Song of the Thin Man (1947)

From my favorite movies..

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Most of the reviewers here for this film appear to fall right in line with the common perception that this was one of, if not the weakest of the Thin Man films. But you know what? I liked it. I think a lot of it had to do with the hep-cat dialog coming from clarinetist Clinker Krause (Keenan Wynn), and if there was a better supporting cast in the series elsewhere, I think you'd be hard pressed to find it. Besides Wynn, you had Leon Ames, Gloria Grahame and Jayne Meadows, and the kicker would be Dean Stockwell, still a kid as young Nick Charles Jr.As usual, and despite my best efforts to follow the characters and situations, it's virtually impossible to solve the mystery presented, but getting there is much of the fun. I knew that necklace would wind up being instrumental in solving a murder as soon as Nick (William Powell) picked it up the first time, but gee, what's with Mrs. Talbin (Patricia Morrison)? She would have gotten her revenge when her husband confessed to killing Drake (Phillip Reed). I think you'd have to call her shooting of Mitchell Talbin (Ames) an unforced error. Oh well, too bad.So for a swan song, I think Nick and Nora Charles went out respectably. Powell by this time was showing his age a bit but Myrna Loy still looked great, though both conceding that perhaps their party hearty days may have been well behind them. Even Asta still had a few good scenes left in him, working the bedroom gimmick for maximum effect. Spanning a period of slightly over a dozen years, I think the Thin Man series came to a successful conclusion with this entertaining swan song.

This is the sixth and last in the series of Thin Man movies with William Powell and Myrna Loy. The plot deals with a night club manager who is murdered after he assaults a trumpet player in a band and two times a girlfriend and well as owe several thousand dollars to another man. Nick and Nora take on the murder case at the request of the girlfriend (Jayne Meadows) of the prime murder suspect. The jilted murder victim's girlfriend (Gloria Grahame) also gets bumped off as well. The movie has some scenes with the son of the Thin Man (played by Dean Stockwell). Keenan Wynn costars as one of the band members (though he is never considered to be a prime suspect). There is still a good chemistry between William Powell and Myrna Loy in this movie. There are less good one liners that you often heard from the earlier movies in the series though. Asta also has a few good scenes in this movie. William Powell and Myrna Loy appear a bit more tired in this last movie of the series. But I guess that is to be expected as one gets older anyway.

Song of the Thin Man is a sad-sweet experience, something like meeting a good friend you haven't seen in years and realizing how much affection you still have for him... but also how much you both have aged. It's been 13 years since The Thin Man appeared in 1934. We have to stop and remember that Nick Charles wasn't the thin man back then; that particular thin man was just one of the many murder victims Nick and Nora came across in their six movies. We remember the sophistication and insouciance of this affectionate and clever couple. They were never at a loss for a quick come-back or to shake a cold, gin martini. Even Nick's modus operandi to bring all the suspects together at the conclusion and pick apart the case until he has the murderer squirming never quite got stale. Alas, with Song of the Thin Man we have the MGM factory squeezing out one more film to try to wring a profit from it, this time attempting to make it "contemporary" by setting the story in the post-WWII social world of after-hours jazz clubs, bebop musicians and hep cat dialogue. Nick and Nora never looked uncomfortable anywhere their adventures took them in the past. They look at times now as out of place as salesmen from Peru, Indiana, at a Linda and Cole Porter party. Gone is the sophisticated world of white sofas and polished black floors, of naughty Porter lyrics and earnestly sophisticated Gershwin tunes. Martinis seem oddly old fashioned now (and so do Old Fashioneds) as Nick drinks high balls and Nora sips sherry. And instead of clever repartee, Song of the Thin Man gives us the kind of dialogue only studio journeymen can write. Says one character, "I must have blown my top, kicking Buddy over for a road company Casanova like you!" The solution depends on the kind of half-baked, melodramatic psychology popular at the time. To make it even more tedious, there are no characters except Nick and Nora to care about. The movie is peopled with crooks, opportunists, gold- diggers, scat-talking musicians and the unattractive rich. The acting is so variable that it doesn't take long to realize we're watching the kind of movie that MGM did not waste much effort on. Why spend time on it? Two names: William Powell and Myrna Loy. Even though 13 years have elapsed, even though, at 55, Powell is a little fuller around the face (Loy at 42 doesn't seem to have changed a bit) and even though WWII altered decisively the world of films, they remain one of the most refreshing, attractive and delightful movie pairs in screen history. They raise the movie, if at least not to their level, to a level of enduring affection for their style, their warmth, their intelligence and, that word again, their insouciance. So three stars is too much for the movie but five stars is too little for them.

When Nick goes out to the gambling ship to investigate Asta (his dog) finds a single edged razor blade on the floor of the ransacked office/stateroom. Nick searches the cabin for a while before noticing that Asta is excited about the blade.Nick picks it up, ponders it for a minute and says, "No. I don't think it was Somerset Maugham." Apparently the only point of this little scene is to make a reference to the movie and book, "The Razor's Edge" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038873/by Somerset Maugham which was written in 1944 and filmed in 1946.