Movie detectives in the 1930s paved the way for film noir in the 40s.
Whether you call them gumshoes, shamuses, or dicks, the detectives on the silver screen in the 1930s were cool, incorruptible and trendsetting. Sherlock Holmes, Charlie Chan, the Thin Man, and Sam Spade ruled the decade ruled by the Depression. During that desperate time, a new kind of film sleuth elevated the detective yarn into a moral allegory of good versus evil. The hero employed deft logic in outsmarting a cunning criminal who otherwise would have gone free if not for the detective's determination and skill. It was the precursor to the film noir genre that followed in the 1940s.
Sherlock Holmes
Still the most portrayed fictional film detective of all time, Sherlock Holmes made the leap off the page and firmly established himself as a screen legend in the 1930s. Holmes, the English private eye created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, was featured as a character in seven films during that decade. Although stage actor William Gillette was the first to portray Holmes with a deerstalker hat and curved calabash pipe, Basil Rathbone recreated the look on screen in "The Hound of the Baskervilles," in 1939.
Charlie Chan
Charlie Chan was the star character in 20 short detective films playing throughout the 1930s. Chan was known for making pithy and wise -- if grammatically stilted -- statements as he meticulously and mysteriously deduced the villain in these B movies. Although Chan's character was Chinese, he was most popularly played in the 1930s by Swedish actor Warner Oland. Oddly enough, during the course of more than 40 films, Chan was never once portrayed by a Chinese actor.
The Thin Man
Dapper, suave, debonair, and usually half-drunk, Nick Charles and his wife Nora were the epitome of class in a time when men wore fedoras and women wore garters. William Powell and Myrna Loy traded sharp barbs and witty dialogue while solving upper-crust crimes in three Thin Man films in the 1930s. Based on characters created by novelist Dashiell Hammett, it's generally acknowledged that the first film, The Thin Man, was the best one made.
Sam Spade
The iconic Sam Spade had a pre-Humphrey Bogart incarnation in the 1930s. Spade, another Dashiell Hammett creation, was first featured in a rarely screened 1931 version of The Maltese Falcon. Instead of Bogart's cool, removed, wryly smart sleuth, Ricardo Cortez portrayed Spade as a slick ladies' man who put the moves on every dame who wandered into the film frame.
Tags: Charlie Chan, Sherlock Holmes, Dashiell Hammett, film noir