a5c7b9f00b In and around some great blues, swing and jazz music, a very unpopular band-leader. Prince Ellis, is killed in a Harlem nightclub, and, in and around some more great music, a detective finds the lists of suspects is very long,Prince Ellis was indeed very unpopular with many citizens. This black cast film was enjoyable, a wonderful all-star Black cast displaying excellent acting and entertainment. Monte Hawley was considered the greatest actor of his race and he proved it. Monte Hawley was in the most used actor on stage and screen. Monte starred in many hit black cast films. Monte Hawley was wonderful in this movie, this is the best. Josephine Edwards stole the movie with her beauty, acting, singing, dancing talent- wonder why she didn&#39;t go further. Would of loved to see her in more movies. CeePee Johnson and his Orchestra had a great sound and CeePee was a amazing bandleader and singer. I enjoyed it and I&#39;m sure you will too. Great singing by The Four Toppers- I wonder if the Four Tops knew it was a good of the same name before them. But, most of the black cast films are pleasant but its the entertainment that carries and steals the movie but in this case the acting is good and entertainment. The whole all-star cast if wonderful and holds their own. This movie is one of the better of the black cast films. Mystery in Swing (1940) <br/><br/>** 1/2 (out of 4)<br/><br/>Entertaining murder-mystery about a popular band leader who has plenty of enemies out there. One day he is killed and the main suspect is the father of a woman he was trying to date. Before long various other red herrings show upit seems no one liked the man.<br/><br/>MYSTERY IN SWING is a pretty entertaining race picture that manages to put itself right up there with the other &quot;B&quot; mysteries that were being pumped out by Hollywood at the time. Quite often these race movies didn&#39;t look very good technically because of the low-budgets but that&#39;s not the case here. In all honesty this here could easily pass offa Hollywood &quot;B&quot; film.<br/><br/>There are quite a few good things about this movie including the mystery itself. Sure, we&#39;ve seen this type of thing countless times beforethere&#39;s a bad man who many people hated and we learn of the reasons whywe slowly click down to the ending where we learn the truth. I actually thought the mystery was well-done here and the revealing killer was nice. The film even gets into some horror trappings at the end, which is another added bonus.<br/><br/>As with many other race movies from this era, this one here features some nice jazz music, which adds to the entertainment. I also thought the performances were above average for this type of film. All in all, MYSTERY IN SWING runs a fast-paced 64-minute and is a lot of fun.
inerabol Admin replied
365 weeks ago