A Close Call for Boston Blackie (1946)

Too much of everything

Great Film overall

Don't Believe the Hype

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Boston Blackie is led astray by a dame. The dame in this case being an ex-girlfriend of his played by beautiful Lynn Merrick. There's a baby, an extortion plot, and the inevitable murder charge for Blackie. One of these days Inspector Farraday might get the right suspect if he actually stopped to consider someone, ANYONE, besides Blackie! An enjoyable entry in the Boston Blackie series with lots of comedy. Blackie once again disguises himself as an old man. At least he doesn't wear blackface this time. Chester Morris, Richard Lane, and George E. Stone are all good as usual. Claire Carleton is fun as Runt's girlfriend Mamie. The baby is cute. Certainly not the best Boston Blackie movie but hard to dislike.

Every time we think that after so many hilarious and varied adventures, the writers of the 'Boston Blackie' movie series must be running out of ideas sometime, they surprise us with something ENTIRELY new: this time, the story seems to revolve around one of Blackie's romances at first, and when the husband of the girl Blackie was 'sweet on', just released from jail, is found dead in Blackie's apartment, Inspector Faraday comes to the conclusion that, while he's learned by now that Blackie wouldn't kill anybody for diamonds or money and neither is he a deranged strangler - for a woman he MIGHT commit murder...But the case very soon becomes a lot more complicated: there's a 'borrowed' baby involved that the 'Runt' and his girlfriend Mamie try to hide in the most impossible places (a very talented baby, by the way - literally a BORN actor!), while Blackie once more is at the same time on the run from the police and after the real murderer... Another VERY entertaining and surprising entry in this wonderful series of 40s crime-comedy mix!

If you've never seen a Boston Blackie film, then there are a few things you should know about every film. First, Blackie USED to be a criminal. But, he did his time in prison and has definitely reformed. However, despite leading a very respectable life, the Inspector is always assuming that Blackie is bad and is constantly trying to pin murder raps on him. Second, the Inspector is an idiot...but his assistant is even stupider. Third, Blackie always is able to outsmart these two and ends up solving the crime himself. Fourth, he is a sucker for a dame...and in this particular installment, that's a serious problem. That's because he trusts an old ex-girlfriend--not realizing she's a crook and her boyfriend is a murderer! But because Blackie has this blind spot, he nearly gets arrested for murder and ends up having his friend, Runt, care for a lost baby! So is this film worth seeing? Well, for a B-movie it's pretty good but I must admit that there is a definite sameness with the Boston Blackie series. In other words, if you've seen a couple of them, you can pretty much guess what will happen in this one. It's pleasant and entertaining...plus the baby is pretty cute (yes, this one has a baby). A worthwhile time-passer and it's nice to see Blackie dressed up as an old man--the makeup job was actually really good.

A Close Call For Boston Blackie is a title with a double meaning. Our hero is once again suspected of a crime he didn't do, in this case a murder right in his own apartment. But the really close call Chester Morris has is that he could have been married to dame who is part of a plot to slip him into a frame for said murder.This film rests on a wildly illogical premise than Lynn Merrick who had been kanoodling with Morris before marrying playboy Robert Scott. On the day after her husband was paroled from prison because he turned out to be one bad seed of a prominent family, he turns up with gun in hand looking for Blackie. He's later found shot to death in Blackie's apartment.Of course the idea that Boston Blackie would ever fall for a bad dame and worse almost marry her is wildly ludicrous since we know how street smart he is. But this dame borrows a baby from Charles Lane who is his real father and passes it off as her's and Scott's. The idea is to extort some money out of Scott's wealthy father.Followers of the series know that Blackie is a master of disguise and he puts on an old man's disguise as the baby's grandfather to help expose the scam. But I cannot believe that Merrick could not have seen she was also being scammed by a guy she was intimate with. That just won't play.The ever faithful George E. Stone is here as well as the dumb and dumber cops Richard Lane and Frank Sully. But A Close Call For Boston Blackie was way too impossible to swallow.