Voice of the Whistler (1945) User Reviews

"How does a person go about making friends?"

[utgard14 · 7/10 · 15 September 2014]

Wealthy industrialist John Sinclair (Richard Dix) has devoted so much of his life to making money that he has no friends. To make matters worse for the saddest millionaire, his health is now failing. While on a doctor-prescribed vacation, he meets sexy nurse Joan (Lynn Merrick). He steals her away from her fiancé Fred to go live with him in a lighthouse, promising he will leave his fortune to her when he dies. After awhile Fred shows up and the plot, as they say, thickens.

The fourth in Columbia's Whistler series starring Richard Dix. Not the best but pretty good, especially given the short runtime. Dix is solid as usual. Fine support from Rhys Williams, James Cardwell, and beautiful Lynn Merrick, who looks great in a bathing suit. There's an early scene with a group of men sitting in a darkened room watching newsreel footage about the life of Dix's character that is close enough to Citizen Kane that one might call it a rip-off. Perhaps William Castle meant it as an homage. By the way, how precious is that little girl in the doctor's office? "I can't help it if I'm popular" -- so cute.

With friends like these ...

[Spondonman · 7/10 · 20 May 2007]

Whistler no.4 was imho perhaps the weakest of the 8 in the series, the main trouble being the plot change from seedy tarmac to invigorating lighthouse. This still means it's an atmospheric, interesting and inventive mystery thriller, keeping you on your toes with all the twists to the very end.

Rich, friendless and ill industrialist Richard Dix has a heart attack and gets ordered to go on vacation, forget about work and de-stress. He bumps into an English ex-boxer cocky Ernie Sparrow who befriends him and shows him round his poor but friendly neighbourhood. But sadly it doesn't last long as a new story direction is suddenly taken. You go from feeling sympathetic for everyone to feeling it only for Sparrow, such is the effect of the "business arrangement" that was made. Favourite bits: Some of the homely scenes looking out of the lighthouse windows stick in the mind; Lynn Merrick never looked lovelier this side of Boston Blackie, or out of a saddle either.

If you like the genre like me it's a nice little film, an hour well spent.

Interesting "Whistler" tale with a lighthouse theme...

[Doylenf · 6/10 · 12 January 2008]

RICHARD DIX was nearing the end of his career in "The Whistler" series and this one was made just four years before his untimely death from heart attack. He plays a rich industrialist who takes the advice of his doctors and seeks relaxation away from the pressures of work which are killing him.

LYNN MERRICK is a blonde nurse who takes an interest in the strangely quiet man. She's in love with a young doctor but gives in to the idea of marrying Dix (at his suggestion) so that when he dies within a few months, she would be a rich woman inheriting all of his wealth. She presents the plan to her fiancé (JAMES CARDWELL) but he rejects it flatly and she goes ahead with her plan to marry Dix for his money.

What happens after that is what makes the film interesting, since the plot is anything but predictable. Suffice it to say that Cardwell returns to the lighthouse where Merrick is living her married life to Dix, and the plot thickens as a murder plan develops that goes awry.

Interesting "Whistler" story with the loneliness theme nicely played out amid the lone atmosphere of a Maine lighthouse.

Summing up: Intriguing and better than average entry in this series.

Things Are Seldom What They Seem

[dougdoepke · 17 November 2007]

One of the best of the offbeat series. About 15 or 20 minutes into the screenplay and we still can't be sure what direction the story will take or how it will turn out. We're being set up for something, but without the usual conventions, it's hard to know what. In fact, this is one of the most unusual plot turn-arounds of that period. No doubt, a little programmer like this could get away with a lot more than a higher profile project. That's why there's more movie gold to be found under the 40's radar screen than on it.

