Mr. Moto Takes a Vacation (1939)

Sorry, this movie sucks

A lot of fun.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Mr. Moto takes on a mysterious jewel thief known as Metaxa out to steal the recently-unearthed Crown of Sheba. This last Peter Lorre Mr. Moto movie starts out fun but then unwanted comic relief George P. Huntley shows up. Huntley as Archie Featherstone ranks among the worst examples of forced comedy I've ever seen. Why they felt they needed to ruin an otherwise enjoyable Mr. Moto movie with this idiot is beyond me. He even appears in blackface at one point! To make matters worse, he teams with racist caricaturist Willie Best not long after.A good supporting cast including Lionel Atwill, Joseph Schildkraut, and pretty Virginia Field can only do so much. The writing is pretty thin, as well. They even reuse a bit from the previous Moto film, Mr. Moto in Danger Island. In that one, Moto (faking appendicitis) arrives by ship and is picked up by an ambulance. After the ambulance departs, two men come rushing up in a cab exclaiming that they are the real ambulance drivers and the two men with Moto are imposters. Well a very similar bit is used here, except instead of an ambulance it's an armored truck with two imposter drivers.It's not surprising this is the end of the Moto series. The U.S. would be at war with Japan in a couple of years so it would have been impossible for Fox to continue making movies with a Japanese hero. Besides, if this is an example of where the series was headed it's better they stopped here. It was a decent series with Peter Lorre always giving a good performance even when the material didn't deserve it. This one's probably the worst of the lot but still watchable. When Huntley's not around, it's actually entertaining.

I generally love these 1930 mystery/police Charlie Chan type of movies, and this is no exception. However, something seems bad with this movie. A late attempt to switch from cerebral Moto movies centered around the plot contrivances to a salad bar spoilt by comedy relief that is as relieving as sore feet. A typecast buffoon appears from nowhere impersonating a clumsy Englishman who plays the detective, and even other characters seem entangled into providing comedy relief. The plot may seem odd or a bare excuse to us today, but back then the possibility of epochal archaeological discoveries was not only real, but a commonplace occurrence.

Mr. Moto Takes a Vacation (1939) ** (out of 4) Eighth and final entry in Fox's original series once again finds Peter Lorre in the role of Mr. Moto. This time he must fight off countless bad guys who are trying to steal a priceless crowd previously owned by the Queen of Sheba. This final entry isn't the weakest of the series but it might be the most disappointing. I was highly disappointed in this one because it features a pretty good cast but there's really nothing that works overly well here. The movie certainly a long way from being bad but at the same time there's just not enough good stuff here to make the film worth viewing. The actual story is a fairly interesting set up but not enough is done with it as we pretty much get cardboard bad guys popping up at various spots and doing something bad. There's really no heart or soul behind any of the writing and in the end the movie just comes off as a low grade "B" movie rather than something unique like a lot of the films in this series. Lorre finds himself giving another good performance and we've also got decent work by Joseph Schildkraut, Virginia Field and Lionel Atwill. Atwill is pretty much wasted in the film but it's always nice seeing him. G.P. Huntley plays the comic relief here and his awful character really brings the film down several notches. I'm not sure who the director thought would find this performance funny. Black character actor Willie Best also appears briefly. Fans of the series will certainly want to check this one out but it's doubtful many others will find any type of entertainment here.

This is one of my favorite Mr. Motos, and I have seen them all. As usual Lorre is his charming self as the debonair Mr. Moto. Lionel Atwill plays a delightfully zany museum curator, the usual comic relief is quite funny here, and there are lots of suspects on whom to cast an eye. It's fast paced and fun.The archaeologist doesn't have quite the same flair as Thomas Beck, the usual second lead in these programmers, but he's adequate. Stepin Fetchit is on board, and while he speaks in a stereotypical manner his lines are funny, not demeaning to his intelligence, and he actually saves the day in his brief time on screen.