It is a performances centric movie

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Mildred Henshew, the ravishing niece of a town reporter, arrives for her summer holiday, and she's welcomed by a youngster who promptly leaves his girlfriend, to befriend the newcomer. The storyline follows the teenage sexuality's logic, with Mildred being promoted from brat to 'young woman', after she and the boy visit the murder scene. Mildred threatened with leaving, the boy tempted her with a secret swimming hole, and a descent in a dark house follows, with both teenagers getting dirty. Monogram treats the audience with a comedy about teenage detectives, in a small town, and while the romance was enjoyable, the denouement, with the teenagers in the modest dark house during a thunderstorm, is neat, and the only reason to give the movie the name it has; except that, unlike other comedies, here the mystery plot makes sense.Marcia Mae plays a girl from the city, during a holiday; she's a bit vain, being a young woman played as such, and has a strongly peculiar voice.Like many other movies, this vehicle with an exploitative title was made to be enjoyed, not analyzed.

So 1940 wasn't only the year former Our Ganger Ernie "Sunshine Sammy" Morrison started playing Scruno in Monogram Pictures' East Side Kids movies, or that other former OG member Mary Kornman made her final picture for the same studio called On the Spot, it was also the year former OG director Robert F. McGowan made his final movies for the exact same studio. One of them was this one which starred Marcia Mae Jones-who previously appeared in McGowan's OG shorts Birthday Blues and Mush & Milk as well as with other former OG member Jackie Cooper in The Champ-and Jackie Moran. They are a couple of teens intent on getting an innocent man out of jail. McGowan provides some good humor as well as wonderful atmosphere concerning the title object which only appears near the end. So on that note, I recommend Haunted House. P.S. Another player familiar to OG fans is Clarence Wilson, who played a meanie in the series shorts, Shrimps for a Day and Little Sinner.

The title "Haunted House" gives the impression that this Monogram poverty row teenaged comedy is going to be something totally different than it actually is. "Teenaged Detectives" or even "The Boy who got the Scoop" might raise this up only a bit of a notch, but even if reflected accurately, the whole movie would be a boring rip-off of the "Nancy Drew" series. I give Jackie Moran credit for making his newspaper assistant a likable young man, desperately trying to break into the business as a journalist, but thwarted by his cantankerous boss (George Cleveland), he is tossed back into the copy room. His main goal is to prove that the sweet Christian Rub (who is on trial for murder) has been framed. When Cleveland's spoiled niece (Marcia Mae Jones) arrives, Moran sets out to prove Rub's innocence even more vigorously and gets into all sorts of trouble, accusing the wrong people and losing his job. And then there's the fact that the only inclusion of an even remotely haunted house comes at the very end where the culprit is discovered inside the victim's home, all boarded up simply because nobody lives there anymore. Certainly not at all haunted, even by the victim's ghost. A few amusing moments don't make for an overall good movie, and even with some great character performers (Rub, Cleveland, Clarence Wilson to mention a few), this one ranks as a Z-grade dud.

A fun film produced to cash in on the popularity of mysteries that swept the late '30's / early '40's. Very well done for an obvious "low budget" b-film. "Want-to-be" reporter and editor's niece do their best to prove innocence of accused murderer. Much circumstantial evidence leads them down several wrong paths, causing frustration and chastizing from elders. Perserverance pays off as they finally convince the law of friend's innocence, surprising everyone with the guilt of the real culprit. Definitely worth viewing.