Richard Dix is perfectly cast as the burned-out magnate looking for a new lease on life after years of cut-throat competition at the top. In fact he looks like he's at tether's end until he meets the sweet blonde nurse. ( Prophetically, the alcoholic Dix would die a few short years later). However, the chummy stroll with cabbie Rhys Williams along poverty row is rather overdone, while the roomful of cheerful clinic patients smacks of pure Hollywood pretense. On the other hand, the converted lighthouse amounts to an inspired bit of "mise-en-scene", with a moonlit seascape that stretches into a glimpse of eternity and a perfect backdrop for the events that follow.

I don't know if the writers intended the screenplay as a cynical commentary on friendship among the poor and those who serve them, but it certainly looks that way. The irony isn't played up, but it's still there. Also, note how the closing shot amounts to a spooky warning that in such matters, no one gets off scot free. Then too, if there's a moral to the story, I suggest something like never messing with a guy who has battled his way to the top of the business dog pile. Anyhow, it's an intriguing little 60 minutes, more than worthy of that shadowy figure of fate and master of graveyard commentary, the Whistler.

three's a crowd (especially in a lighthouse)

[goblinhairedguy · 6/10 · 18 May 2004]

Like the other entries in the Whistler series, this one has an intriguing premise (not far removed from "Indecent Proposal") with a couple of nice twists. Unfortunately, it doesn't make for good cinema due to its static nature -- it's much more suited to the series' original medium, radio. The grungy setting of the first entry in the series (also directed by the fledgling William Castle) is sorely missed, though he does introduce a few oddball characters in passing. Nonetheless, it is worth sitting through the dull parts for the clever climax and the haunting aftermath. And there's one of those nice little walk-across-the-room bits by a sexy waitress to keep the guys alert (reminiscent of Lana Turner's rookie appearance in "They Won't Forget" or Yvette Vickers' eye-catching serveuse in "Hud"). A similar tale of a lighthouse-bound ménage-a-trois occurs in PRC's semi-noir appropriately entitled "Lighthouse".

A melancholy tale

[AlsExGal · 7/10 · 18 April 2017]

The Whistler series from Columbia is unusual. Every feature starts out with an introduction by "The Whistler" who is just a shadowy anonymous figure. The protagonist in every feature is played by Richard Dix, and in each case he is a different person with a different problem.

This one tackles greed and loneliness. Dix plays business titan John Sinclair. The film opens with a film within a film that is a history of Sinclair's business life, starting in WWI, then spreading to auto production and banking, how his banks stayed solvent through the Great Depression, and a recent court win over another company stealing Sinclair's inventions. It's a nice little device to catch you up on John's history. But Sinclair is lonely because he doesn't trust other people to not use him to get his money. He has no friends or relatives. He has something that is merely called "an attack", and his doctor says he needs to leave immediately for a vacation or else he will die, the implication being that he will probably die shortly anyways. Nothing more specific is ever said about his illness.

Well, John does take that trip, does make friends in Chicago, and then changes his destination to the seacoast on medical advice. He takes two of his Chicago friends with him - a cabbie, Sparrow, who helped him when he did not know he was helping the rich John Sinclair, and a nurse, Joan, at a neighborhood clinic for poor people. He marries the nurse strictly as a business deal - she will stay with him the few months he has left in return for inheriting his fortune. The problem is, Joan already has a fiancé, Fred, but he is struggling in spite of being a doctor and Joan wants money NOW. It is a revealing scene when she talks to her fiancé and you see how greedy she is underneath that compassionate exterior.

So John, Sparrow, and Joan go to live in a lighthouse on the Maine Coast, renovated to a beach house. There is just one snag - John doesn't die. Happiness with Joan has helped him recover. The other snag is Joan is getting impatient again, tired of the isolation of the lighthouse which is really nothing for John since he has always been socially isolated. And then Joan's ex-fiancé shows up unexpectedly one day. John is suspicious that Fred will take Joan away. Fred still loves Joan. Joan still loves Fred but also loves the promise of her inheritance which she loses if she dumps John. And how does Sparrow the friendly cabbie fit into all of this, or does he? Watch and find out how this noir turns Capra-esque and then turns Hitchcock in the end.

