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Amystery film is a film that revolves around the solution of a problem or a crime. It focuses on the efforts of thedetective,private investigator or amateursleuth to solve the mysterious circumstances of an issue by means of clues, investigation, and clever deduction. Mystery films include, but are not limited to, films in the genre ofdetective fiction.
While cinema featured characters such asSherlock Holmes in the early 1900s, several other Sherlock Holmes likes characters appeared such asBoston Blackie andThe Lone Wolf. Several series of mystery films started in the 1930s with major studios featuring detectives likeNick and Nora Charles,Perry Mason,Nancy Drew andCharlie Chan. While original mystery film series were based on novels, by the 1940s many were sourced from comics and radio series. Towards the 1940s these series were predominantly produced asb-movies, with nearly no mystery series being developed by the 1950s.
Around the 2020s a wave of popular theatrical straight mystery films were released theatrically includingKenneth Brannagh'sMurder on the Orient Express (2017) andRian Johnson'sKnives Out (2019) as well as on streaming services with the parodicMurder Mystery (2019) starringAdam Sandler.
Mystery films mainly focus on acrime or apuzzle, usually amurder, which must then be solved bypolicemen, privatedetectives, or amateur sleuths. The viewer is presented with a series ofsuspects who have a motive to commit the crime but did not actually do it, and whom the investigator must eliminate during the course of the investigation. At times the viewer is presented with information not available to the main character. The central character usually explores the unsolved crime, unmasks the perpetrator, and puts an end to the effects of the villainy.[1]
During the early 20th century, there was substantial overlap between the genres of detective film andhorror film, and the term "mystery" was used to encompass both.[2]
The works ofArthur Conan Doyle were often adapted to the screen in early cinema, specifically withSherlock Holmes such asSherlock Holmes Baffled (1900).Gary Don Rhodes wrote that the large volume of detective films released in the 1910s either owed to Sherlock Holmes but that contemporary reviews such as that ofMoving Picture World in 1911 bemoaned the lack of a proper Sherlock Holmes adaptation in "Doctor Doyle's finished style."[3] By 1915 BC, the same trade paper stated that "strange as it may seem, the story of crime mystery is fast degenerating into one of stock properties."[3]
There were several mystery and detective films produced during thesilent film era, including numerous films involving Sherlock Holmes,Boston Blackie andThe Lone Wolf.[4] Mystery and detective films were among the most popular genres of the silent film era. This ranged to American, British, German and Danish adaptations of Sherlock Holmes and European series likeNick Carter, Nat Pinkerton and Miss Nobody.[5]With the beginning ofsound film, mystery film series came into their own withPhilo Vance in the 1929 filmThe Canary Murder Case.A series of films continued in until 1947.[4] Other series followed such as Charlie Chan which began in 1931 and ended in 1949 with 44 films produced.[4]
In the 1930s, most of the major Hollywood film studios produced mystery series, withMGM havingNick and Nora Charles and Joel and Garda Sloane,Warner Bros. havingPerry Mason,Torchy Blane,Brass Bancroft andNancy Drew. Universal hadBill Crane while Fox had Charlie Chan andMr. Moto.[6]
American mystery film series of the 1930s predominantly relied on mystery literature for inspiration. About every character from the 1930s drew from literature, such as Charlie Chan, Nick and Nora Charles,Thatcher Colt, Perry Mason, andMr. Wong. The 1930s featured many female detectives of various ages from Nancy Drew, Torchy Blane andHildegarde Withers while the 1940s had none.[7] Productions in the 1930s were occasionally A-budget pictures such asThe Black Camel (1931),Aresene Lupin (1932) andThe Thin Man (1934).[6]
By the 1940s, film detectives came from multiple sources such as radio and comic strips and many others had original scripts.[7] MGM, Warner Brothers, and Paramount had generally halted their production of mystery films by 1942 leaving production to these films being made byRKO,Columbia, Universal and other more minor studios.[6] This led to what author Ron Backer described as 1940s mystery films as being "almost always B-productions" with actors who were "past their prime".[6] These includedChester Morris as Boston Blackie,Warner Baxter as theCrime Doctor,Warren William as the Lone Wolf andBasil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes.[4] These smaller budget films led to more major productions such asJohn Huston'sThe Maltese Falcon (1941) whileMurder, My Sweet (1944) introduced the characterPhilip Marlowe to film. Marlowe would appear again inThe Big Sleep (1946) while other films author Martin Rubin deemed as notable detective mysteries includedLaura (1944).[8] These detective films drew upon thriller and thriller-related genres with their nocturnal atmosphere and style influenced byexpressionism.[8] They often overlapped withfilm noir, which arose in the mid-1940s and was coined by French critics in 1946.[9] The style was not acknowledge by American filmmakers, critics or audiences while these films were being developed until the 1970s.[10]
Mystery films series disappeared by the 1950s.[6] With the exception ofMiss Marple films in the 1960s, it was rare to find films with a female lead that had any sequels.[7] Bran Nicol found that the more traditional "clue-puzzle mystery" was "well-served" by 1960s and 70s film adaptations likeThe Alphabet Murders (1965),Murder on the Orient Express (1974), andDeath on the Nile (1978), the decades following it left mystery adaptations to be made for television as the "default home of sumptuous Golden Age adaptations"[11]
Eric Sandberg (Crime Fiction Studies) stated that whilefilm streaming services were predominantly dominated by iterations ofNordicnoir andpolice procedurals, there have been works inspired the classical mystery fiction, such as the parodicMurder Mystery starringAdam Sandler andJennifer Aniston which was one of Netflix's most popular films of 2019.[11] Sandberg noted that only by the 2020s, specifically withKenneth Branagh's 2017The Murder on the Orient Express had the genre been financially successful again with more than $350 million grossed worldwide, leading to a sequelDeath on the Nile (2022).[11] Other variations of includedRian Johnson'sKnives Out which was not an adaptation of a golden age work, but was Johnson's first foray into the "puzzle-mystery" style, and was the second highest-grossing film in America in 2019.[11]
