Another Thin Man **** (1939, William Powell, Myrna Loy, Virginia Grey, Otto Kruger, Ruth Hussey) – Classic Movie Review 2264

The bubbly 1939 comedy detective thriller film Another Thin Man is another enjoyable Thin Man mystery, the third in the MGM six-movie franchise, based on Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op story The Farewell Murder.

Director W S Van Dyke II’s bubbly 1939 American comedy detective thriller film Another Thin Man is another enjoyable Thin Man mystery adventure, the third in the MGM six-movie franchise, based on the writings of Dashiell Hammett. With no further Thin Man stories, it is based on Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op story The Farewell Murder.

William Powell and Myrna Loy make a welcome return as married sleuths Nick and Nora Charles who this time set out to unmask a killer at work on the Long Island estate of old Colonel Burr MacFay (C Aubrey Smith), who invites them to spend the weekend at his house after receiving threats from shady Phil Church (Sheldon Leonard).

McFay is Nora’s father’s former business partner and the administrator of her fortune and somebody apparently wants him dead. Other shady characters include MacFay’s housekeeper Mrs. Isabella Bellam (Phyllis Gordon) and his adopted daughter Lois (Virginia Grey).

The plot is too rushed at the start, then the duo are left to dally too long for witty banter over the investigation, running the movie into unnecessary overtime at 104 minutes when the original’s 93 was perfect. But, nevertheless, with Asta back as their terrier, it is still an entertaining and engrossing mystery movie, with the humorous dialogue, the plot’s intriguing mystery, and Powell, Loy and the MGM stalwarts all running silky smoothly.

The Charles’ son Nicky Jr is introduced for the first time, and the cast also includes their terrier Asta, Virginia Grey, Otto Kruger, C Aubrey Smith, Ruth Hussey, Nat Pendleton, Patric Knowles, Sheldon Leonard, Tom Neal, Phyllis Gordon, Marjorie Main and Shemp Howard in an uncredited role as Wacky.

The Afro-Cuban dance team René and Estela, headliners at the Havana-Madrid Club in New York City, are featured in the floor show at the West Indies Club.

The original screen-writers Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett return again, after scoring Oscar nominations for the first two films, this time to adapt Hammett’s The Farewell Murder. It’s good that they give marriage and the baby a very lightweight, light-hearted treatment and get on with the proper detective work of the business of murder and sleuthing.

The ‘Another Thin Man’ of the title is Nora’s new child, Nickie Jr (William Anthony Poulsen), even though the original Thin Man was actually the killer and not the Nick Sr character.

It was released on 17 November 1939 (in the US) and was another hit for MGM, grossing a global total of $2,223,000 and making a profit of $394,000, against a .budget of $1,107,000.

The movie’s vast popularity led to three more sequels: Shadow of the Thin Man (1941), The Thin Man Goes Home (1945), and Song of the Thin Man (1947). There followed an admired 1957-58 TV series with Peter Lawford and Phyllis Kirk.

After this, Powell was for ever erroneously thought of as the Thin Man, but this character was actually the murder victim, Wynant, played by Edward Ellis. So the film could not be called Return of the Thin Man because The Thin Man from the first film was completely dead.

In June 2012 Warner Bros decided to go slow on the plan to film The Thin Man, a re-adaptation of Dashiell Hammett’s novel, set to star Johnny Depp as Nick Charles and to be directed by Rob Marshall from a screenplay by David Koepp.

The Thin Man series: The Thin Man (1934), After the Thin Man (1936), Another Thin Man (1939), Shadow of the Thin Man (1941), The Thin Man Goes Home (1945), and Song of the Thin Man (1947).

The cast are William Powell as Nick Charles, Myrna Loy as Nora Charles, Virginia Grey as Lois MacFay, Otto Kruger as Assistant District Attorney Van Slack, C Aubrey Smith as Colonel Burr MacFay, Ruth Hussey as Charles’ nanny Dorothy Walters,  Nat Pendleton as Lieutenant Guild, Patric Knowles as Dudley Horn, Lois’s fiancé, Tom Neal as MacFay’s secretary Freddie Coleman, Phyllis Gordon as MacFay’s housekeeper Mrs Isabella Bellam, Sheldon Leonard as Phil Church, Don Costello as Diamond Back Vogel, Harry Bellaver as Creeps, Muriel Hutchison as Smitty, Abner Biberman as Dum-Dum, Marjorie Main as Mrs Dolley, and Shemp Howard as Wacky.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2264

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Another Thin Man on the marquee of a Toronto cinema showing it as a double feature with the Richard Arlen film Missing Daughters.