Kid Glove Killer (1942)

First feature film from director Fred Zinneman is a snappy little "B" feature that features Van Heflin as the head of a city crime lab who solves the murder of the town mayor by analyzing ... See full summary »

Director:

Fred Zinnemann

Writers:

John C. Higgins (story), Allen Rivkin (screenplay),

Stars:

Van Heflin, Marsha Hunt, Lee Bowman

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Van Heflin	...	Gordon McKay
Marsha Hunt	...	Jane Mitchell
Lee Bowman	...	Gerald I. Ladimer
Samuel S. Hinds	...	Mayor Daniels
Cliff Clark	...	Captain Lynch
Eddie Quillan	...	Eddie Wright
John Litel	...	Matty
Cathy Lewis	...	Bessie Wright (as Catherine Lewis)
Nella Walker	...	Mrs. Daniels

Storyline

First feature film from director Fred Zinneman is a snappy little "B" feature that features Van Heflin as the head of a city crime lab who solves the murder of the town mayor by analyzing evidence from the crime.

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Plot Keywords:

mayor | murder | evidence | marriage proposal | false accusation | 

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Mystery | Thriller

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Certificate:

Passed

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

April 1942 (USA)

Also Known As:

Along Came Murder

Filming Locations:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios - 10202 W. Washington Blvd., Culver City, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

74 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Some cast members in studio records/casting call lists did not appear or were not identifiable in the movie. These were (with their character names, if any): Connie Gilchrist (Mrs. Harrison Chetwode), Naomi Childers (Miss Huser), Mary Currier (Manager), Charles Wagenheim (Martin), 'Florence Wright' (Saleslady), Harry Strang and Ted Oliver. Childers was apparently replaced by May McAvoy.

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Quotes

Eddie Wright: Just bury me with one of your swell hamburgers on my chest.
Bessie Wright: With onions?
Eddie Wright: You oughta know by now.

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Connections

Remake of A Crime Does Not Pay Subject: They're Always Caught (1938)

User Reviews

Offbeat forensic thriller offers glimpses of coming noir cycle

The title hints at something possibly more provocative – kinkier – than what the movie is. It has one foot in the fast-paced stories of urban corruption and crime of the 1930s, the other in the more disillusioned, skeptical world of emerging film noir of the 1940s.

Instead of a crusading newspaper reporter, Kid Glove Killer gives us a forensic investigator (Van Heflin) working for the police department of a mid-sized city. Its citizens are under siege from a criminal combine that suborns public officials and operates shakedown rackets. Two high-profile political murders galvanize the populace and a prosecutor (Lee Bowman) who, in an eerie preview of talk radio, delivers slanted law-and-order rants over the air. But we soon find out that he's on the mob payroll and is actually the killer (who uses not kid gloves but car bombs).

He's also romancing Heflin's lab assistant (Marsha Hunt); Heflin's also sweet on her if he'd lift his droopy eyes from a microscope long enough to admit it. The story turns on Heflin's sifting through the evidence to exonerate an innocent man whom Bowman tries to railroad. But when the evidence starts building up, Hunt inadvertently spills the beans to the vigilant Bowman.

Kid Glove Killer stays a cut or two above the standard programmer by virtue of superior acting (Heflin never had the parts his talent deserved) and its unusual, if primitive, forensic angle. It's noteworthy that the final clue sealing Bowman's fate is predicated on the assumption that, back in 1942, men did not bother to wash their hair more often than once a week.