed in a film 5 years prior to her breakthrough performance in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE and 2 decades prior to her self named sitcom. As usual, Nick with Nora's help rounds up all the suspects and walks the viewer through his deductive reasoning and then announces who the killer is. As this was the third sequel it is plain to see the basic formula that is present in all the THIN MAN films. It, by this film, had become about as complex as a color by numbers coloring book. Little imagination but still fun to do. I would rank this my fourth favorite of the six THIN MAN FILMS.