A delightful, eminently watchable comedy, masterly paced, you may find it endearing, with its expert timing, and despite the gracelessness of its male cast, anyway the movie spells its genre so as not to disappoint the gullible; a playwright rented the mansion once owned by an insane physician, whose legacy of fright still carries on, and the playwright gathers there several people to stage his play, with one of the main results being that they all are really guests and none knows indeed the house. I believe that the device of 'the audience on stage', or 'the audience in the movie', as represented by the old-timer and his degenerate secretary intended to have fun no matter what, worked wonderfully; that's how exciting they felt to be the cinema, and they were right. Miljan plays the controversial playwright, June Collyer plays the starlet, while Kolker and Kirke are the usual creeps from such movies; save for the two girls (June and Eve), it's an ugly cast, one player uglier than the other, at least four mugs (the playwright, the supposed Amphytrio the psychiatrist, the heady Terry, the butler).Eve Southern was intriguing, she's the one playing the insane widow.The guards' uniform looked eerie. The patient's discourse was an early impersonation of the German Leader.Nice pace, sharp one-liners, two likable actresses, ugly male cast; as said, it's a farce, kindred to music hall, revue, etc., but the plot was neat anyway, and the experience is refreshing.Strayer directed 'The Ghost …' in '34, and 'The Monster …' in '32.

Some nice plot twists keep the viewer sitting up through this old dark house mystery featuring John Miljan as a playwright with a new play to read—a thriller, this time! Among a supporting cast of vaguely familiar faces, Richard Carle and Johnny Arthur lend comic relief as a Broadway producer and assistant accompanying Miljan. Producer Carle is constantly firing and un-firing assistant Arthur, which is cute but predictable; on another level entirely is their merry insistence for a good chunk of the film that the entire "mystery" taking place is part of Miljan's presentation of his new play, put on for their benefit!Nothing particularly unusual here, otherwise, but those of us who enjoy being trapped in a dark house on a stormy night with an escaped lunatic in the neighborhood will find an hour of fun. As a bonus, the final few minutes feature a couple of bursts of really ripe maniacal laughter.

"People stranded in a country house during a storm discover that the home was the sight of an unsolved murder years before. During a dinner discussion of the incident, the lights go out and, when they come back on, they discover that one of the guests has been killed. Fearing for their lives, the guests attempt to find out the secrets behind the death before others can occur," according to the DVD sleeve's synopsis.There are a couple of clever twists in this murder at the "Old Dark House" story, with the "Play within a Play" being its most interesting feature. However, the direction is rather ordinary, which serves to highlight a certain cheapness of production. Like most movies of this type, there is (or, should be) an ensemble of intriguing characters. Herein, only old-time Broadway producer Richard Carle (as Herman Wood) and his fey secretary Johnny Arthur (as Homer Erskine) maintain interest.**** The Ghost Walks (12/1/34) Frank R. Strayer ~ Richard Carle, Johnny Arthur, John Miljan

The Ghost Walks is a nifty little mystery with a great twist, snappy dialog, and best of all a pansy played to the twittery hilt by character actor Johnny Arthur which never demeans or denigrates his character. Mr. Arthur is great in his role of Homer Erskine bringing great comic relief as the secretary of the Broadway producer Herman Wood, played by another great character actor Richard Carle.They play off of each other superbly.Although the acceptable words of the time sissy and cream puff are used to describe the character of Homer, it is never mean spirited or meant as denigration, and are not spoken by the manly males of the film but by his employer, who fires and rehires him every other scene and who displays an almost exasperated affection for his devoted employee.There is a great scene where Homer tells his boss that he has devoted the best years of his life to him and has been everything but a mother to him.The mystery angle of the film is very entertaining, and the twist at the end might just leave you in stitches.For a low budget poverty row picture, this film has superb set decoration and great costuming.Director Frank Strayer ably handles his cast and this film holds together much better than some of his other low budget mystery attempts, but he had a great script to work with and some wonderful actors to carry it through.This film is a must see for devotees of poverty row films, old dark house mysteries (they actually managed to work in the lines "It was a dark and stormy night)and it has the added bonus of being an early representation of a gay character in film where nothing bad happens to them in the end.This movie is available for download in the public domain film section of the Internet Archive at archive.org.