Recommended as a very good entry in the series. Columbia certainly knew how to take a shoestring budget and turn out an interesting product.

Murderous love triangle

[gridoon2024 · 6/10 · 20 February 2013]

Although "Voice Of The Whistler" is the shortest of the first four Whistler films, running just under an hour, it is also the slowest in its setting up the plot. It doesn't really pick up until the last 20 minutes or so, when the young doctor arrives at the lighthouse and the film becomes (not a who-done-it but) a who-will-do-it-first! The characters are complex people - neither good nor bad, but somewhere in between (like most of us). Other points of interest include the surprising amount of skin Lynn Merrick shows in her vintage mid-1940s swimsuit, and the pseudo-documentary at the start which actually reminded me of Woody Allen's "Zelig"! **1/2 out of 4.

Show me a powerful titan, and I'll show you a miserable soul.

[mark.waltz · 7/10 · 12 July 2016]

A powerful industrialist has spent more time making millions than making friends, and thinking that he is dying proposes to a hard-working nurse (Lynn Merrick) so he can do something good with his fortune. In spite of being engaged to the idealistic Rhys Williams, she agrees, destroying her chance of happiness in the process. She ends up taking care of him in a remote seaside lighthouse, and the question arises, how long does it really take a dying man to die?

What starts off slow suddenly becomes intriguing, adding a Gothic twist to the mystery. Tom Kennedy (brother of the slow-burning Edgar) is the only person who is in contact with them, that is until Williams pays a surprise visit and Dix creates an ominous warning involving a chess game. Is there a murder plot afoot, or is the whistler really in charge of the chess board?

The always hysterical Miverva Urecal has a magnificent cameo as an obnoxious woman trying to buy flowers that have already been sold. Once again, the aging Dix is paired with a much younger woman, but unlike Lon Chaney Jr. in the "Inner Sanctum" series, it isn't as morbid. Dix, one of the major matinée idols of the early 1930's, is still dashing, if dangerous, and twists and turns in the story never stop. "B" melodrama at its best with a great final shot concerning Merrick.

Loneliness is a disease that can destroy a man's mind

[sol1218 · 6/10 · 18 November 2007]

**SPOILERS** One of the most unusual and unpredictable of "The Whistler" movies that has to do with burnt out industrial and banking tycoon John Sinclair, Richard Dix, who after working himself into an early grave, in making his millions, finds out that he'll soon and up in one if he doesn't get his act together and take a long vocation from his work.

Going to his rented island vacation house off Chicago's Lake Michigan Sinclair has a sudden seizer and ends up in Chicago cab driver's, who gave him a lift, Erin Sparrow, Rhys Williams,next door hotel room. Despite his phenomenal success in the business world Sincleir never had a chance to develop any lasting relationships and is in fact, despite his many millions, all alone in the world. It's Sparrow, a former English lightweight boxing champion, who shows the clueless Sinclair, who now calls himself John Carter, what friendship is all about and how to make friends as well has his, Sinclair, ability in influencing people to invest in his banks and businesses.

Having a new lease on life Sinclair easily makes friends with a number of people that he comes in contact with in Chicago including registered nurse Joan Martin, Lynn Merrick, who Sparrow introduced him to. Not really being that hip in Joan's future with her long suffering fiancée Dr.Fred Graham, James Cardwell, who's trying to open up his own practice, he works almost for nothing at a local charity clinic, Sincalir make Joan a proposal to marry him and move into his new home away from home a converted, with all the modern convinces, lighthouse off the coast of Maine.

A destroyed Dr. Graham leaves Joan feeling that her marriage to Sinclair, with him not expecting to live for more then six months, so that she could inherit his money is incredibly greedy as well as unfeeling towards him. It's when Sinclair's health improves and his sudden death, predicted by his doctors, doesn't come to pass that things start to get a bit stressful for everyone involved including Dr. Graham. The doctor unexpectedly showed up at the lighthouse expecting Joan to come back to him, after her husbands John Sinclair's demise, as well as as also getting himself a piece of Sinclair millions.

