A nefarious murderer known to Dick Tracy (Morgan Conway) only as "splitface" has a target of 14 victims, and it's up to Tracy, his bumbling associates and the feisty Tess Trueheart (Anne Jeffreys) to find and stop him. There's spooky hypnotists, a creepy mortician (any other kind in old movies?) and a mysterious femme fatale (Jane Greer) whose nightclub owner father may or may not be hiding the hideous fiend (Mike Mazurki). Dick has an adopted son, here, a science wiz kid played with amusing over confidence (in the character, not the actor) played by Mickey Kuhn. Milton Parsons, playing the aptly named coroner "Deathridge", is totally deadpan and hysterical.
The film starts off on a creepy note with a young woman being strapped on the street, deathly afraid as Splitface face, unseen, approaches. While no real motive other than revenge is given for these gruesome murders, that is insignificant in the way it that the film is presented. There are some terrific elements in the dark photography, and the final confrontation between Dick Tracy and Splitface is exciting. Morgan Conway, cast as the title character, was not as well accepted as the previous actor, Ralph Byrd, and after only two films would be let go from that part, but he does a good enough job in this film that I could have seen him continuing. Anne Jeffreys is definitely the best test to heart that I have ever seen, and her intermingling with the smartly made up Greer is delightfully catty. I can see how film producers would thus cast Greer as Femme fatales in the genre of film noir where she excelled. While the series only lasted for four films, I found all of them to be extremely enjoyable and fast-moving. It certainly could have lasted another half dozen or so.
The film starts off on a creepy note with a young woman being strapped on the street, deathly afraid as Splitface face, unseen, approaches. While no real motive other than revenge is given for these gruesome murders, that is insignificant in the way it that the film is presented. There are some terrific elements in the dark photography, and the final confrontation between Dick Tracy and Splitface is exciting. Morgan Conway, cast as the title character, was not as well accepted as the previous actor, Ralph Byrd, and after only two films would be let go from that part, but he does a good enough job in this film that I could have seen him continuing. Anne Jeffreys is definitely the best test to heart that I have ever seen, and her intermingling with the smartly made up Greer is delightfully catty. I can see how film producers would thus cast Greer as Femme fatales in the genre of film noir where she excelled. While the series only lasted for four films, I found all of them to be extremely enjoyable and fast-moving. It certainly could have lasted another half dozen or so.