The Falcon in Mexico

Plot synopsis:
A detective travels south of the border to investigate an art dealer's murder.Tom Lawrence AKA The Falcon (Tom Conway) encounters a young woman hiding in a doorway. Her name is Dolores Ybarra (Cecilia Callejo) and she asks The Falcon to help her retrieve a stolen painting from a nearby art gallery. After breaking into the gallery Tom realises that Dolores was the model for the portrait not the artist and then stumbles upon the dead body of the gallery owner. Alerted by a burglar alarm, security guards arrive. When Tom explains to them what happened they do not believe his story as Dolores has vanished. The guards reveal that the portrait was painted by Humphrey Wade who has been dead for 15 years and so could not have employed the youthful Dolores to be the model. When the guards try to arrest Tom, he escapes with the painting and takes it to the home of Winthrop "Lucky Diamond" Hughes. Hughes (Emory Parnell), who is known as "lucky diamond" due to an enormous diamond ring he wears, is a noted collector of Wade's work and he quickly identifies the portrait as being a genuine work by Wade.Hughes suggests that Tom should go and question Wade's daughter Barbara about the painting, but when Tom goes to her apartment there is no answer at the door. The Falcon breaks into the apartment, where he finds a stack of newspaper clippings about the sale of Dolores' portrait. When Barbara Wade (Martha Vickers) returns home Tom asks her about the painting and she tells him that she believes that her father is not dead. The police, who have been alerted by Hughes, arrive prompting Tom to plan to go to Mexico (where Wade is said to be buried) and Barbara insists on going with him. After giving the police the slip the pair fly out to Mexico City but at the airport Barbara gives The Falcon the slip and is met by a car from the La Casa Del Laga Inn. Tom hires the taxi of Manuel Romero (Nestor Paiva) and his son Pancho (Fernando Alvarado) to follow her. They track her to the Inn, which is located in a small rural village. There Tom confronts Barbara and she explains that she has come to the Inn because that is where he father lived and worked. She introduces him to her stepmother Raquel (Mona Maris) and her dance partner and new husband Anton (Joseph Vitale). Anton warns Tom to leave Barbara alone and leave Mexico. The following morning Raquel asks Tom to abandon his search for Wade, but Tom accuses her of trying to curtail his investigation for fear that she should be judged a bigamist if Wade were indeed found to still be alive.Back at the Inn, the desk clerk, Paula Dudley (Mary Currier) shows Barbara and Tom to Wade's studio which she has kept just as the artist left it. As Barbara is leaving the studio she suddenly senses the presence of her father behind a locked door and Tom picks the lock. Inside the room they find a painting done in Wade's style and the paint is still wet, Paula arrives and orders them out of her room. When asked about the painting Paula claims it is her own work, but Tom suggests that she is in fact creating forgeries of Wade's work. Returning to his own room Tom startles Dolores who is searching for her portrait, Tom goes after her into the hallway but she has gone. The Falcon returns to his own room and is just about to retrieve the painting when a man knocks him out and steals the portrait. When he comes round Tom questions Paula about Dolores and she tells him that she is the daughter of Don Carlos Ybarra (Pedro de Cordoba). Tom goes to visit the Don and informs him that his daughter may be in danger, the old man tells Tom that Dolores travelled to the United States to assist an artist friend recover a painting. The Don and Tom search for Dolores, but they are too late - her body has been found drowned in the lake.Tom returns to the Inn only to find Manuel rummaging through his belongings and fires him. Soon after, Hughes arrives at the Inn but without his famous ring. At dinner that evening Barbara collapses at the table, she has been poisoned. Tom concludes that whoever poisoned her also drowned Dolores and murdered the art dealer back in New York all to prevent it being discovered if Wade is really alive. Paula remarks that Raquel has a strong motive for ensuring that Wade remains dead, which prompts Anton to accuse her of killing the art dealer because he had recognised her paintings as forgeries of Wade's work. When Barbara has recovered from the poisoning attempt, Paula disappears and when Tom goes to he room he finds the missing portrait hidden in her desk. When Tom goes to the lake to look for Paula he discovers her dead body in a boat but as he approaches the boat Manuel appears and reveals that he is in fact an undercover Mexican police