A Stiff Movie of Stiffs
13 years ago there was a dinner party held at the manor for thirteen guests except the thirteenth guest never appeared. Now the mysterious thirteenth guest has been left a fortune and the guests who were at the party are showing up dead, placed in the seats they were sitting at all those years earlier. It is a complete mystery to the cops lead by Police Capt. Ryan (J. Farrell MacDonald) and Detective Grump (Paul Hurst) as they try to get to the bottom of what is going on and who is doing all the killing.
I have always had a liking for Ginger Rogers and it is the fact that Miss Rogers appears in "Lady Beware" which attracted me to watch. Unfortunately for me Miss Rogers is in it nowhere enough for my liking and the knock on effect of that is we end up with a typical mystery house movie where we have a creepy house with tunnels and furniture covered in dust cloths along with people turning up dead. The whole thing boils down to who is doing the killing and early on it leads you to suspect some one and doesn't do enough to make you think otherwise.
But whilst we have this murder mystery going on we also have some comedy with inept cops who not only get scared easily but do silly things like in their sleep put a gun against their heads instead of the phone when it rings. It is all incredibly simple stuff and to be honest not that much fun. The worst thing is that Ginger Rogers' comic talents are kept restrained and so she doesn't bring the movie to life with those trademark facial expressions which were a big part of her talent.
What this all boils down to is that "Lady Beware" just didn't do it for me and lacked the humour as well as the mystery to make it grab your attention. And sadly for those who watch because they are fans of Ginger Rogers it ends up disappointing because her comic ability is restricted by the script.