The movie "The Voice of the Whistler" then takes a turn for the worse for everyone involved with Sinclair and Dr. Graham plotting each others murder with Joan, who's caught in the middle of all this, not Sinclair's money being the ultimate prize.

****SPOILER ALERT FROM THIS POINT ON****You never know what's coming next but when it does it will shock your socks off. Sinclair for all his smarts let's the cat out of the bag in giving Dr. Graham the idea to murder him. It's that idea on Sinclair's part that leads to the double disaster at the conclusion of the film. If Sinclair was honest with himself he would have left Joan alone and not think that he could buy her like the many expensive, homes cars and yachts, items he bought for himself all through the years.

In he end Sinclair overestimated himself in trying to outsmart Dr. Graham and giving him the opening that he needed to put him away for good and thus have Joan all for himself. It wasn't that Dr. Graham saw through Sinclair devious and murderous plan but that Sinclair, always feeling that he's in complete control, overlooked some very vital things, like the nailed shut lighthouse windows, that in the end lead to his downfall.

Good Try -- Doesn't Quite Work

[alonzoiii-1 · 4/10 · 16 November 2007]

Richard Dix is a big, not very nice industrialist, who has nearly worked himself to death. If he takes the vacation his doctors suggest for him, can he find happiness for the last months of his life? Well, he'll likely be better off if he disregards the VOICE OF THE WHISTLER.

This William Castle directed entry has some great moments (the introduction and the depiction of Richard Dix's life through newsreel a la Citizen Kane), and some intriguing plotting in the final reels. Dix's performance is generally pretty good. But, unfortunately, the just does not quite work because one does not end up buying that the characters would behave the way that they do. Also, the movie veers from a dark (and fascinating beginning) to an almost cheerful 30s movie like midsection (full of nice urban ethnic types who don't mind that they aren't rich) and back again to a complex noir plot for the last 15 minutes or so.

This is a decent movie -- worth seeing -- but it needed a little more running time to establish a couple of the characters and a female lead capable of meeting the demands of her role.

Best "Whistler" I've Seen So Far

[mgconlan-1 · 8/10 · 7 February 2008]

A truly great "B" and the best "Whistler" series film I've seen so far. It's true that the plot doesn't make much sense, but there's a marvelously surrealistic quality about the exercise and Richard Dix's performance is one of the most haunting of his career, harking back to his great epics of the 1930's ("Cimarron," "The Conquerors" and "Reno"). William Castle's direction shows his marvelous command of atmosphere — he really was a first-rate suspense director when he wasn't throwing things at the audience or giving them electric shocks — and also is distinctly influenced by Orson Welles even before they worked together on "The Lady from Shanghai," especially in the fake newsreel used to introduce Dix's character and his backstory and the long scenes of the semi-retired tycoon and his blonde trophy wife living a joyless existence in a remote residence. Lynn Merrick is superb as a morally ambiguous character, and though James Cardwell is weak, Rhys Williams is a far better than average comic-relief sidekick even though his sudden appearance makes it seem at first as if that train took Dix not to Chicago but to London via the transatlantic tunnel Dix was constructing in the film of that name. "Voice of the Whistler" is an especially good entry in a series that on the whole maintained a high level of quality and holds up better than the rather dated, tricky "Whistler" radio shows. Please, Sony, follow the example of Universai's release of the "Inner Sanctum" films and put out all eight "Whistler" movies as a DVD boxed set!

Watchable, but where is the ironic twist?!

[planktonrules · 5/10 · 28 November 2007]

This film is really like two separate films morphed together near the very end. The first 85% is a nice film about a rich but lonely man who is able to find himself. He seems like a very nice guy and you want him to succeed. I liked this very, very much and Richard Dix played an extremely sympathetic character. Then, as if out of left field, near the end of the film, the plot took a HUGE detour in an entirely different direction and this change made little sense. As I said, it seemed like an entirely different movie. Plus, once the film changed and the plot took a very dark turn, there was no sense of irony or suspense--leaving the viewer with a very flat and downbeat ending. While those who created this anthology series wanted to create a series with many of the characteristics of the later Twilight Zone TV show, the writing in the case of several of the installments just was too spotty. For a suspense-type film, it was gravely lacking in suspense.

