The clock strikes midnight. It's Gloria Stuart's 21st birthday and she is celebrating over a late dinner with her father and three eager suitors.
The happy conversation soon turns to the castle's blue salon, a room that has been locked for 20 years. Three people died mysteriously in that room, all those years ago. One of the suitors proposes a challenge: he plans to spend the night in the blue room if his each of his rivals will do the same over the next two nights.
Things happen pretty quickly over the next several scenes: Suitor number one disappears, the butler converses in low tones with a stranger at the kitchen door, a mysterious attacker frightens the daughter, suitor number two is shot....
The plot is pretty standard but it's fast paced and has a couple of twists. The usual old dark house corners and shadows are put to good use. There's also the classic shot where the camera pans slowly across the suspects' faces, one by one, close up.
Gloria Stuart is fine as the beautiful daughter. Lionel Atwill is appropriately suspicious as her shifty father. Paul Lukas is rather dashing as the best of her suitors (although his accent is a bit distracting). Midway through the picture, Edward Arnold enters the scene as a clever and dogged police detective who's determined to get to the bottom of things.
Lively characters, plenty of suspense, a bit of humor - exactly what you would expect from a Universal picture with this title. Lots of fun.
The happy conversation soon turns to the castle's blue salon, a room that has been locked for 20 years. Three people died mysteriously in that room, all those years ago. One of the suitors proposes a challenge: he plans to spend the night in the blue room if his each of his rivals will do the same over the next two nights.
Things happen pretty quickly over the next several scenes: Suitor number one disappears, the butler converses in low tones with a stranger at the kitchen door, a mysterious attacker frightens the daughter, suitor number two is shot....
The plot is pretty standard but it's fast paced and has a couple of twists. The usual old dark house corners and shadows are put to good use. There's also the classic shot where the camera pans slowly across the suspects' faces, one by one, close up.
Gloria Stuart is fine as the beautiful daughter. Lionel Atwill is appropriately suspicious as her shifty father. Paul Lukas is rather dashing as the best of her suitors (although his accent is a bit distracting). Midway through the picture, Edward Arnold enters the scene as a clever and dogged police detective who's determined to get to the bottom of things.
Lively characters, plenty of suspense, a bit of humor - exactly what you would expect from a Universal picture with this title. Lots of fun.