Perhaps there's something in the silliness of this film noir spoof that made me feel sorry for the cast, but after a while I began to smirk, then it began to turn into a smile and after a while, I slightly laughed. This is one of those beyond bizarre films that defies description, dealing with the investigation of a murder investigated by none other than former Bowery boy Gabriel Dell. An all-star cast comes in and out of the plot for the most bizarre dialog. At times, it appears that someone describe the scene to the actors, and they were asked to improvise the dialogue as they went along. One actor speaks entirely in cliches, and Will Geer, as a rather quacky doctor, tells Dell that he can't give out any details but then begins to make up this outrageous gossip about everybody that he mentions in the conversation. One of the females talks about her lover in a way that makes absolutely no sense but after awhile, I began to laugh because in making no sense, it actually became very funny.
Most of the supporting cast are on and off pretty quickly and they include fellow Bowery Boy Huntz Hall, Vincent Gardenia, Barbara Harris, Joyce Van Patten, Anjanette Comer, Nita Talbot and Sorrell Booke. It's a silly film that often makes no sense, but the less it makes sense, more fun it begins to get, and after a while, I began to understand what the writers were going for. Normally I would rate something like this at a two or a three, but there's a sweetness to the film that can't be overlooked, a well-intended parody that nearly bombs but would make me feel guilty if I were to give it a bomb. It's definitely a curiosity, not much more, and I'm not surprised that word-of-mouth made it a big fiasco in the mid-1950's when movies weren't very good to begin with and there was better stuff on TV.
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