One of the Best in the Series

[Michael_Elliott · 25 February 2008]

Voice of the Whistler (1945)

*** (out of 4)

Fourth film in Columbia's series is once again directed by William Castle but he also co-wrote the screenplay here. This time out Richard Dix plays a rich man who will dead within a two month period. Not wanting to spend his last months alone, he offers a nurse (Lynn Merrick) a great opportunity. She marries him to bring him happiness and he'll leave her his millions. They go through with the plan but all of the sudden he starts to get healthy again. This is certainly the best film in the series so far and it works mainly due to the great story they are working with. There's a lot of twists and turns throughout the short 60-minute running time but it all leads to a highly believable ending. Dix is very good in his role as is Merrick and the two work perfectly well together. The screenplay offers both of their characters a chance to grow, which certainly isn't normal for this type of B movie. Castle does a very good job with his direction and proves he could direct something without gimmicks.

William Castle Returns Whistling His Tune

[BaronBl00d · 5/10 · 1 January 2010]

Cheaply made entry into the Whistler series of films produced in the 1940s and directed with skill by soon-to-be showman/horror director extraordanaire William Castle. This is one of Castle's earlier films and you can see his burgeoning skills as a director - especially in the third act of this film. The story here concerns a wealthy industrialist taking time from his job and identity to make himself better though time is against him. The doctors tell him he is sick because of a lack of friends. He therefore gets some friends - and then makes a business agreement with a pretty nurse to marry him for six months(what time he has been told he has allotted) and then she upon his death will never want for nothing financially. Well, she had a fiancée and the story then moves to a weird love triangle in a lighthouse that has been turned into living quarters. This film has quite a few obvious flaws. For starters, the acting is very poor. Richard Dix who starred in most of the films in this series is at best bland. His range of emotion wouldn't cast a blip on a radar of any magnitude. He is overall acceptable but nothing grand to be sure. His fellow actors don't fair any better - in fact - much worse with the exception of Rhys Williams who plays the affable Ernie. Williams has screen presence and acting ability and innate charm for the camera. He works. Pity the rest do not. Lynn Merrick is okay as the mean-spirited, nasty, avaricious beauty that makes the deal with Dix only to regret it later. Merrick can be seen in some scenes looking at the camera early on in the film as can many of the smaller role actors. Castle apparently does not have much to work with here and it shows. Nonetheless, the film is short and does move quickly. The end is fairly inventive and this is certainly a watchable film at the very least.

On Loneliness

[kidboots · 8/10 · 27 February 2013]

This is a very haunting entry in the unusual Whistler series, exploring loneliness and the need of friendship. Lynn Merrick was an up and coming starlet who had been featured on the Crime Doctor series and also in "Nine Girls" but she just wasn't showy or different enough to stand out from the crowd I suppose - she looked eye catching enough in this movie. These series were particularly good with unusually solid parts for girls, here Merrick plays Joan Martin, a nurse at the East Street Clinic where ruthless industrialist John Sinclair (Richard Dix) has been directed. He has just collapsed outside a train station where he is helped by a cheery cockney (!!!) cabbie who doesn't know who he is. Sinclair has been a hard headed business man all his life and through his hunger for power has missed out on love and companionship and now wants to make amends. He is drawn to nurse Joan (Merrick) but Joan is engaged to doctor Fred, even though, because of his lowly paid work among slum patients, he cannot give her the money and security that she craves. Sinclair sees his chance, reveals his true identity and lies, telling Joan he has only six months to live and that after his death, if they marry, she will inherit everything.