officer.Barbara is at the village plaza when a local woman approaches her and tells her that she will lead her to her father. When Tom and Manuel return to the Inn and discover that Barbara is missing they follow her to an island where her father's grave is located. Tom removes the headstone of the tomb and they find that the crypt is empty, this prompts the woman who led Barbara there to admit that Anton had paid her to bring Wade's daughter to his tomb. The local villagers are holding a fiesta and the local police report to Manuel that one of the traditional dancers scheduled to take part in the fiesta has had their costume stolen. When Tom hears that the costume is that of an old man, he deduces that Wade has stolen it so that he can disguise himself. Tom and Manuel go with the police officers to question the dancers, but almost as soon as they have gone a man wearing a costume and mask approaches Barbara and lifts his mask to reveal that it is Wade (Bryant Washburn). He explains to his daughter that he disappeared because his life was a failure, but after his alleged suicide his paintings suddenly became valuable meaning that he could not even let her know that he was actually still alive. He goes on to warn Barbara that both of their lives are now in danger, but barely have the words left his lips than he is shot in the back and killed.Hearing the gunshot Tom goes to Barbara and when he sees her dead father concludes that it is Hughes who is the killer as his collection of Wade paintings would be rendered virtually worthless if it proven that the artist was still alive. Manuel confirms that Hughes is in financial trouble and has even had to sell his lucky diamond ring prompting The Falcon to come up with a daring plan to lure Hughes out into the open. Tom dons the old man costume Wade was wearing and walks conspicuously out into the middle of the plaza. Thinking his attempt upon the life of the artist has failed Hughes takes aim from a balcony, but before he can fire Manuel spots him and shoots him dead. With the case solved The Falcon says goodbye to his friends in Mexico and boards a plane for New York.

Tags: murder

Review:
Not that it detracts from a nice little comedy-mystery, but this was an even cheaper affair than usual from RKO as they used up a lot of stock rustic Mexican background film to lilting music here while the main characters glided or drove about in front.
Tom Conway as the Falcon looked as handsome and debonair as ever (no.
9/13  I don't count those last 3 non-RKO efforts with John Calvert), and had to do without the comedy double act of Clark and Gargan from now on.Investigation of a painting painted by a dead man (with an art gallery eerily similar to the one in Woman In The Window) leads to murder and theft; the Falcon is chased by the cops while he's chasing the baddies all the way into deepest Mexico.
The dead painter's daughter was played chockful of feminine intuition by Martha Vickers, next step for her was the cute Big Sleep.
She also uttered my favourite line from all of the Falcon films  "My father lived at this inn while he was alive"  wonderful stuff!
Nestor Paiva played a helpful ambiguous peasant and Joseph Vitale a rather unhelpful serious dancer, some of their best stuff was to come later with Paramount.
This is the ninth Falcon film, and a particularly good one.
It contains some very good second unit material shot in Mexico, so there must have been a large budget for that, as it must have taken at least two or three weeks on location.
There are excellent performances from two Hispanic actors, Fernando Alvarado is a charming little Mexican boy, and Nestor Paiva is excellent in a major supporting role.
This is an excellent unpretentious B picture, just the sort of thing one wants in the Falcon series..
"The Falcon in Mexico" is a 1944 entry into "The Falcon" series, by now starring Tom Conway.
In this story, Tom Lawrence (The Falcon) is in Mexico investigating the possibility that a dead artist might not be so dead after all, after he sees the model for one of the artist's portraits.
Martha Vickers plays the artist's daughter, who keeps "seeing" her father.
Mona Maris is her remarried stepmother who dances in a Mexican club with her new husband.The movie is okay, with an abrupt ending, which isn't unusual in these films, and the movie seems like an ad for visiting Mexico.
Supposedly some of the footage is from the Orson Welles' debacle "It's All True." If so, I'm glad RKO found good use for it..
This "Falcon" entry relocates to Mexico and features all the stock characters and situations that one would expect from Hollywood in that setting - some of which (the repeated footage of songs in the cantina, for instance) is obviously used simply as filler.
