TORCHY BLANE IN CHINATOWN 1938Barton Maclane, Glenda Farell. From the Torchy Blane series. Classic fast-talking good-guy police detective MacBride and his girl, Torchy (reporter). I have a love/hate relationship with this whole series (nine of them). This one was one of the better ones. A blackmail case.But throughout the series Torchy, a pretty reporter, is constantly trying to snoop into ongoing police investigations, jeopardizing her own and other peoples' lives, not to mention stealing or tampering with evidence. She is always on the verge of getting arrested or rubbed out by the murderers or gang members. So she's irritating.I'd rate the similar "Maisie" series (with Ann Sothern) higher.

Poor Torchy! Her boyfriend, Lieutenant Steve McBride, breaks their date to go protect an art smuggler from a sinister gang. Steve sure doesn't seem too sorry—he hardly even apologizes to Torchy. Of course, she sneaks after him that night, hoping to catch a scoop for her newspaper….Barton McLane gets a big role this time around—his Lieutenant McBride is right at the center of the action. Unfortunately, the lieutenant has never been dumber. He tells the smuggler not to worry, that the police will protect him—and the smuggler is promptly murdered. He tells the next threatened victim the same thing—and that guy is murdered just as quickly. He's not protecting anybody!Glenda Farrell is fine as always in her sixth appearance as adventurous reporter Torchy Blane. The cops do their best to keep her in the dark, but Torchy gets her leads and reports them without resisting a dig or two: the first murder, she writes, has left "investigating officers, headed by Detective Lt. Steve McBride, running around in circles so fast they're apt to meet themselves coming back."The plot concerns some stolen jade "burial tablets" and a supposed Chinese gang out to retrieve them. Unfortunately, there's not enough humor or snappy by-play between characters—the really appealing elements of the series' better entries—to keep this one moving. Tom Kennedy, back again as faithful but dim police chauffeur Gahagan, isn't given nearly enough to do, either. It's a cast of pros and the production is competent, so the picture is certainly watchable. Farrell, especially, is never boring. However, the rather dreadful plot and an overall lack of zip place this one at the bottom of the list of Torchy Blane mysteries.

**SPOILERS** As you would expect fast talking and quick thinking news reporter Torchy Blane, Glanda Ferrell, gets the jump on a gang of Chinese jade thieves with just old fashion police work. Something that her boyfriend police Let.Steve McBride seemed to be totally lacking of.With the people involved in smuggling a bunch of valuable Chinese burial jades into the country on a secret hit-list, by persons who's families the jades belonged to, Let. McBride is put on the case to protect their lives and catch their potential murderers. McBride's attempt to keep the killers from doing their dirty work ends in disaster with two of those targeted Allan Fitzhugh, Anderson Lawler, and Dr. Mansfield, James Stephenson, ending up mysteriously murdered. In the case of the unfortunate Allan Fitzhugh he also-besides being gunned down- ends up losing his head over-the jade burial tablets-them.**Caution Spoiler** Going to the city morgue to check out the circumstances of Fitzhugh death Torchy finds out, through his fingerprints, that he-or his headless corpse- isn't the person whom the police believe him to be. This murder mystery also gets a bit strange after Dr. Mansfield is later killed by smoking a spiked, by his killers, cigarette which poisons him. Before the meat-wagon, or morgue ambulance, arrives Dr. Mansfield's body mysteriously disappears from sight!These double murder now leads to the real person whom the murderers, now turned extortionists, are really targeting Senator H. Baldwin, Henry O'Neill. It's Sen. Baldwin, who owns the worlds biggest Chinese jade collection, whom both the late Allan Fitzhugh and Dr. Mansfield as well as the still alive Capt. Condon, Patrick Knowles were working for in smuggling burial jades out of China.The murdering blackmailers try to shake down Sen. Baldwin for a cool $250,000.00 by threatening to crash his daughter's Janet, Janet Shaw, wedding announcement reception, or even go so far as murdering her, at his Long Island estate. Janet's fiancée Dick Staunton, Richard Bond, agrees to pay the extortionists off by meeting them a his speedboat in the far end of New York Bay where they feel safe from the police an where the switch is to be made. It's then that Torchy goes into action in checkmating the extortionists plan. With the help of the US Navy and her boyfriend's, Steve McBride, bumbling assistant officer, and now promoted to Sergent, NYPD poet laureate Gahagan, Tom Kennedy, Torchy ends up getting the goods on the extortionists before they can get the goods, the $250,000.00 in extortion money, for themselves!

Fifth in the series of reporter-criminologist Torchy Blane who assists Detective Lieutenant Steve McBride in solving crimes. In this entry, Torchy figures out the solution to the deaths of three prominent men but allows Steve to get the credit at the end and make the collar. If this subservience is not enough, we are subjected to rampant racial stereotyping of Chinese and blacks. Detective Sergeant Gahagan provides comic relief that includes in this film his breaking into poetry from time to time. The film does involve Chinese burial tablets and has a few superficial shots that might have been take on the street of a major city "Chinatown" but the plot does not have anyone going there and doing anything. This version mostly takes place in police stations, at The Adventurers Club, homes, and at sea where a contribution is made by the US Navy. The plot is a remake of the 1920 "The Purple Cipher" and the1930 "Murder Will Out." It involves a combination of revenge murder and blackmail. There are notes to victims passed on Chinese laundry tickets and via additional means. Death comes via a multitude of means and bodies have a habit of disappearing. Fair.