The odd thing is that they then move to an isolated lighthouse - after realising that being around people has cured him of his malaise. Never fear, Joan has now given him even more of a reason to live and at the end of six months it is a hale and hearty John and a discontented Joan who welcome Fred as a guest to their lonely home. Fred has changed from a caring doctor to a grasping opportunist who can see a way out for himself and Joan. John's thoughts are going along the same lines and he engages Fred in that old conversation "how would you plan the perfect murder"??? John confides his plan of starting a rumour around the village that Fred is a sleepwalker - so when Fred's body is found, he will have a perfect alibi. Fred starts to act on the "suggestion", just as John hoped he would and when Fred enters his room that night, John is two steps ahead of him and Fred then becomes the corpse.... but there is a problem!!! After listening to John's proposal, Fred had become paranoid and ordered Sparrow (who is now John's buddy) to nail down the windows so it seems John now has to carry Fred's body down to the rocks below where he is seen by someone.... but who!!!

After proving that he could play a villain as well as the next man (in "The Ghost Ship") Richard Dix was signed to do "The Whistler" series where he was called on to play a variety of characters - none of them particularly nice!!!

Radio's The Whistler brought to the big screen with Richard Dix again.

[cgvsluis · 5/10 · 23 December 2022]

This is one of a series of movies starring Richard Dix based on the very popular radio drama "The Whistler" with it signature whistling.

This episode...I mean movie is all about the wealthy businessman John Sinclair, who is suffering from poor health and lack of friends. On his was to a cruise vacation he passes out in a cab. The friendly cab driver and former boxer, Ernie Sparrow, takes him home until he can get him to a doctor at the free clinic. This new doctor recommends avoiding a cruise and instead going to a small town in New England where he should make friends.

John invites Ernie to come with him and proposes to the local free clinic nurse. The doctor told him he is going to die probably in months. So his proposal to Nurse Joan Martin, is marry him...come to Maine to nurse him and when he dies she will get his whole fortune.

Only in Maine, where they buy a lighthouse and turn it into a house, John gets better and doesn't die as expected. Joan's former fiancée, Dr. Fred Graham, comes to pay them a visit and take Joan away with him. Except his timing couldn't be worse as John had just confessed his love to Joan, wanting to have a real marriage.

Then John during a chess explanation maps out how he would commit a murder...and Fred starts to take step to use it!

Interesting film, my one complaint is the person who ends up with the fortune seems a little mercenary, making the ending a bit of a disappointment. The rest of the end seems like poetic justice.

If you are a big Whistler fan I recommend not missing this one, also if you like a good murder mystery plot...you may enjoy this.

Somewhat of a change of pace

[Wizard-8 · 27 May 2017]

"Voice of the Whistler" is an interesting entry in the Whistler series in several aspects. The first half of the movie will lead you to believe that it will be the story of a dying man trying to improve his life before he passes on. It is treated pretty seriously, and there is nothing chilling or horrifying about the movie during this first half. Things do start to get darker in the second half of the movie, but not right away - it's only in the last fifteen or so minutes that the movie gets seriously dark. And the way the movie unfolds during those last fifteen minutes feels more like a noir of the period than a suspense drama.

Although my above description of the movie may make it sound to be somewhat of a mess, it's actually executed fairly well. It's fairly briskly paced and never boring - you'll be wondering what exactly will happen in the end (though the flash forward scene at the beginning of the movie does take out some of the punch at the end.) This is a nice little B movie that does its job in just sixty minutes.

Pure camp and ass-backwards fun

[talbs67 · 12 January 2008]

This 1940's gem seems to be a screwy morality play and an ill-conceived cautionary tale combined, put together by some very clumsy writers and a director who evidently took verrrrry long lunches. The characters' motives and behavior are so contrary to basic human nature, so lacking reason, so contrived, so bizarre -- and let's not forget the shoddy police work and questionable medical procedures, not to mention people who trust strangers implicitly -- that the best thing to do is watch it and laugh at it.But it's oddly enjoyable throughout -- for how utterly camp it is.

If "huh?" isn't the word you say most in reaction to this miserable but entertaining little piece of cinema, I'd be very surprised.