Sounds like a title for a modern-day vampire movie, but, actually, this is a pretty juice slice of the '30s old dark house recipe. As in a million bucks in gold hidden in a mansion by a dead gangster. The police enlist the service of a father-daughter clairvoyant team to locate the loot, while the gangster's doctor has his own cunning plan.
Featuring Warner Oland, Stuart Erwin, Dorothy Wilson, Dudley Digges, Gertrude Hoffman, Oscar Apfel, Frank Reicher, and June Darwell.
We start with Dr. Paul Cornelius (Oland) visiting Joe (Reicher) in the hospital. Joe tells him about the money; "it's all yours" if Paul will give him an injection to ease his pain. At the mansion, we see two elderly women , Mrs. Marble (Darwell) and her housekeeper Mattie (Hoffman) reading that Joe's died. "It's ours now...now he's dead, and we're free!" Says Marble. "Curse or no curse!" A ghostly face comes out of the darkness, down the stairs. Marble falls.
We segue to Mlle. Mystera, that is Patricia's (Wilson) 'vocational guidance' place. She's in the midst of an "astral plane" reading. Her dad, Horace (Digges) waits outside. Next thing we know, there's a police raid (the 'customer' was a detective working undercover, Dwight Wilson--Erwin); Horace pleads to the Chief Inspector (Apfel) that he can help the police. Patricia gives Dwight an impromptu reading, which proves very accurate.
"This is the battiest thing I ever let myself in for!" Says the Inspector, who, thanks to Dwight's urging, agrees to let Patricia off if she works for the police. So, Patricia starts in on their case right in the inspector's office--doesn't go so well at first, but she has predicted a murder that just happened. "All those gyp artists work with the move!" insists the Inspector. Dwight suggests another case: "How about that old housekeeper, and that nutty ghost story?"
Meaning Mattie and Mrs. Marble. Apparently, Mrs. Marble has died from her fall. Sure enough, Patricia proceeds to 'see' a lot about that house. Next, thankfully, we're at Marbles house. "There's an evil spirit in this house." Patricia disagrees; I bet it's actually Dr. Paul. Yep, he's at the door. Finally, we've got the group of usual suspects gathered in the drawing room of the old place. It's almost half way into the movie's run time.
Anyway, the doc relates the whole story about Joe's death-bed confession: the money's in the Marble house because the old woman was his wife. "We suspect murder, but we can't prove it" says the Inspector to the doc. That worthy comes up with a cunning plan--that he should stay in the house under the pretext of studying the psychics. Patricia doesn't want to hang around, but she perks up when Dwight shows up.
He's got a search warrant for the money, which is obviously stolen mob money. Strangely, Cornelius tells Mattie that he knows who killed Mrs. Marble. "I'm convinced" Horace observes, "that she knows where the money is." It sounds as though Cornelius and Horace might come to some sort of arrangement concerning the money.
It's possible that Cornelius knows, or thought he knew where the money was, because of Joe's confession--which we didn't hear. Horace tries to talk his daughter into using her skills to find the money: she refuses. Dwight takes a short cut to their room. Next we see someone sneak up on Mattie's bed: the 'ghost' of Joe warning her to lay off the money. The others converge on her.
Since she is afraid of the ghost, she won't tell the others about the money. Patricia insists that it wasn't Joe at all. The only one not present who could be pretending to be the ghost is Mrs. Marble, who's inconveniently dead. Or is she? Horace wants to talk to Dwight about Cornelius, but the cop has to leave. Now, the doc skulks into Mattie's room. He mentions a secret room.
Horace overhears this, and finds the entrance. Well, first thing he sees is the 'ghost's' mask. Cornelius hears some knocking from the corridor; it's actually Horace investigating a hiding place. He surprises Horace, and takes his gun away. Patricia gets antsy and finds Cornelius, but doesn't suspect anything of him. "Where's my father?!" He lays a trap for her, telling her that dad's down stairs. He now tells her that it's Mattie who's up to something.
He tells her that he's going to give the old bat an injection. Meanwhile, thanks to Patricia's skills, she sees her father in in a crystal-ball like glass lamp. We find out that the money is in a certain place in the cellar; well, we'll see. Mattie has to come up with something to tell the menacing Cornelius. He says he's killed Horace. Indeed, once in the secret passageway, they see the body, then get to the cellar.
In a weird way, it seems that now Mattie and Cornelius are in cahoots--no, she was trying to lure him into a deep open well. Turning the tables, he chucks her in. Patricia shows up. Thinking fast, Cornelius tells her that Mattie killed her father, and then tries to lure her into the deadly well. Dwight makes it back; hears her screams, and, with reinforcement and attempts to rescue her.
Dwight finally gets at at Cornelius, who, unsurprisingly, tumbles into the well. Now that all's well, were comfy back at the inspector's office. "What I want to know is, who gets the reward?" he asks. He has Patricia sign a waiver, which is in fact a marriage license for her and Dwight. That a boss who knows how to play winggman. The end.
This is nicely atmospheric, and the mansion certainly does all it can to help along the ghostly crime mystery. Once things start happening there, it gets interesting. Except for a couple of things: it's obvious that Oland's character is the bad guy; an undead Mrs. Marble would be the only other possibility, and that would change too much other stuff to work; and, given that, the mystery really doesn't get going until we're well into the movie.
Nonetheless this is an enjoyable way to spend an hour. The performances are really quite good. Ironically, Patricia, who has maybe the shadiest credentials, is the only one (other than the cops) who isn't acting suspicious. she's so above-board the only will accept the reward under the wink-wink sanction of sharing it with Dwight, her newly betrothed. The first part is somewhat redeemed by the quips at the police station coming from O'Hara.
Not a million bucks worth here, but Before Dawn will get the pot boiling.