MISSING EVIDENCE

US, 1939, 64 minutes, Black and white.
Preston Foster, Irene Hervey, Inez Courtenay, Chick Chandler, Noel Madison.
Directed by Phil Rosen.

A small-budget second feature from Universal Studios. Preston Foster (Last Days of Pompeii) appeared in a number of these, a solid leading man. The leading lady is Irene Hervey who had a long career both in film and on television. The director is Phil Rosen, who worked with Edison in filming The Miracle Man in 1912, began direction in 1915, prolific in small-budget features, his career cut short by his death in 1951.

In many ways, this is a routine FBI investigation, undercover. Interestingly, the focus of attention is on the selling of sweepstake tickets, being outlawed by the government yet manufactured falsely in the United States, imported from overseas, defrauding gullible customers.

Preston Foster is the investigator, Irene Hervey being an agent of sales at a prestigious hotel. She is part of the link between the big bosses, the printing of the tickets, their distribution by small time agents. She and her friend are taken in by the FBI fobbing off all accusations. The old elevator man at the hotel buys a ticket and finds he has the winning number, only to receive a telegram indicating that the ticket was fake. He shoots himself. This changes the attitude of those working in the hotel and they go to the FBI agent, leading to their all infiltrating the company distributing the tickets. They are all directed by a boss who keeps saying that he is in connection with Mr Big, Noel Madison.

There are criminal connections, guns and fights, timing and expose – and Linda working for the boss who reveals, as they make their escape in a car, intending to sale overseas, that he is the Mr Big. There is a car crash, death, and vindication of the infiltration and expose.