Dick Tracy (1937)

A master criminal called The Spider puts the famous detective's brother under a hypnotic spell and turns him against Dick.

Directors:

Alan James, Ray Taylor

Writers:

Chester Gould (based on cartoon strip by), Barry Shipman (screenplay)

Stars:

Ralph Byrd, Kay Hughes, Smiley Burnette

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Ralph Byrd	...	Dick Tracy
Kay Hughes	...	Gwen Andrews
Smiley Burnette	...	Mike McGurk
Lee Van Atta	...	Junior
John Picorri	...	Moloch (as John Piccori)
Carleton Young	...	Gordon Tracy, After
Fred Hamilton	...	Steve Lockwood
Francis X. Bushman	...	Chief Clive Anderson
John Dilson	...	Ellery Brewster [Chs. 1, 12]
Richard Beach	...	Gordon Tracy, Before [Chs. 1, 12]
Wedgwood Nowell	...	H.T. Clayton [Chs. 8-9]
Theodore Lorch	...	Patorno [Chs. 1, 12]
Edwin Stanley	...	Walter Odette
Harrison Greene	...	Cloggerstein / Durston
Herbert Weber	...	Tony Martino [Ch. 1]

Storyline

A master criminal called The Spider puts the famous detective's brother under a hypnotic spell and turns him against Dick.

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Plot Keywords:

brother vs. brother | damsel in distress | cigarette smoking | deception | double cross | 

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Taglines:

ADVENTURE - to amaze you! THRILLS - to make you cheer! ACTION - to startle you! (original poster)

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Genres:

Action | Comedy | Crime | Thriller

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Certificate:

Approved

Did You Know?

Trivia

The failure of the original copyright holder to renew the film's copyright resulted in it falling into public domain, meaning that virtually anyone could duplicate and sell a VHS/DVD copy of the film. Therefore, many of the versions of this film available on the market are either severely (and usually badly) edited and/or of extremely poor quality, having been duped from second- or third-generation (or more) copies of the film.

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Goofs

The substitution of Carlton Young for Richard Beach in the first place. It was wholly unnecessary and meant that a different looking and sounding Gordon appeared in the rest of the serial. Carlton Young was not even dubbed for consistency as is the usual practice.

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Quotes

Orphange matron [Ch. 1]: Have you seen anything of Junior? Oh, there you are! Why aren't you get on the bus with the others? Everyone was terribly worried, you bad boy!
Junior: Well, I'm sorry, ma'am.
Dick Tracy: I'd like to keep this little rascal with me for a while, Miss. You see, he can identify one of the men that got away, and his life won't be safe until this matter is cleared up.

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Crazy Credits

"Oscar & Elmer" are given final cast credits in the opening sequence.

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Connections

Version of Dick Tracy (1990)

User Reviews

Laughable - but it wasn't meant to be.

After watching all 15 episodes I have to tell you that this Dick Tracy seems to have paved the way for some of today's action heroes taken from the classic comics. The plot line is simply put - silly (a big crime ring cooperates with foregin goverments, wants to blackmail their own government, brainwashes people...). There seem to be hundreds of things going on and not a single case is solved. Tracy comes in, gets in a fight, the evil scheme is spoiled (case closed), bad guys escape, Dick follows them and get's in terrible danger. End of episode, right before Dick is about to die a horrible death. The next episode opens with a long revision of the previous story and Dick escapes unharmed. Meets with friends and the new problem arises. They investigate for a few minutes and then the same story all over. All right, the effects were awesome for the time when this was made and the ideas for how the villains planed to take charge were probably highly original back then (but were copied ever sense), still, not a single episode seems to have any depth. It was just jumping from one quick and shallow attempt by the Lame one to do whatever it was he wanted to do (there never seemed to be a grand plan behind his actions) to another. All in all, if they wouldn't repeat those previous episode scenes at the beginning of each episode and if the episodes took some time to develop a story it might have been good. Now (especially after watching it at once) as one long Dick Tracy session, I was really disappointed by the shallowness, but pleasantly surprised by the great effects.

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

20 February 1937 (USA)

Also Known As:

Adventures of Dick Tracy

Filming Locations:

Republic Studios, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Republic Pictures (I)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

290 min (15 episodes)

Sound Mix:

Mono (R C A Victor "High Fidelity" Sound System)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1