Boston Blackie's Rendezvous (1945)

Boston Blackie (Chester Morris) and his sidekick, the Runt (George Stone), are at home in their apartment, having just retired. Suddenly the door bell rings. It is their friend, Harry Hayden. His nephew, Steve Cochran, has been in a sanitarium, but has escaped after he learned his emotional problem is incurable. If the news leaks out, it will be a problem for his brother, who is to marry into a good family. While they are talking, Cochran listens from the window. After Hayden leaves, he slips into the room and talks to Blackie. He tells his story and Blackie promises to help him, but then he strangles Blackie until he passes out and steals a suit of clothes. As he leaves he drops his diary. He goes to a dance club and asks for Nina Foch, one of the hostesses. Foch is not in. Runt comes home and revives Blackie. They read Cochran's diary and find out about his interest in Foch. In the meantime, Cochran is dancing with Adelle Roberts, and invites her to a nightclub.

Blackie phones Inspector Farraday (Richard Lane), even though Hayden did not want him to, but Lane is not in. They find the taxi driver that drove the couple, and he takes them to a spot in the park where they got out. Lane and his crew show up suddenly. Since Cochran was wearing Blackie's clothes, Lane assumes Blackie did it. Lane says he either did it or is shielding someone, so he arrests them. They take Blackie to the police psychiatrist. Blackie leads him a merry chase in the interview, including a couple of sleight-of-hand acts. (Morris was actually an accomplished magician.) Frustrated, Lane releases Blackie. Meanwhile, Cochran is having head problems, and strangles the maid in his hotel.

Blackie cons Foch's address out of Iris Adrian, the hat check girl at the club. He gets there just before Cochran. Adrian calls Foch to warn her that she may be in danger from Cochran, and she assumes that Blackie is he. Farraday knocks at the door and Blackie flees through the window. When Lane leaves, Cochran comes to her room posing as Blackie, claiming that Farraday sent him. He is getting ready to strangle her when Adrian comes in. Cochran talks Foch into leaving with him for safety. Later Lane comes to the girls' apartment, and the hat check girl tells Lane she left with Cochran. When Blackie and Runt get to their apartment, they find the maid's body. Then Lane arrives, and finds the maid's body, but Blackie and Runt escape. In an incongruous slapstick moment in an otherwise sober movie, Blackie and Runt slip into the hotel in blackface dressed as maids. When they ring the doorbell, Cochran calls the front desk and they slip out the other door. But Blackie and Lane catch up with Cochran and rescue Foch just in the knick of time.




Cochran


Foch