Scared Stiff (
1945)
65 min -
Mystery |
Comedy - 22 June 1945 (
USA)
Jack Haley (the
Tin Man of Oz) plays
Larry Elliot, who is a chess reporter and not the sharpest tool in the shed,
Larry is confronted with an ultimatum if he wants to keep his job as a newspaper reporter. He is forced to cover a big harvest festival held at a winery in Grape
City. At the paper he is known to miss out on bigger stories to cover more trivial events of minor interest.
Larry begins with getting off the bus at the wrong stop, Grape
Center instead of City. He has brought his girlfriend
Sally Warren, who deals in antiques, to accompany him to the winery. Accidents rarely come alone, and the man sitting next to Larry on the bus is found murdered, holding a chess piece in his hand when the police find him. Of course Larry, who is a chess expert, is blamed for the killing.
All the bus passengers are held in custody at Grape Center awaiting the sheriff to arrive and start the murder investigation. Before he arrives, Sally finds an antique set of chess pieces she wants to acquire, and involves Larry in her quest to buy them.
The set is said to have been the property of
Kubla Khan in the
12th century, and were brought to the
West by
Marco Polo.
Unfortunately the set is divided between the two twins owning the winery,
Charles and
Preston Waldeck, and they haven't spoken to each other in ten years.
Sally manages to acquire the white set pieces from Preston. When Larry is about to get the black pieces from Charles, both he and Charles are knocked out by an unknown attacker, who also steals the black set pieces.
The sheriff arrives to town, and starts conducting his investigation. The prime suspect is convicted murderer
Deacon Markham, who is the man who first sold the antique chess set to the Waldeck brothers, after stealing it from its rightful owner. The theory is that Markham now wants the set back to sell it back to the forst owner and get the money he needs to escape the country.
Cast:
Jack Haley as Larry Elliot
Ann Savage as Sally
Warren
Barton MacLane as
George "Deacon" Markham
Veda Ann Borg as Flo Rosson
Roger Pryor as
Richardson
George E.
Stone as
Mink
Robert Emmett Keane as
Prof. Wisner
Lucien Littlefield as Charles Waldeck / Preston Waldeck
Paul Hurst as
Sheriff
Arthur Aylesworth as
Emerson Cooke
Eily Malyon as
Mrs. Cooke
Buddy Swan as
Oliver Waldeck
- published: 24 May 2014
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