We come again to the temporary end of the Charlie Chan series, as Castle in the Desert marks the final Chan film produced for Fox. There is nothing in the film’s content indicating closure or finality – indeed, this may be the most professionally mounted Chan picture under Sidney Toler’s Fox tenure. But studying the dates reveals a different story. The previous year, 1941, saw a mere two Chan pictures, while Castle in the Desert is the only Chan movie for 1942 – a real dearth, I know! But for mystery-addicted junkies of the ‘40s (needing to scratch their Chan itch), this slow waning of Chinese goodness must’ve been quite striking – and with no Chans to grace the good people of America at all in 1943! See, there was a war on (something just a tad more important), and white folk cannot tell the Chinese and Japanese apart anyway – shameful, I know.
What was really happening was a slow process by Fox Studios to divulge themselves of their entire B-movie division – with the diminished film audience in Europe, it was more profitable to focus solely on serious-minded fare. World War II aside, 1942 saw great Fox head Joseph Schenck step aside, replaced by Spyros Skouras – the man responsible for turning Fox into Twentieth Century Fox, thus starting its slow but inevitable slide towards evil. So it’s bye-bye B’s, not only Chan, but also prolific Fox series such as Jane Withers, Michael Shayne and The Cisco Kid – Oh boooy, I got some more movie franchises to add to the Master List!
I’d suspect Schenck was still acting head when Castle in the Desert was under production, as it evinces no shame for its status as a silly seat-filler with a mean streak of casual racism. Befitting Castle’s status as the sole Chan entry for an entire year, it commands a seemingly above-average budget. This is perhaps most evident in the film’s greatest image, an opening shot depicting the titular castle in the desert – a European stronghold eerily dropped dead in the deathless center of California’s Mojave Desert. It’s the sort of casually surreal image I’d frankly expected to see more of in the Chan films, and do expect to see more of in the upcoming entries, which use titles more similar to Castle in the Desert, and less similar to Charlie Chan Visits a World Capital We Haven’t Exploited Yet.
Some things in Chan never change, and plot is one of them – formula is god. Thus the next section within the castle, as always, is a chance to hoist 50% of the cast on us in 30 seconds, with single lines of dialogue meant to get across piles of character exposition:
“Greetings, Lucy Manderley (Lenita Lane), I am Professor Gleason (Lucien Littlefiend), here for no particularly good reason. It’s a pleasure to also meet Brenda (Arleen Whelan) and Walter Hartford (Edmund MacDonald). Oh, is that Dr. Retling (Steven Geray) I see now?”
There’s not much you need to know about any of these folk, really, though it is a consistent impediment to my watching these films that I feel the need to pause and take notes every time a new name is uttered (every 7 seconds in these early sections)…It takes me upwards of an hour and a half to watch these 61 minute flicks. For what it’s worth, Walter is a lawyer, Dr. Retling is a doctor (really?), and no one at all is a lovebird. That silly form of ‘30s audience pandering is long gone, as creators of 1940s proto-exploitation understood a couple of silly Chinamen and some romantically-unentangled ingénues were all we really needed.
The most important figure here at Castle Manderlay is the master of the house, Paul Manderlay (Douglass Dumbrille again). Paul?...Paul?!...PAUL?!!! What the living hell does this series love that one name so?! I swear, there’s been a “Paul” in every one of the past 10 entries! This Paul, infuriating name or no, is far better than usual, as indicated by his wonderful scar-hiding mask – result of a mysterious, never-addressed accident. Paul’s the sort of early mad scientist type Vincent Price made a career out of pastiching, only he’s really a historian, a professor of European medieval history. He has established an Old World castle here in the Californian badlands for the ostensible seclusion it offers – despite the proliferation of ready-made suspects who make idle residence here for little justified reason.
I won’t question why he chose the Mojave over the Rhineland (WWII aside, of course, for as little lip service as it gets here), since it’s the premise of this film, and its best element. I wholly welcome the weird. For what it’s worth, Paul is trying to get into the head of the ancient Borgia noblemen, reputed for their hereditary conditions of insanity and serial-poisoning. In order to think like a Borgia, Paul has no electricity, a real torture chamber, a poisoning dungeon, suits of armor…he’s even married a Borgia – “Lucy” Lucrezia, who fears she may be as nutty and poison-happy as her long-dead brother Cesare, as well as the countless Borgias past.
Really, it’s an excuse to get Charlie Chan in the 16th century. I’m going to allow this.
True to all that talk of poisoning, Gleason is soon poisoned. All present suspect Lucy, but are unwilling to address her. What happens, though, is that Paul’s attorney Walter suggests the body be dumped in the nearest hotel full of yokels, where Dr. Retling will then pronounce Gleason dead. It’s for Paul’s sake, really, as his will stipulates he’ll lose the fantastic Manderley fortune if any notoriety ever comes to the family name. And dumping corpses, that’s sooo much better than simply reporting corpses.
