Doomed to Die (1940)

Doomed to Die (AKA Mystery of the Wentworth Castle) was the fifth of the six Mr Wong crime B-movies made by Monogram Pictures from 1938 to 1940. It was the last to star Boris Karloff as Mr Wong. Keye Luke took over the role for the sixth and final movie. The five Boris Karloff Mr Wong movies were all directed by William Nigh.

The character was created by Hugh Wiley in a series of 1930s short stories. The James Lee Wong of Wiley’s stories bears almost no resemblance to the character as portrayed in the films. In the stories Wong is a young Chinese-American man, Yale-educated and very Americanised, and he is a Treasury agent. In the movies Mr Wong is a middle-aged Chinese gentleman, English-educated and very English in outlook (although still quite comfortable with his Chinese cultural heritage), and he’s a private detective.

In Doomed to Die shipping tycoon Cyrus Wentworth (Melvin Lang) has a lot of problems to deal with. One of his ships, the Wentworth Castle, caught fire resulting in the loss of 400 lives. There was a certain item of cargo aboard which could be considered contraband and Wentworth knew about it. His business arch-rival Paul Fleming (Guy Usher), whom he hates and despises, is trying to force a merger on him. And Fleming’s son Dick (William Stelling) wants to marry Wentworth’s daughter Cynthia (Catherine Craig), a match Wentworth is determined to prevent.

When Wentworth is shot Dick Fleming is the very obvious prime suspect. Cynthia’s best friend, feisty girl reporter Bobbie Logan (Marjorie Reynolds), tells her not to worry. She has persuaded the famous detective Mr Wong to take the case.

The Homicide cop investigating the case, Captain William Street (Grant Withers), is as loud and confident as he is stupid. Having jumped to the conclusion, based on flimsy circumstantial evidence, that Dick Fleming was the killer he has no desire to do any real investigating.

Mr Wong has a few leads he’d like to follow up. He’s very interested in the passenger list for the Wentworth Castle’s ill-fated final voyage. He’s also interested in Wentworth’s chauffeur. And he finds a clue. It’s a document stolen by a man who has cracked the safe in Wentworth’s office. The man managed to burn the paper but Mr Wong doesn’t despair. That paper can still give up its secret, thanks to infra-red photography (which in 1940 would have seemed like cool high-tech forensic technology).

The plot is quite serviceable and there are enough suspects to keep things interesting.

Karloff is all avuncular charm and is fun to watch.

Marjorie Reynolds makes a fine feisty girl reporter. I imagine that in real life feisty girl reporters are probably quite annoying but in 1930s/40s American B-movies they’re always great fun.

This is a Monogram movie so production values are pretty basic. William Nigh spent most of his career churning out B-movies, being the kind of director who was totally lacking in inspiration but could bring a low-budget movie in on time and on budget. And this movie is pretty well paced.

The best thing about this movie is that there is no comic relief. It’s an absolute joy to watch an American B-movie of this era that isn’t saddled with lame irritating comic interludes.

Doomed to Die is a perfectly competent B-movie which provides decent entertainment and Karloff makes anything worth watching. Recommended.

VCI’s Mr Wong Collection offers all six movies on two DVDs. The transfers are far from pristine but they’re acceptable.

I’ve reviewed Hugh Wiley’s Mr Wong short story collection Murder by the Dozen. I’ve also reviewed other Mr Wong movies - Mr Wong, Detective (1938), The Mystery of Mr Wong (1939), Mr Wong in Chinatown (1939) and The Fatal Hour (AKA Mr Wong at Headquarters, 1940).