Mildred Henshew, the ravishing niece of a town reporter, arrives for her summer holiday, and she's welcomed by a youngster who promptly leaves his girlfriend, to befriend the newcomer. The storyline follows the teenage sexuality's logic, with Mildred being promoted from brat to 'young woman', after she and the boy visit the murder scene. Mildred threatened with leaving, the boy tempted her with a secret swimming hole, and a descent in a dark house follows, with both teenagers getting dirty. Monogram treats the audience with a comedy about teenage detectives, in a small town, and while the romance was enjoyable, the denouement, with the teenagers in the modest dark house during a thunderstorm, is neat, and the only reason to give the movie the name it has; except that, unlike other comedies, here the mystery plot makes sense.Marcia Mae plays a girl from the city, during a holiday; she's a bit vain, being a young woman played as such, and has a strongly peculiar voice.Like many other movies, this vehicle with an exploitative title was made to be enjoyed, not analyzed.

The title "Haunted House" gives the impression that this Monogram poverty row teenaged comedy is going to be something totally different than it actually is. "Teenaged Detectives" or even "The Boy who got the Scoop" might raise this up only a bit of a notch, but even if reflected accurately, the whole movie would be a boring rip-off of the "Nancy Drew" series. I give Jackie Moran credit for making his newspaper assistant a likable young man, desperately trying to break into the business as a journalist, but thwarted by his cantankerous boss (George Cleveland), he is tossed back into the copy room. His main goal is to prove that the sweet Christian Rub (who is on trial for murder) has been framed. When Cleveland's spoiled niece (Marcia Mae Jones) arrives, Moran sets out to prove Rub's innocence even more vigorously and gets into all sorts of trouble, accusing the wrong people and losing his job. And then there's the fact that the only inclusion of an even remotely haunted house comes at the very end where the culprit is discovered inside the victim's home, all boarded up simply because nobody lives there anymore. Certainly not at all haunted, even by the victim's ghost. A few amusing moments don't make for an overall good movie, and even with some great character performers (Rub, Cleveland, Clarence Wilson to mention a few), this one ranks as a Z-grade dud.

Although the house concerned isn't haunted, it's merely the crime scene of a murder, young Jackie Moran who works in a small town newspaper is determined to find the killer and prove his worth to editor George Cleveland. He's also showing off for Cleveland's niece Marcia Mae Jones who's visiting from out of town.For a cheap Monogram programmer it's not Gone With The Wind, but not all that bad either. Moran barks up a wrong tree at first, but eventually gets it right. Imagine having your grandmother being the alibi for your first suspect.The murder turns out to be a cover-up for another crime. The victim was a wealthy widow and her killer is one whom she gave her trust. And a rather obvious choice.Not a bad film, but not one to write home about.

As a previous reviewer pointed out, don't let the title fool you. While this is a good movie, it contains no haunted house, but makes up for it with plenty of suspense. The title and a less than honest summary drew me into the movie, but I was not disappointed, in fact I'm upset that there aren't more great movies like this in circulation today.Jimi Atkins wants to be a reporter, but he isn't thrilled at the way the press is making his friend Olaf out to be a murderer, which he is on trial for. Jimi's about the only person in the town that knows Olaf is innocent, but with all the evidence against him, has little luck in convincing anybody. Then a ray of hope enters when his employer's niece, Mildred, arrives for the summer. After hearing Jimi's stories of Olaf, and seeing him at the courthouse she decides he can't be a murderer after being so nice, and besides that, 'he doesn't look like a murderer'. So now Jimi and Mildred are eager to get on the trail of the real murderer, though in their detection, twice they seem to strike out in finding the real murderer to clear Olaf's name, but they won't give up.They figure out the only place to find evidence that could clear Olaf and lead them to the real killer is in the house of the murder victim, which seems to be inhabited by something or someone else. They find out who the real killer is, and are in a race to find the evidence to back up their story to the newspapers. An exciting murder/mystery that'll have you on the edge of your seat and cheering for the juvenile detectives. 10 out of 10.