This second-rate B comedy is enjoyable for its cast but not much else. The cliched script and trade characters are typical of this type of murder mystery comedy, and they are involved in a ridiculous plot line involving a murder that is somehow tied in to a telephone operator (Jean Porter) who tells the time.
Michael Whalen is a saxophone playing reporter who shows up at her office just to listen to her voice say the time over and over again (with the help of Porter's supervisor Jane Darwell), and he ends up being arrested for the murder of Ruth Hussey which leads him and photographer Chick Chandler to go out of their way to prove his innocence. Along the way, they become involved with collection agent Gloria Stuart and a group of mobsters, and from there the plot just gets more and more convoluted.
It's nice to see a young Gloria Stuart 60 years before she had her legendary performance as old Rose in the blockbuster "Titanic". She's pretty and spiky and the perfect ideal of a 1930's screwball comedy heroine. Whalen and Chandler basically play truly silly characters. There are far too many red herrings and plot twists designed to confuse the viewer, and characters tossed in at the last moment do nothing but add to the chaos. Still, the frantic pacing and like humor makes it enjoyable in spite of the ridiculous goings-on, and at under an hour, this is a decent but forgettable time-filler. This definitely did not warrant two sequels which film audiences probably did not realize worst sequels because the original was simply lost in the back of their mind, that is if they had seen it.
Michael Whalen is a saxophone playing reporter who shows up at her office just to listen to her voice say the time over and over again (with the help of Porter's supervisor Jane Darwell), and he ends up being arrested for the murder of Ruth Hussey which leads him and photographer Chick Chandler to go out of their way to prove his innocence. Along the way, they become involved with collection agent Gloria Stuart and a group of mobsters, and from there the plot just gets more and more convoluted.
It's nice to see a young Gloria Stuart 60 years before she had her legendary performance as old Rose in the blockbuster "Titanic". She's pretty and spiky and the perfect ideal of a 1930's screwball comedy heroine. Whalen and Chandler basically play truly silly characters. There are far too many red herrings and plot twists designed to confuse the viewer, and characters tossed in at the last moment do nothing but add to the chaos. Still, the frantic pacing and like humor makes it enjoyable in spite of the ridiculous goings-on, and at under an hour, this is a decent but forgettable time-filler. This definitely did not warrant two sequels which film audiences probably did not realize worst sequels because the original was simply lost in the back of their mind, that is if they had seen it.