THE BISHOP MURDER CASE

 

THE BISHOP MURDER CASE is a 1929 sound film produced by MGM. It is another adaptation of a S.S. Van Dine novel featuring upper-class amateur sleuth Philo Vance, with a young Basil Rathbone portraying the character. 

THE BISHOP MURDER CASE was made and released during the same period that Paramount was making a series of Philo Vance films starring William Powell. This shows how popular the Van Dine novels were at this time, with two major Hollywood studios making films with the same character concurrently. 

I have read a few of the Van Dine Philo Vance novels, but I have not read THE BISHOP MURDER CASE. The movie has a series of murders, with clues involving nursery rhymes and chess. Rathbone's Vance is much more personable than the literary one (as was William Powell's), but he's still an erudite, fastidious fellow who appears to have major knowledge of just about every subject. The characters of District Attorney Markham (Clarence Geldert) and Sergeant Heath (James Donlan), regulars in the Van Dine novels, show up here as well, with Heath once again portrayed as a comic relief dolt. One thing that is notable in this film is that Markham essentially lets Vance take charge of the case, to the point where Philo tells the D.A. and Heath what to do. 

Since this is a very early sound film, there are some creaky elements to it, and there are times where it feels like a stage play. There are, however, some outdoor sequences, and Nick Grinde (credited as "screen director") sets up a number of expressionistic shot compositions. David Burton was credited for stage direction, and while Rathbone is his usual precise self, the supporting cast is somewhat hammy--the lovely Lelia Hyams is very fluttery as the leading lady. Roland Young plays a sarcastic suspect who at multiple times refers to Rathbone's Vance as "Holmes", in a snarky bit of forecasting. 

The story sets up things so that one major suspect appears to be the murderer, only to reveal another character as the culprit instead. It's a nice twist, but after the movie was over I thought it was a bit incredible that the actual perpetrator could have been able to accomplish all the crimes, but one could say that about nearly every murder mystery tale. 

I viewed THE BISHOP MURDER CASE on Tubi. It was a decent print, but there were times when the sound quality was not very clear, but one must remember this is a talkie made in 1929. It's a good murder mystery, but one wonders how better it would have been if it had been made a few years later when cinematic sound techniques had been much improved. An older Basil Rathbone would have been great as a more authentic Philo Vance--one could easily imagine him as an acid-tongued know-it-all snob. But would audiences have wanted to watch such a character?