Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back

This is not only the best Bulldog Drummond film, it is simply one of the best series detective films ever made and I would even go so far as to say it is one of the ten best classic (e.g. pre-1950) detective films ever made. It is not a mystery in the sense that the perpetrator is evident from near the start of the film...the real mystery is why the crimes, including kidnapping and murder, are being committed (another crime is why until recently we have not been able to buy watchable home video copies!). The merits of this film are well stated by the late William K. Everson in his book "The Detective in Film" but for the record: the director Roy Del Ruth does a great job of keeping the action moving; the lively cast, including Ronald Colman, Loretta Young, C. Aubrey Smith, Charles Butterworth, Una Merkel, and of course, Warner Oland, is first-rate from top to bottom; the script by Nunnally Johnson is witty and intelligent; and its production values including fabulous sets like Oland's living room in his cavernous London mansion, are untouchable. This film, which is part screwball comedy as well as detective film, is in my view the only one which comes close to being as good as The Thin Man (1934) in weaving the two genres together. I can not believe there is anyone who thinks this is a bad film -- those who rate it low must be having a bad day or confusing it with the 1947 Columbia "B" remake of the same title with Ron Randall! It is too bad that copyright hassles have never made it available for television broadcast in North America; otherwise I think this would be a very well known and regarded film rather than one known mainly to die-hard genre specialists.