All this takes about five minutes to actually happen, but the next 56 minutes hinge so much upon it, it’s necessary to be careful expositing at this stage.
Now it’s time to introduce Charlie Chan, in a San Francisco hotel with “Number Two Son” Jimmy (Victor Sen Yung), on “leave” from the U.S. Army – he joined at the end of the last film, and is now playing hooky for the sake of franchise in exactly the way I predicted he might. Chan receives a letter from insane old friend Lucy requesting he travel out to Manderley. There is no mention of Gleason, and for all intents and purposes this movie isn’t really a murder mystery yet.
(Actually, the 61 minute film won’t officially be a murder mystery until the 56th minute – er, spoiler. That’s a fairly outrageous break in formula.)
Chan passes through one of them folksy old western towns in the Mojave, probably because Fox had a western set they wanted to use, and otherwise the Desert half of the title would be unjustified. Here at the Mojave Wells Hotel, Chan fends off a sub-Dracula series of mutterings about the Curse of Manderlay – such superstition seems silly outside of Romania. A particular old bat, self-appointed as “Saturnia, Mistress of the Dead” (Ethel Griffies, of Dead Men Tell) rambles in near-incomprehensibility about how “Death waits for you out there.” Chan arranges a ride to the castle, accompanied by a sudden, unexplained traveler, Watson King (Henry Daniell). Hilariously, Mistress Saturnia offers up her doom-laten assessment of Watson as well: “He’ll die a violent death, he will. And his murderer will go unpunished.” Ha ha ha!
After the meta commentary of Charlie Chan in Rio, I cannot say how intentional it is to suddenly pair Chan up with a sidekick called “Watson.”
Chan meets with Paul at the castle, as the rest of the entire cast creeps about in suspicious ways. The nature of the castle and Paul’s work is further explained. Chan understands how there is no connection to the outside world, so he’s commandeered one of Jimmy’s carrier pigeons – Army, remember, and surely already about to be court marshaled. Retling also gets to chat Chan chummily, revealing himself to be somewhat of the Renfeld type to Paul’s proto-Price. Yup, this is another of the horror pastiche entries, though without a specific form of horror to comment on – it’s simply all-purpose strangeness. Given my Chan tastes, I like this.
Later Chan meets with Lucy, to learn she didn’t send the letter (handwriting and all). Chan is all set to leave the castle, a mere third into its entry, when it is revealed the lone car’s carburetor is missing. They’re stranded 35 miles into California’s second-worst desert, presumably a madman on the loose, and all cell phones without reception (or at least in the totally hypothetical 2010 remake). Ah, maybe Castle in the Desert doesn’t overly copy any preexisting horror flicks, but it damn well resembles a mass of ‘em.
Jimmy Chan makes his delayed entrance, passing through that same old western town and fending off the same inimitable combination of superstition and xenophobia you still find in boondoggle stick towns our great nation over. His willified cab driver will only take Jimmy within two miles of Manderlay Castle. “Luckily,” I guess, Jimmy has a compatriot making the final trek – the great Saturnia herself, going on about how the stars have informed her of imminent murder (she knows she’s in a Chan flick, methinks, as Jimmy also eagerly awaits violent murder – a casual respite from the armed forces, he says).
As Jimmy crawls “comically” through Paul’s dummy-laden torture dungeon, yet another cast member presents himself to the castle crowd (that’s the twelfth character, by my count, and I’ve probably not mentioned them all here). This supposed trespasser is Arthur Fletcher (Milton Parsons) a P.I. from L.A. here to I.D. Lucy’s M.O. – that is, he’s here to investigate Gleason’s sad fate. He won’t have to wait long to learn firsthand of that fate, for soon Arthur collapses at the dinner table before all the assembled guests, poisoned in the exact same manner.
As Arthur’s body is spirited away, Chan investigates the poison annex (just like all homes have), where he discovers – Jimmy and Saturnia. I love how Jimmy’s reintroduction is always played for a jump scare, long before even Cat People codified the “jump scare” as a briefly acceptable cinematic trick – these B-movies prove there’s nothing new under the sun.
Chan, ever the automatic chemist, promptly identifies the poison used against Gleason and Arthur – the same delicious nightshade preferred by Romeo in Shakespeare’s play, no matter textual analysis could never single out a specific root. And…ah hah!, a clue audiences can use! Now, usually the “clues” come in the form of continuity errors intentionally left in, forcing audiences to separate them from the accidental continuity errors. Here, though, the clue is literary. That’s where I’m a Viking! I love it when movies assume my non-idiocy (a rather rare circumstance)! And Chan, knowing the same Shakespearean play all people with functioning high school diplomas ought to know, sees the truth – neither Gleason nor Arthur is dead.
