Tonight's Movie: Fingerprints Don't Lie (1951)

FINGERPRINTS DON'T LIE (1951) is a 57-minute programmer available from VCI Entertainment in their Forgotten Noir Collector's Set Series 2.

I've previously enjoyed FBI GIRL (1951) from this collection, as well as films in other Forgotten Noir volumes. They're typically low budget but reliably entertaining, with good casts.

This film was less enjoyable than the typical "Forgotten Noir" film, but it still had its moments, and a couple memorably low-budget aspects almost pushed it into "so bad it's good" territory.

As the movie begins, Paul Moody (Richard Emory) is convicted of the murder of Mayor Palmer (Ferris Taylor) on the basis of fingerprint testimony by police forensic expert James Stover (Richard Travis, THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER).

The late mayor's daughter Carolyn (Sheila Ryan), who is also Paul's fiancee, visits Stover to see if there's any way his testimony could have been wrong. Although her father had opposed her marriage to Paul, there were corrupt officials with a far greater motive to murder her father, and she maintains faith in her fiance.

Although the fingerprint at the crime scene was clearly Paul's, Stover is concerned enough to start looking at other explanations for the murder.

The plot is fairly humdrum, but the execution is something else again -- starting with the film being scored with organ music! It reminded me of an old-time radio show -- this one just happened to have pictures to go with it. Other than silent film scoring, which is another thing entirely, I don't think I'd ever seen a film like this scored with an organ, and it was enjoyably bizarre.

Additional signs of a low, low budget abound, including an establishing shot of a building with the street numbers and words on the building backwards. I'm not sure if it was film or a filmed photograph, but whatever it was, the negative was flipped the wrong way!

Another odd moment comes when the real murderer looks out a window straight down to the street a few stories below. He's later shot and falls out the same window, but seems to fall onto a balcony, which had not been visible when he looked out the window. Or did he just happen to fall onto a mattress which wasn't meant to be in view of the camera?

For classic film fans, there's a certain sad irony in Tom Neal playing the prosecuting attorney, given his own very serious run-ins with the law. A few months after this film was released, he infamously beat up Franchot Tone in a romantic dispute over Barbara Payton, sending Tone to the hospital. In 1965 Neal was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in his wife's death; he was paroled after six years but died just a few months later.

Leading lady Sheila Ryan is a happier story. A steadily working actress from 1939, she appeared in everything from Busby Berkeley's THE GANG'S ALL HERE (1943) to the Anthony Mann film noir classic RAILROADED! (1947) to Gene Autry Westerns such as THE COWBOY AND THE INDIANS (1949). The year after this film was released she married Autry's sidekick Pat Buttram, a union which lasted until her passing nearly 23 years later. She was just 54 when she died.

Also in the cast is one-time Miss California Margia Dean, seen last week in RIMFIRE (1949). As was mentioned in the comments to that review, Dean is still with us; she'll be 98 in April.

Lyle Talbot turns up as a police lieutenant, one of many such small roles among that busy actor's scores of credits. The tiresome Sid Melton is ostensibly comic relief as a photographer; my hand itches to hit the fast-forward button whenever he's on screen. Michael Whalen and Rory Mallinson round out the cast.

The movie was directed by Sam Newfield and filmed in black and white by Jack Greenhalgh.

The print and sound quality are quite good, especially considering the film's low budget.

In addition to the previously mentioned collector's set, VCI released this film as part of a double feature disc.

The bottom line is that this "C" level film, while not on a level with other "forgotten" films from VCI, still has aspects which die-hard fans of the "B's" (and lower!) may find enjoyable. I found the cast and the nuttier aspects enough to offset the more mundane, dry scenes, and in the end it was worth an hour of my time. As the saying goes, "Your mileage may vary!"