The Spider

"The Spider" began in a mysterious manner, but the mystery was the origins of a young man part of a magic show named Alexander (Howard Phillips). He worked in a show headlined by Chatrand the Great (Edmund Lowe), and Chatrand was earnestly trying to find Alexander's people. It merged into a murder mystery when a man, who seemed to know Alexander, was murdered at one of Chatrand's shows.

Alexander became the main suspect for police inspector Riley (Purnell Pratt), and Chatrand would have to act fast and decisively if he was going to clear Alexander, who had just been reunited with his sister, Beverly (Lois Moran), during that same show.

"The Spider" took murder mystery solving to the extreme. Usually a murder will occur in a place with no more than ten suspects; "The Spider" had several hundred suspects and none were allowed to leave the auditorium until the investigation was completed.

"The Spider" used a method that had been tried in other movies for crime solving: Chatrand used Alexander to read minds, which was similar to using a medium. How else could they find the killer among hundreds of potential perpetrators?

"The Spider" was entertaining enough. It borrowed a little bit from "Murder at the Vanities" in which a murder had been committed during a Broadway production and the police were trying to solve it before the production ended. It does add a bit of excitement and suspense to the movie. I liked "The Spider" even if it was not as intelligent as other murder mysteries.

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