Copyright 18 April 1938 by Grand National Films, Inc. New York opening at the Globe 15 May 1938. U.S. release: 2 April 1938. Australian release through British Empire Films: 27 June 1940. 5,874 feet. 64 minutes.SYNOPSIS: Lamont Cranston, alias The Shadow (Rod La Rocque) is a witty Walter Winchell character who writes and broadcasts a newspaper column in which he lampoons the city's bungling police force. The commissioner (Thomas Jackson) is not amused. He retaliates by banning Cranston's newspaper from access to all press release bulletins issued by his department. Cranston rescues the paper by foiling an elaborate murder/embezzlement plot and handing the police a full (if totally undeserved) credit for the capture of the criminals. NOTES: Second of the seven The Shadow pictures. The first, The Shadow Strikes (1937) also starred Rod La Rocque. Third was a Columbia serial, The Shadow (1940), starring Victor Jory. Monogram Pictures entered the fray in 1946 with The Shadow Returns, starring Kane Richmond, who also played The Shadow in Behind the Mask (1946) and The Missing Lady (1946). Finally, Republic lensed Bourbon Street Shadows in 1958, starring Richard Derr.COMMENT: One of the best "B" films ever made, it's hard to believe that this movie is so little-known today. Based on an extremely popular radio serial, you'd expect to find a host of fans singing the picture's praises. Well, perhaps not. The Shadow depicted here cleverly departs somewhat from the comic strip character with cloak and wide-brimmed hat. Instead La Rocque and his ingenious scriptwriter have opted to present the hero as a suave, sarcastic radio commentator who has it in for the police. In fact the skillful debunking of authority figures is so thoroughly amusing, I marvel that International Crime has not been singled out for special attention by the cultists. The problem here of course is that former matinee idol La Rocque, despite his ingratiating performance (we love the scene in which he runs through a variety of foreign accents in radioese for the benefit of the My Friend Irma-brained heroine, so capably impersonated by Astrid Allwyn), is unknown to the corduroy set. A pity. La Rocque provides a delightful spoof of the conventionally brash hero, his tongue smoothly tripping through polished lines of delicious invective that never flag from start to finish.La Rocque alone would be worth many times the price of admission. But, as it happens, The Shadow is not the only colorful character in the play. In fact the script allows a wonderful line-up of our favorite bit players many a choice moment. For instance, Thomas Jackson has a great time as the harassed police chief and - though I've not the space to run through the whole cast - William Pawley as a reformed safecracker, Will Stanton as a jail drunk and most especially, Lew Hearn as a too obliging cab-driver are absolute musts for special accolades. As for the direction, Charles Lamont has rarely been so stylish. His only films which bear comparison to this sterling effort are the much-praised horror spoofs of the mid-1950s such as Abbott and Costello Meet Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Francis in the Haunted House which do have a cult following. International Crime is equally amusing, far more quirky and much more forcefully acted. Furthermore it's superbly photographed by Marcel Le Picard whom I always regarded as one of the worst hacks in the business. I was wrong. It seems that Le Picard was rarely given an opportunity to show us what marvelously atmospheric effects he was really capable of achieving.

This is an odd little B-movie--one that at least is different. Rod La Roque stars as "the Shadow"--a combination radio celebrity and amateur crime solver. Using his show, he periodically tweaks the noses of the local police--who respond by arresting him on trumped up charges (wow...I guess the Constitution wasn't created until after 1938). And, along for the ride is one of the most common clichés in crime films of the era--the spunky and occasionally annoying reporter (who also happens to be the daughter of the radio station owner). Together, they investigate a crime AND have a good time! For the most part, this is light and silly B entertainment. It's not terrible but cliché-ridden and only adequately written--at best. But, on the positive side, La Roque was very good in the movie--and it makes you wonder why he had faded to a B-actor after a relatively promising series of films in the 1920s and early 30s.Adequate.

