Citizen Kane might have indirectly inspired this Charlie Chan classic oddly enough. The setting is a Castle In The Desert whose look might have been taken from the real life San Simeon or the film Xanadu. But it has that look of a sinister place where all kinds of crime does occur. And in this case murder does visit the Castle In The Desert.There are two criminal conspiracies going on at the same time and the instigator of one has the hubris to ask Charlie Chan in to help with one. Silly perpetrator, did the individual not realize what forces they were turning loose, the mind of one shrewd detective?Sidney Toler arrives with Victor Sen Yung as number 2 son and they're both among others trapped in the place. Their hosts are eccentric millionaire Douglass Dumbrille and wife Lenita Lane with such interesting and varied guests as Ethel Griffies, Henry Daniell, Steven Geray, Arleen Whelan, Richard Derr, Edmund MacDonald, and Milton Parsons, all of whom have dabbled in screen villainy. In fact that's the best thing going about Castle In The Desert, a ton of red herrings to choose from.Castle In The Desert is not one of the strongest Charlie Chan features and 20th Century Fox would drop the series after this film and it would reemerge at Monogram in two years. But the cast makes this one a lot of fun.

I've never understood why some folk in the Asian community don't like Charlie Chan.A reviewer here said he cringed at the racist comment of an innkeeper who wouldn't let Charlie sit on his porch. Well, gee...in 1940 America that was common behavior. But Charlie Chan doesn't throw a fit, he gets on with the job of investigating murder and at the end of the film shows himself to be smarter than all the white folk who looked down on him.Doesn't that make him a great role model? That was the case in many of the Charlie Chan films. The character was created at a time when Orientals were always villains, nothing more. Earl Derr Biggers created Chan to be a hero. He is brighter than everyone else he meets, for all that he doesn't speak grammatical English. Not because he's stupid, but because he's an immigrant from Hong Kong! Lesson? Just because someone's English language skills are not up to snuff doesn't mean that they can't run rings around you intellectually.True also to the tenor of the times, Chan has to have "comic relief" - either his fully Americanized sons (and occasionally daughter) who speak English perfectly and are played by Asians who deserve to have their work seen - or by African Americans Stepin Fetchit or Mantan Moreland. I admit I do have problems watching those characters - I don't think I would have thought their actions funny then, nor do I think their funny now, but again, they're part and parcel of the times.Having said all that, Warner Oland is the only Charlie Chan for me. I've never really cared for Sidney Toler's version. The plot is rather labyrynthine, but fun for all that. For the most part, anyway!

A noted professor(Lucien Littlefeld)is murdered at the Mojave Desert mansion of millionaire Paul Manderley(Douglas Dumbrille)and his wife(Lenita Lane), a descendant of the infamous Borgia family. House guests become murder suspects along with their hosts when Oriental sleuth Charlie Chan(Sidney Toler)and his Number-Two-Son Jimmy(Sen Yung)start searching for clues. While poking about the castle, Detective Chan discovers an assortment of poisons and a torture chamber along with other things that could make good murder weapons. Mr. Manderley claims the items are there because he is a medieval scholar targeting research of the Borgias. Not the best Chan flick, but then again not the worst; good enough to please any murder mystery fan. Supporting cast features: Arleen Whelan, Edmund MacDonald, Richard Derr and Henry Daniell.

Mid-entry in the long-running "Charlie Chan" series which originally started with Warner Oland portraying Chan and finished up with Roland Winters taking on the role; here, Sidney Tolar is cast as the clever Orientel sleuth, amusingly sniffing out a killer in a desert mansion. Although Tolar is enjoyable, the overly-colorful supporting turns by Arleen Whelan, Richard Derr, Douglas Dumbrille, and Sen Yung as Jimmy Chan are amateurish, and the mystery plot is perhaps too convoluted for its own good (and nearly impossible to follow in its final fifteen minutes). Still, some dry laughs and good production values in this modest second-biller. ** from ****