Barbara's exotic young stepmother turns out to be genuinely attached to her, for instance, while the grinning, thick-witted Mexican who seems to be playing a part in a bad film turns out to be a very cool bird indeed.There is some artful photography and some smart dialogue, and while there does seem to be a certain amount of tourist advertising blatantly inserted -- literally, as in photographs of travel brochures -- this film is more interesting than I thought it was going to be.
Oddly enough, while it features a number of murders they are all left more or less in the background to the main mystery, which is the question of who faked the stolen portrait...
Despite some of the rather silly reviews of it seen here this writer can very highly recommend it.Typically with this series the dialog is quite sharp and delivered with panache by a solid stock company of reliable actors and actresses.
I must say that one thing that particularly pleased me was its charming music score which relied heavily on south-of-the-border melodies as well as some classic RKO library music by Roy Webb which was always good.Conway is as suave and pleasing to watch as ever and there is a fine supporting performance by the underrated Nestor Paiva.
The ladies are beautiful, charming and a little mysterious and really nothing can be faulted here unless one enjoys indulging in nit-picking.All in all a thoroughly satisfying movie and one of the very best of the FALCON series.
Much of the problem, as other reviewers note, is the big travelogue part, which only gets out of Hollywood proper thanks to some artistic Orson Welles stock footage.
Otherwise it's process shots and RKO's backlot, along with that all-purpose ethnic Nestor Paiva (Manuel) furnishing a dollop of comic relief.
(Still, I really like the enchanting two little girl singers Hunter & Alvarez.)What's worth watching for the guys, at least, are the gals, especially Vickers who's downright beautiful, at least in my book.
While not among the best Falcon films, this one is pretty good and worth a look.
For my time, I would much rather watch an earlier Falcon film.
That's because the George Sanders films were usually better written and more exciting--as well as starred the wonderful Sanders.
With THE FALCON'S BROTHER, Sanders' real-life brother, Tom Conway, took over the leading role since Sanders wanted out of the series in order to pursue other acting opportunities.
Now this was a very logical choice, as Conway looked a lot like Sanders and also had a similar lovely melodious voice.
But despite this, I still found myself missing Sanders, as to me he was THE Falcon and the earlier films were just were written better and seemed so much fresher.By 1944, Conway's Falcon had fallen into a rather predictable pattern that must have worked well at the time because they made so many of these films during a three year stretch--a HUGE output of 9 films!
Of course, I would contend that averaging three films a year was exactly why the films seemed not quite as good as the earlier ones--they were rushed into production and didn't seem as smooth or engaging as earlier ones.Now THE FALCON IN Mexico is a bit better than most films of this period thanks to a relatively simple but engaging mystery.
A low-point in the series was THE FALCON OUT WEST and I think most of the problem with that film was that there were too many twists and turns and surprises.
Plus putting Conway out West just didn't fit his style and personality, though Mexico seemed a much better change of venues.The plot involves the possibility that a famous dead painter MIGHT actually be alive.
The Falcon, naturally, comes to her aid and by the end the mystery's all naturally been revealed..
A fairly uninspiring entry in the series that continues the gimmick of the location from Out West.
Never far from women or trouble, Tom Lawrence meets both when he meets Dolores Ybarra trying to get into a door and recover a painting she did.
The problem with the painting is that the painter actually died 15 years earlier, but yet the portrait must have been done recently.
Lawrence seeks out the artist's daughter Barbara, who reveals a mystery around her father's death and the two head to Mexico to investigate further.After being Out West, the film series continues its attempts to freshen things up by "being places" rather than doing things.
In this case we have a lazy travelogue that takes us to Mexico with lots of backdrops and footage (with supposedly a famous source!).
The mystery starts out well enough and does offer intrigue to a point but it is pretty much lost in the delivery, which seems more interesting in providing a lot of footage of Mexico instead.
Berke's direction is fine I'm sure but he is continually overshadowed by the stock footage (supposedly shot by Orson Welles) which regularly takes centre stage.
The film also features a couple of songs (a common filler in b-movie world), they aren't much cop here but do add a sanitised flavour of Mexico.Conway is not as smooth as he was in some other of the Falcon films.