In the late 1930's Grand National Pictures released two films based on the popular magazine and radio character, The Shadow. The first outing, 1937's THE SHADOW STRIKES saw silent film star Rod La Rocque donning hat and cape, in a rather bland drawing room mystery. Ironically, this crime thriller without the thrills had been very loosely adapted from a legitimate Shadow Magazine adventure. Considering the rather uninspiring result, it is hardly surprising that the studio decided to rethink their approach before putting a sequel into production. The result of this reconsideration, was INTERNATIONAL CRIME.INTERNATIONAL CRIME is an odd duck of a film. Gone was almost any connection to the Shadow character as he appeared in the magazine series, or even the character from the previous film. This time out, all inspiration was derived from THE SHADOW radio program.The thing that needs to be understood here is that The Shadow is really a split personality. The hawk-nosed avenger with the blazing twin .45's and the legion of secret operatives existed only in the magazines. On radio he was Lamont Cranston, amateur criminologist and "wealthy young man about town", who in the ancient Orient had learned the "power to cloud men's minds so they cannot see him." "Friend and companion" Margo Lane was also an invention of the radio series, though she was later shoehorned into the prose adventures as well. INTERNATIONAL CRIME features almost all the standards of the radio Shadow: Lamont Cranston, amateur criminologist, Margo Lane (though here called "Phoebe Lane") as his Girl Friday, cabbie Moe Shrevnitz, and foil Commissioner Weston. In fact, the only significant player missing is The Shadow himself.Cranston (still played by Rod La Rocque, but with considerably more energy) is now a newspaper columnist and radio personality who goes by the on-air non deplume of "The Shadow". In the middle of a broadcast, his overeager and stereotypically ditzy blonde assistant, Phoebe, hands him an ill advised tip on an upcoming box-office robbery, that is actually a red-herring to draw away the police so that another crime may be more easily committed elsewhere. Already in the doghouse with Police Commissioner Weston for his caustic commentary on the capabilities of the constabulary, Cranston's reputation is now on the line, unless he can solve the real crime, a combination theft and murder, himself. But the sleuthing is never really the main point of the film: the detecting is really just a framework to hang the movie's humorous elements on. At no time is there ever a real sense of danger to the proceedings. From the moment that Phoebe crashes into the middle of Cranston's radio broadcast, the audience knows what kind of film this is supposed to be and just sits back to enjoy the ride.There is one other very odd element to the film that begs noting –one that may have gone unnoticed by the movie going public of 1938. The criminal masterminds of the piece are Viennese nobility, plotting to halt a bond issue from foreign businessmen that will finance military forces in their homeland. On March 12, 1938, Austria was officially absorbed into Germany. Therefore the government that these conniving and murderous villains are working against, is the Nazi regime of Adolph Hitler. Today it is remarkable to consider that such a plot device could have been used in the same year that Neville Chamberlain made his fateful, "peace in our time" speech, and impossible to believe that such an element would have been allowed to stand if this film had been made even a year later.While fairly predictable, the film nevertheless rolls along at a good clip, providing a light weight, light-hearted and fairly amusing crime comedy in a similar vein, but a lower rent district, to the Nick and Nora Charles or Mr. And Mrs. Smith adventures. INTERNATIONAL CRIME is both a drastic change and a huge improvement over the feeble and stodgy THE SHADOW STRIKES.

This time the Shadow has a radio show. Everyone seems to know he is LaMont Cranston. He is at the behest of radio executives and newspaper men and always seems to have trouble getting to the studio on time. There is so much potential in the Shadow's character to come up with a first rate noir film. What do we get. A poor man's Nick Charles who is glib and silly. A plot that is, at best, confusing. There are characters coming at each other from all directions, but ultimately the Shadow knows. He is unflappable and self centered. The problem is that above all else he is dull and uninteresting. I would bet you that given a 1930's audience and a slight rewrite of the screenplay, no one would even know this movie is based on the wonderful old radio show.