Mysterious Mr. Moto (1938)

By CinemaSerf

Talk about self sacrifice? Well, renowned sleuth “Moto” (Peter Lorre) has only gone and got himself imprisoned on Devil’s Island so he can make best buddies with felon “Brissac” (Leon Ames) in the hope that he can gain his trust, help him escape and make it back to London where he hopes to be able to identify the ruthless leader of the aptly named “League of Assassins”. Their target is industrialist “Darvak” (Henry Wilcoxon) who has a secret formula that would be of great value should it manage to fall into their hands. Of course,  to keep up his disguise “Moto” also has to stay one step ahead Scotland Yard, and so things actually get perilous for him as he closes in on the shrewd culprit. This is a solid outing for a Lorre comfortably delivering a part he has made his own by now. He’s well supported by Ames and Wilcoxon as well as Lester Matthews and Erik Rhodes. Indeed, even the damsel that is “Ann” (Mary Maguire) gets a little more to do as the action hots up. They do bear a resemblance to the “Charlie Chan” mysteries, and like them they use hints of science and logic to enable deductions that that other London detective might have deduced were elementary to nobody but “Moto”. Good fun.