Instead we have a bit of life from Paiva in a good sidekick character.
Maris, Vickers, Currier, Callejo and others all do so-so jobs but nobody has much conviction about anything  probably not helped by the material.Overall then a fairly uninspiring entry in the series that continues the gimmick of the location from Out West.
The stock footage is all well and good but the mystery becomes slack and uninteresting all too quickly..
Too many distracting process shots with actors in front of filmed backgrounds....
RKO must have had a very small budget to work with when they made "The Falcon in Mexico", using stock footage of actual location photography but process photography for all of the studio shots with actors in front of the screened location backgrounds.
It becomes such a distraction that there's a tendency not to follow the plot after awhile but just to watch how often the actors are in Hollywood rather than Mexico.Whatever, the story is not intriguing enough and nobody seems to be trying very hard to bring it to life.
Even the usually vivacious MARTHA VICKERS (who played the nymphomaniac in THE BIG SLEEP) has a hard time conveying any genuine emotion while she pines for her long lost father, while others in the cast are competent enough but not really inspired.
NESTOR PAIVA has the best supporting role as an overly enthusiastic but helpful taxi driver called Manuel.Nevertheless, Conway does a decent job as the debonair detective who has the same interest as the police in solving a crime, but seems to be avoiding them at every turn.Some of the background photography is well filmed, but using process shots for scenes involving the actors is too obvious for comfort.Summing up: All in all, a passable B-film entertainment..
The Falcon meets two beautiful women, commits two minor crimes, finds a corpse, gets wrongly accused of murder, escapes from custody and learns that something mysterious is going on south of the border.
It doesn't all happen in exactly that order, but there's plenty of fast-paced fun.But once the Falcon and one of the women fly to Mexico, the excitement levels off.
At one point, the Falcon warns a Mexican gentleman that somebody may try to kill his daughter.
He's not even curious about where the threat comes from!The problem with the main part of this movie is that there's so much Mexico, there's no room left for mystery.
But there's no suspense, and the ending is very weak.Considering when it was made, "The Falcon in Mexico" probably had a public relations component.
But in a mystery movie, an exotic setting goes only so far.
South Of The Border Down Mexico Way. When Tom Conway met that black cat determined to cross his path he should have gone blocks out of the way.
He didn't though and wound up helping Cecilia Callejo break into an art gallery to retrieve a painting for which she modeled.
But the gallery owner is dead Callejo flees through a window and Conway has to run from the San Francisco police.The daughter of the dead artist who painted it played by Martha Vickers might provide answers.
They all wind up meeting in old Mexico providing The Falcon with a host of subjects.
Along with ever helpful driver Nestor Paiva and his young son Fernando Alvarado.A middle run Falcon film, the exotic location helps, but it's not anything abut a studio created Mexico..
Mexico travelogue featuring the Falcon.
The Falcon (Tom Conway) heads to Mexico to investigate a murder and hang out with a cab driver (Nestor Paiva).
Despite an exciting first twenty minutes or so, this turns out to be one of the weaker entries in the series.
It seems more concerned with promoting tourism to Mexico than telling a fun mystery story.
It's just not what I watch a Falcon movie for.
Anyway, Tom Conway is good as usual.
The lovely ladies this time include Martha Vickers and Mona Maris.
The series is missing the regulars it had earlier on, such as the Falcon's sidekick Goldie or the bumbling cops Donovan and Bates.
Worth a look for fans but prepare yourself that this isn't one of the Falcon's better movies..
Too much Mexico, not enough Falcon mystery.
The Falcon films, both with George Sanders and Tom Conway in the lead role, are on the most part very enjoyable.
There are some very good ones like the first two Sanders Falcon films and 'The Falcon Strikes Back', though also a few disappointments like 'The Falcon in Danger'.While it's watchable enough, 'The Falcon in Mexico' is one of the series' weaker films.
A charming Martha Vickers and a very funny and full of life Nestor Paiva are the supporting cast's standouts, Fernando Alvarado is also appealing.However, the story does suffer from a lack of suspense, erratic pacing (tries to be bright and breezy, which it is sporadically, but is too hectic more like), a very vague and weird motive for the criminal, not being focused on enough with Mexico being favoured over it and a very abrupt ending.
