I gave this film a 9 out of 10, because it was exactly what I expected it to be.

Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Mr Ames was taking two men on a trip to his house during a storm. It was to show his passengers Mr Woods and his secretary Mr Erskine a play he had written. The car he was driving has problems and they have to get out and walk. Nearby there is a big house.They make their way to the house and Mr Ames knows the people that own the house and some of the guest. One lady is the daughter of the owner of the house. She is Ames girlfriend. Throughout this movie the secretary Mr Erskine is funny, he is afraid of everything Many unexplained things happen in the house. A woman named Bernice talks to spirits. Supposedly Dr Kent is the lady's doctor. Bernice has mental problems. Later she comes out again has dinner and talks to a spirit.Mr Woods finds and reads pages of the play in a manuscript in a bedroom. He realizes this was all a gimmick and this was the play Ames wrote. Woods starts to laugh and thinks it is a good play. Mr Ames admits that he hired these actors to act out his play in front of Woods but now Beatrice the one who talks to spirits is dead and then her body disappears.Scary, funny and stupid. It turns out there are secret passages in the house. There is also a picture on the wall that has eyes that move. A guard comes to the house and tells the guest that a mental patient escaped nearby and he will stay in the house just in case the person goes there.The villain captures 4 people who he intends to operate on in the house where the secret passages and rooms are. He intends to change their, nose, face, chin etc.This movie is full of things that may or may not be part of Ames play but you get a few laughs out of it.

A delightful, eminently watchable comedy, masterly paced, you may find it endearing, with its expert timing, and despite the gracelessness of its male cast, anyway the movie spells its genre so as not to disappoint the gullible; a playwright rented the mansion once owned by an insane physician, whose legacy of fright still carries on, and the playwright gathers there several people to stage his play, with one of the main results being that they all are really guests and none knows indeed the house. I believe that the device of 'the audience on stage', or 'the audience in the movie', as represented by the old-timer and his degenerate secretary intended to have fun no matter what, worked wonderfully; that's how exciting they felt to be the cinema, and they were right. Miljan plays the controversial playwright, June Collyer plays the starlet, while Kolker and Kirke are the usual creeps from such movies; save for the two girls (June and Eve), it's an ugly cast, one player uglier than the other, at least four mugs (the playwright, the supposed Amphytrio the psychiatrist, the heady Terry, the butler).Eve Southern was intriguing, she's the one playing the insane widow.The guards' uniform looked eerie. The patient's discourse was an early impersonation of the German Leader.Nice pace, sharp one-liners, two likable actresses, ugly male cast; as said, it's a farce, kindred to music hall, revue, etc., but the plot was neat anyway, and the experience is refreshing.Strayer directed 'The Ghost …' in '34, and 'The Monster …' in '32.

It's occasionally amusing -- a story about seven people in a "haunted house" on a stormy night. One by one, four of them disappear, evidently one of them murdered.There's a lot of shouting and carrying on. One of the characters -- the secretary of a Broadway producer -- is gay, and I'm glad because he gets most of the funny lines and bits of business. I suppose some people today would argue that the character's flamboyance is politically incorrect but I'm sure that if this were shown in the Castro Theater it would get belly laughs and applause.The plot is hardly worth going on about. I always enjoy the notion of a handful of people stuck in a country mansion during a fierce electrical storm but the writers have to DO something with the proposition. After all, it's not funny in itself. Neil Simon did an exceptional job with it in "Murder By Death," using some of the same hoary tactics. (Two living eyes stare out of a painting.) All of the acting is overdone. The lines are loud and the gestures theatrical, but the viewer will have to go easy on such weaknesses. It's 1934, and many of the actors of the period came from the stage. They had to shout to reach the balcony. On top of that, the huge, noisy cameras had to be enclosed in soundproof "blimps", as they were called, and the microphones hidden in vases, buttonholes, garter belts, and whatnot.It's worth a look, perhaps, but not two looks.

A fierce storm forces playwright Prescott Ames (John Miljan) and his friends, Broadway producer Herman Wood (Richard Carle) and secretary Homer Erskine (Johnny Arthur) to seek shelter at a country house. It seems they walk right into the middle of some weird happenings - Dr. Kent (Henry Kolker) has mental patients in various rooms and every so often blood curdling screams are heard. Beatrice (Eve Southern) is convinced her late husband was murdered and goes into trances when she communicates with him. There is a showdown at dinner with accusations flying thick and fast - the lights go out and Beatrice disappears. It is all too much for Wood and Erskine, who go to their room intending to leave. But things are not as they appear - Ames has masterminded the whole evening - it is the first act from his new play and everyone at the house is an actor, rounded up by Gloria (June Collyer) Ames' fiancée. Woods and Erskine cotton on when they find the play, "The Ghost Walks" in their room, but meanwhile someone is taking things seriously because Beatrice is found murdered.A knock at the door is heard and a keeper from the local sanitarium is enquiring about an escaped patient. "At the sanitarium we call him Case 202 - I guess you'd call him a homicidal maniac"!!!! Of course while everyone is now in a panic, Woods and co still think it is part of the play and are constantly making jokes!! Ames then tells how he came by the house - it was once owned by a mad doctor who had 9 patients that mysteriously disappeared. It then got the reputation as a haunted house. When a portrait "winks" at Erskine, he finally gets the message that this is not a game - meanwhile half the guests have mysteriously disappeared.....While the "play within a play" was ho hum to Broadway audiences, it was still a novel idea to film patrons of the mid thirties. This is a quite enjoyable film that is very easy to watch and even though Johnny Arthur is one of the leads, he is quite funny and the laughs don't get in the way. It is just so nice to see John Miljan as a likable hero (with no nasty secrets to hide) and June Collyer is just as beautiful as ever as the love interest. Johnny Arthur specialised in whiny, effeminate types - typical was his role as Homer Erskine.