Whuh?! So now, ¾ths through, there’s no murder? Yup! Plot resolutely refusing to exist, despite all the event on display, we’re left with weirdness and a cool setting. Given my fatigue with the Chan formula, that’s what I was already relying on.
Meanwhile Watson, that guy who came out with Chan, is serving as sculptor to Paul. Walter, the lawyer, issues forth accusations (or whatever), brandishing a bow and arrow in such a way to inform us that, a mere 15 minutes left or no, there will be blood!
Chan has learnt, through conveniently located typewriter clues, that these two false “deaths” were really the work of Walter – an attempt to bring shame to the Manderlay name in order to get Paul’s inheritance for himself. To further parse out what part wife Lucy has in all this, Chan goes ahead and asks her – ah, the direct approach. New information arises concerning Lucy’s presumed long-dead brother (stepbrother, really) Cesare – He’s among the living (Saturnia crazily espouses so much), but with face scarred from the accident that “killed” him. This is all merely an awkward red herring to plant suspicion upon Paul – but in all the Chans, only one entry saw fit to make its most suspicious suspect the killer (Treasure Island).
Somehow, Chan determines Cesare is still around, with his mind on the Manderlay fortune. Of course, so many years later his face may no longer be scarred – plastic surgery and all, still the wonderful deus ex machina driving half the recent Chan plots. So one of the suspects is a mystery man with a new face – every Toler entry in the past two or three years has used this story, but with 10 minutes left, it’s somehow a little more welcome.
The whole “Romeo and Juliet” thing having gotten us so far into the film sans plot, we now gotta rush through a murder, Chanquest and unmasking. And also Jimmy Chan buffoonery, a truer franchise purpose. Jimmy sneaks about in a suit of armor, prompting Chan to ask “Why does ‘Number Two Son’ inhabit hardware?” There’s a little comic business involving two people dressed as knights, and less comes of it here than would in an episode of “DuckTales.”
Meanwhile…someone’s died! Fifty-four minutes into 61, ‘bout freaking time! It’s Walter, an arrow through his torso. Obviously, this is a rather simply mystery by Chan standards, and here’s part of the solution – Walter wasn’t shot, he was stabbed…by a left-handed devil, ‘cause there’s no way a series that’s anti-Chinese would be pro-lefty. (Surprisingly, the common “lefty” murder twist only now makes its first Chan appearance.)
The rather desultory Chanquest takes place in the castle’s grand chamber, centering on an argument about Paul’s scar. And one “Scooby Doo” unmasking later, it turns out he has no scar – Paul’s explanation is that the “scar” was his alibi for desert hermitude, which – Ah, who cares?! He looked creepy for an hour, and that’s all I demand!
Then Watson makes his left-handed move, proving he’s the killer. His sudden attempt to shoot everyone is also foiled, by Jimmy the knight. For our final Jimmy gag, closing out for good the Fox Chans, Charlie opines “Son chip off old chop stick.” (?!!)
That’s it for Fox. It’s not Chan’s end, oh no siree! I’ve still got – what? – seventeen more to go! This is one Sisyphean film franchise!
Related posts:
• No. 3 Behind That Curtain (1929)
• No. 4 Charlie Chan Carries On (1931)
• No. 5 The Black Camel (1931)
• No. 9 Charlie Chan in London (1934)
• No. 10 Charlie Chan in Paris (1935)
• No. 11 Charlie Chan in Egypt (1935)
• No. 12 Charlie Chan in Shanghai (1935)
• No. 13 Charlie Chan’s Secret (1936)
• No. 14 Charlie Chan at the Circus (1936)
• No. 15 Charlie Chan at the Race Track (1936)
• No. 16 Charlie Chan at the Opera (1936)
• No. 17 Charlie Chan at the Olympics (1937)
• No. 18 Charlie Chan on Broadway (1937)
• No. 19 Charlie Chan at Monte Carlo (1938)
• No. 20 Charlie Chan in Honolulu (1938)
• No. 21 Charlie Chan in Reno (1939)
• No. 22 Charlie Chan at Treasure Island (1939)
• No. 23 City in Darkness (1939)
• No. 24 Charlie Chan in Panama (1940)
• No. 25 Charlie Chan at the Wax Museum (1940)
• No. 26 Charlie Chan’s Murder Cruise (1940)
• No. 27 Murder Over New York (1940)
• No. 28 Dead Men tell (1941)
• No. 29 Charlie Chan in Rio (1941)
• No. 31 Charlie Chan in the Secret Service (1944)
• No. 32 The Chinese Cat (1944)
• No. 33 Meeting at Midnight (1944)
• No. 34 The Shanghai Cobra (1945)
• No. 35 The Red Dragon (1945)
• No. 36 The Scarlet Clue (1945)
• No. 37 The Jade Mask (1945)
• No. 38 Dark Alibi (1946)
• No. 40 Dangerous Money (1946)
• No. 41 The Trap (1946)
• No. 42 The Chinese Ring (1947)
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