Hitchcoc This episode is a bit edgier. First of all, the murder being investigated is much more vicious than others. Charlie is working for an insurance company and is investigating this death but also is working on a personal interest missing persons case. We have here the reappearance of the Charlie's Number Two Son, Jimmy, who has much more personality than son Tommy. Mantan is there again to provide zaniness. That aside, there are several twists and turns in this plot that make it pretty entertaining. Charlie seems to take more of a personal interest in the results of this case because of the brutality of everything. As is always the case, there are some excellent suspects and a love story to boot

mark.waltz A series of bodies have been found recently in Northern California-all headless, armless and legless. Who is killing these victims and leaving their torsos behind? That's Charlie Chan's newest case, and he's off to San Francisco to get involved in the investigation. The film starts with Chan (Sidney Toler in one of his last films), number two son Jimmy (Victor Sen Yung) and chauffeur Mantan Moreland on a bus going up the Pacific Coast Highway where the bus breaks down and someone takes a shot at the unkillable Charlie. Only a bit stunned, Chan immediately agrees to take on the case of a sweet old lady (Mary Gordon on a brief break from the Sherlock Holmes series) searching for her granddaughter which, not surprisingly, ties in with the case he's off to Frisco to assist on.The stylish sets of this Monogram entry in the long-time series makes this appear to be higher budgeted than it probably was. Mantan Moreland gets the typical share of stereotypical cracks that black actors were forced to say in even the lowest ranking of Hollywood studios, but he is certainly funny saying them, whether fighting his way through a Chinese antique store (including a fun house mirror) or finding himself inside the storage area of a morgue (which he spells out loud as M-O-R-G). Sen Yung is as eager as ever in helping pop, even though he disgusts dad by ordering that all-American variation of Chinese dishes called Chop Suey. "Must use fine tooth comb to find son, like flea on dog", Chan says about Jimmy when he goes off on his own to investigate the case without dad's permission. This is entertaining and short, not one of the best of the series (those came from 20th Century Fox in the 1930's with Warner Oland in the part), but certainly higher rated than the other Monogram films. The series would petter out in a few years as Toler's replacement (Roland Withers) never caught on with audiences and double bills themselves seemed to fade away as television came in and audiences began staying home to watch films like these for free.

mbmnow Just viewed this movie couple of minutes ago from the latest release of this one and 3 others made by Roland Winters(which I will watch very soon). I must say that the review by xnet95 was right on. I now have 38 of the total of 44 Charlie Chan movies that were made with Sidney Toler, Warner Oland and Roland Winters and this right is not very good. Did I still enjoy, yes because I am a CC fan. But the movie is not very good, script is awful, story is not fully made so one can make some logical sense out of it. And yes, what Chinatown. Except for a couple quick scenes it could be Shadows Over "Anywhere" which would make more sense. But at last, as a fan of this series I still am glad I have it. I would not recommend this to a non CC fan. But as we are aware, this is a Monogram picture which was known for very low production values.

xnet95 This movie is a total train wreck. I've never seen such a badly constructed movie in all my life. The story is virtually impossible to follow. Characters aren't properly introduced and we're supposed to know who they are and what they're doing!?! You literally need a scorecard to keep track of all the names that come flying at you in rapid fire succession. Plus, there are aliases we have to remember, too. One guy has at least 4 aliases. I can't see how anybody could know what's going on in this film without watching it at least 5 times. Maybe Monogram did that on purpose so that people would come back and pay to see it again.Here are a few of the problems. The PI is not properly introduced. We don't know who he is. At he beginning of the movie, the bus breaks down and all the passengers wait in a room while the bus is being repaired. Some guy takes over and starts telling people what to do. He wants to frisk the Marine that walks in, and we don't know who this guy is (Is he a gay man that wants to "cop a feel"?). We don't know his name, and we don't know why he feels he has the authority to tell people what to do. When the bus finally gets to San Francisco, we find out that he is a PI, but we still don't know who he is. Why is he in San Francisco? Is it work or pleasure? There's no conversation with Charlie to introduce him, so we have no idea what this guy is all about. The big problem is that this PI plays an integral role in the film, plus he pops up every 5-10 minutes like the human whack-a-mole. Why-oh-why-oh-why is Kate found dead in Mary Conover's apartment!?! This one really bothers me. We are barely introduced to Kate, but after multiple viewings I figured out that she is the woman traveling with Mary's grandmother. She is there to help Grandma find Mary because they DON'T KNOW where Mary is. If they don't know where Mary is, how could Kate be in her apartment? Is she keeping secrets from Grandma? One simple scene with Kate telling Grandma she was going to investigate a tip would've helped to clear up this major plot-hole, but the inept losers that made this mess didn't feel it was necessary. Which leads me to…Bumbleham Brown and Jimmy are total dead wood in this flick. They have absolutely NO rapport with each other. Every scene they are in could've been eliminated and the time used to explain some of the HUGE plot-holes.The name of the film is "Shadows over Chinatown". Why? Does any of the action take place in Chinatown? How do we know they are in Chinatown? I only found out that many of the scenes took place in Chinatown after reading a review of this flick. There's NOTHING in this film that looks Chinese, except Charlie and Jimmy. Jimmy and Bumbleham go into a Chinese restaurant that looked like a Jewish deli from the outside, but we don't see the Chinese interior, we don't see Chinese architecture, we don't even see any Chinese people. There is absolutely nothing Chinese about the Chinatown in this film. It could be Anywhere, USA.