
Mary Astor in “Two Arabian Knights,” one of four mystery movies from the 1920s.
I thought it would be fun to analyze last year’s mystery movies to see if I accomplished my goal of providing variety. I generally go from week to week in picking mystery movies, so I only have a general idea of how I am doing.
Here’s how the decades stacked up:
Decade |
Movies |
1910s |
1 |
1920s |
4 |
1930s |
13 |
1940s |
14 |
1950s |
16 |
1960s |
3 |
1970s |
2 |
I did better than I expected. Silents are terra incognita to many people (though one of the 1920s films — “The Last of Mrs. Cheyney” — was a talkie that was also released in a silent version), and I use an arbitrary cutoff date of 1960, though I snuck in five from 1960s and 1970s. The earliest movie was “Hell’s Hinges” (1916) and the most recent was “Zulu Dawn” (1979). You may have noticed there were 53 mystery movies, since I carried over “Earth vs. the Flying Saucers from Dec. 31, 2018.
The 1940s and 1950s tended toward film noir while the 1930s was heavy on the Pre-Codes.
Next, I’ll take a look at the mystery studios.
Date |
Mystery Movie |
Year |
Studio |
3/4/2019 |
Hell’s Hinges |
1916 |
Triangle |
9/30/2019 |
Red Lily |
1924 |
MGM |
11/4/2019 |
The Late Mathias Pascal |
1926 |
Foreign, Albatros |
4/22/2019 |
Two Arabian Nights |
1927 |
United Artists |
6/3/2019 |
The Last of Mrs. Cheyney |
1929 |
MGM |
2/4/2019 |
Hell’s Highway |
1932 |
RKO |
2/24/2019 |
Lawyer Man |
1932 |
WB |
4/1/2019 |
Big City Blues |
1932 |
WB |
9/16/2019 |
State’s Attorney |
1932 |
RKO |
1/14/2019 |
Sherlock Holmes, Study in Scarlet |
1933 |
Fox |
4/29/2019 |
State Fair |
1933 |
Fox |
9/9/2019 |
Counsellor at Law |
1933 |
Universal |
11/11/2019 |
Art Trouble |
1934 |
WB |
5/6/2019 |
She Married Her Boss |
1935 |
Columbia |
5/27/2019 |
Les Miserables |
1935 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
7/22/2019 |
Tough Guy |
1936 |
MGM |
11/18/2019 |
Bulldog Drummond Comes Back |
1937 |
Paramount |
12/30/2019 |
Oops! |
1939 |
WB |
2/18/2019 |
Night Train to Munich |
1940 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
3/18/2019 |
Dulcy |
1940 |
MGM |
12/16/2019 |
Beyond Tomorrow |
1940 |
Independent |
5/13/2019 |
Texas |
1941 |
Columbia |
2/10/2019 |
Eyes in the Night |
1942 |
MGM |
10/14/2019 |
Man Who Would Not Die |
1942 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
1/28/2019 |
Du Barry Was a Lady |
1943 |
MGM |
1/21/2019 |
Crime by Night |
1944 |
WB |
12/23/2019 |
The Horn Blows at Midnight |
1945 |
WB |
6/24/2019 |
Fear |
1946 |
Monogram |
11/25/2019 |
Somewhere in the Night |
1946 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
7/8/2019 |
Crime Doctor’s Diary |
1949 |
Columbia |
8/19/2019 |
Flaxy Martin |
1949 |
WB |
9/2/2019 |
The Fan |
1949 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
6/10/2019 |
Underworld Story |
1950 |
United Artists |
3/11/2019 |
Man in the White Suit |
1951 |
Foreign, Ealing |
4/14/2019 |
Half Angel |
1951 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
6/17/2019 |
The Law and the Lady |
1951 |
MGM |
7/1/2019 |
Five Fingers |
1952 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
8/26/2019 |
Flight to the Future |
1952 |
Promotional |
1/7/2019 |
Pushover |
1954 |
Columbia |
7/29/2019 |
Green Fire |
1954 |
MGM |
12/31/2018 |
Earth vs. the Flying Saucers |
1956 |
Columbia |
8/12/2019 |
The Opposite Sex |
1956 |
MGM |
10/21/2019 |
King and Four Queens |
1956 |
Independent |
12/2/2019 |
Cry in the Night |
1956 |
WB |
3/25/2019 |
The Last Angry Man |
1959 |
Independent |
7/15/2019 |
Big Circus |
1959 |
Allied Artists |
10/7/2019 |
Man Who Understood Women |
1959 |
Twentieth Century-Fox |
10/28/2019 |
The Devil’s Disciple |
1959 |
Foreign,
England |
12/9/2019 |
Susan Slade |
1961 |
WB |
9/23/2019 |
The Shooting |
1966 |
Independent |
8/5/2019 |
Model Shop |
1969 |
Columbia |
4/8/2019 |
The Iceman Cometh |
1973 |
American Film Theater |
5/20/2019 |
Zulu Dawn |
1979 |
Foreign, England |
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About lmharnisch
I am retired from the Los Angeles Times
I always like ’em the earlier the better.
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