There is nothing wrong with this film. It's just pretty lightweight. It does have a nice cast and the theme of the supernatural helps keep one's interest. When the chief character admits to being a charlatan, we would think there would be a slide downward. However, Dame Mae Witty, who is no stranger to mystery, having played the role of Agatha Christie's Miss Marple in several films, manages to put life in this when she has to abandon her "talents" and figure out a way to solve the case and keep an innocent person from being charged with murder. There are other supporting actors who are great characters and a tight little plot that takes only a little over an hour to run its course. I have a soft place in my heart for these early British detective pieces.

Madame La Grange, psychic medium, admits that "Most of the time it's a fake" when she gives a reading. Tonight, however, she insists that she will play no tricks: she's at the English governor's residence in Calcutta, summoned to assist in investigating the murder of a most unpopular man.Dame May Witty plays the medium with appropriate gravity and mystery. Madge Evans wears a worried look as the beautiful secretary who is in love with the governor's son. She also, we soon learn, is the mysterious medium's daughter.Henry Daniell is moody and edgy as a friend of the murder victim. He wants answers from the police, who are represented by Lewis Stone, a Scotland Yard man who's been shipped in specially to look into the case.A couple of spooky séance scenes succeed in sending some shivers down the spine. Particularly effective is a bit when the lights are off and the screen is totally black for a long moment: we hear voices, then Daniell asking "Who killed you?"—and then just perfect silence and darkness for what seems an exceptionally long stretch. (When they do finally turn on the lights, there's another dead body.) It's a solid if not brilliant plot; it builds nicely to an exciting climax and a surprising solution.Witty has the most colorful role and is clearly the featured performer here; she is quite good. Lewis Stone's role, I have to say, I found annoying – he is one sententious police detective but not exactly the smartest. (Judge Hardy would never have come so close to totally blowing a case.) This one won't cause any nightmares but it is atmospheric, fast-moving, and plenty entertaining.

****SPOILERS*** Third version of the British murder mystery "The Thirteenth Chair" has British Inspector Marney, Lewis Stone, try to solve the murder of Lenny Spencer Lee who was found dead with a knife wound in his back at his Calcutta home a few days earlier. It's Lee's good friend John Wales played by Henry Daniell, who was to play future Sherlock Holmes' master criminal Doctor Moriatry, who suspects he knows who murdered him but needs the help of medium Madam Rosalie La Graange, Dame May Witty, to smoke him or her out. Using a séance with a number of persons, 13 to be exact, who are suspected in Lee's murder Madam Rosalie expects to reveal his identity but something goes seriously wrong. Duing the scene when in total darkness the killers identity is about to be revealed by Wales he himself if found murdered with a knife wound in his back with the murder weapon mysteriously disappearing from the scene!It's Madam Roselie who's been secretly working with Inspector Marney who smells a rat in all this in how the séance was manipulated and suspects the killer used it as cover to murder Wales to keep his identity hidden. Given a second chance by Inspector Marney to have a another séance with the dead body of John Wales, who's by now was in the last stages of Rigor Mortis, participating. It's there that the truth finally comes who in fact murdered Lenny Lee by his killer being tricked into admitting his crime even though he skillfully covered all he evidence that would have convicted him.***SPOILES***Overly talky British murder mystery that has trouble making its point in who killed Mister Lee but the fine acting especially that of Dame May Witty more then makes up for it. The disappearing knife act by Lee's as well as Wales killer was a bit too convoluted to take seriously but it did make for a very good surprise ending. With Lee & wales' killer totally falling for it even though it, with the fingerprints on it wiped clean, never would have stood up in a court of law. P.S In the early 1929 talkie version of the movie a pre Darcula and non English speaking Bela Lugosi,who probably had his voice dubbed, made his US movie debut as Inspector Dalzante;The role later created for Lewis Stone as Inspector Marney in the 1937 version of the film.

I love mysteries from the thirties. It isn't because they are good movies, they aren't usually. It is because you can see history being made. Whatever we have now in terms of a cinematic narrative, the on screen avatar detective conventions were highly unsettled before "Kane." Here we have one of the more extraordinary experiments. In the thirties, spiritualism was still vital. Ghosts would speak. There were a number of attempts to relate the ghost we become when we watch action from a distance, to some sort of on screen ghost-mediator representative.Here we have a Jane Marple type, played by a famous theatrical actress. She is a medium, brought in to solve a murder by going into a trance. The actual mystery is not well woven here, but that is beside the point. The way it is reported is what is interesting. She has a contact on the other side called "little eyes." (I'm not making this up.) In the middle of a séance, Little Eyes is about to reveal the name of the murderer when the querent is killed (stabbed) and the session ends. It was dark; everyone was holding hands; the room was locked; a thorough search found no knife; the medium had been tied to a chair.An inspector is called, and he enters into a standard inspector/Miss Marple mode, where she solves the mystery by once again doing a séance, this time with the corpse in a chair. History, folks. These things are the anthropology of our imagination.Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.