The stock Mexican music sounds cheap, not like the Falcon series at all, and the musical interludes were unnecessary and irrelevant to the story, also placed at inappropriate times.The travelogue stuff is striking but doesn't add a lot and slows down the film.
William Berke's direction is undistinguished, and too much of the script is awkward and confused.On the whole, an uninspired entry in a mostly enjoyable series that suffers from too much Mexico and not enough Falcon mystery.
Falcon in Mexico, The (1944) ** (out of 4) The Falcon (Tom Conway) travels to Mexico where he gets involved with murder and a mysterious painting.
This entry gets a minor leg up from the Mexican locations, which are probably just backlot shots but the actual mystery itself is rather bland.
The supporting cast isn't any better and many of the members from previous films, including Cliff Clark, are missing here, which doesn't help matters..
The second movie is unabashed marketing for tourism in Mexico - the last shot is of a tourist poster that melts into a plane flying to or from our neighbor to the south.
The third movie is a lackluster mystery of sorts with Tom Lawrence at his worst.
The Falcon in Mexico is not one of his stellar performances and not really worth your time viewing.
Michael Arlen's radio-serial detective returns for another movie mystery (actually, it's the Falcon's brother this time, with George Sanders having since exited from the role and real-life sibling Tom Conway assuming his duties).
For reasons unknown, the Falcon is down Mexico way, being conned by a Señorita who needs his help in retrieving one of her paintings from an art gallery.
Globe-trotting yarn wants us to believe that New York City and Mexico are just a stone's throw from each other, or that this Falcon is really just a nice guy, quite used to helping out desperate females.
The ninth film in the Falcon series.
A little different than earlier films in the series, this one is the first film since A Date with the Falcon without Edward Gargan as Detective Bates and first one without Cliff Clark as the Police Inspector since The Falcon's Brother, when Clark took over the role from noted character actor James Gleason.
Also, a single character Manuel (Nester Paiva), who "adopts" the Falcon (Tom Conway) when he arrives in Mexico, provides much of the comic relief, service and other roles normally played by a sidekick, houseboy etc..The film begins with the Falcon kissing his girlfriend goodnight, promising her he'll not get involved in another crime solving case.
After avoiding walking under a ladder and a black cat crossing his path, he sees a beautiful woman (Dolores, played by Cecilia Cellejo) attempting to break into an art gallery.
She tells him she is trying to retrieve a painting of hers inside and he helps her only to find, once inside, that the painting is a portrait of her, and that the art dealer has been murdered.
About this time, some "rent a cops" show up, the girl disappears, and the Falcon is suspected of the murder.He learns that the painting was done by deceased artist Humphrey Wade, making it valuable, and that it was recently purchased by a collector of Wade's paintings, "Diamond" Hughes (Emory Parnell).
Of course, the Falcon escapes with the painting before the police arrive and heads to Hughes' house.
Hughes doesn't know the identity of the girl in the painting, didn't even know of this painting's existence until recently, but suggests that perhaps the artist's daughter (who lives nearby) knows more.When the Falcon meets Wade's daughter (Martha Vickers), she reveals that she believes her father may still be alive.
They agree to go together to Mexico, where her father did his painting, but she "ditches" him shortly after they arrive.
A taxi driver, Manuel, and his son help the Falcon follow the daughter to the hotel that was the artist's residence.
Manuel becomes as ever present as the Falcon, appearing in most scenes and/or at critical times throughout the movie, delivering broken English lines reminiscent of Yogi Berra.The proprietor of the hotel (Mary Currier), who acts suspiciously, and the song & dance couple (Mona Maris and Joseph Vitale) working there, are all found to have a connection with the former artist.
Dolores, the woman in the painting (which is stolen from the Falcon's room, and later found in proprietor's room), makes a brief appearance before she disappears again, we meet her father (Pedro de Cordoba), and she is found dead by fisherman.
We also learn more about Manuel.There is song and dance entertainment throughout this film.
Of course, the Falcon solves the mystery and catches the murderer (by putting himself at risk).
However, this film does not include a (fairly typical) lead in to the next film in the series.