The Bat Whispers (
1930-Top grossing films:-Academy Awards:*Best Picture: All Quiet on the Western Front - Universal Studios*Best Actress: Norma Shearer - The Divorcee*Best Actor: George Arliss - Disraeli...
) is a
mystery filmMystery film is a sub-genre of the more general category of crime film. It focuses on the efforts of the Detective, private investigator or amateur sleuth to solve the mysterious circumstances of a crime by means of clues, investigation, and clever deduction....
directed by
Roland WestRoland West was a Hollywood director known for his innovative film noir movies of the 1920s and early 1930s.-Biography:...
, produced by Joseph M. Schenck, and released by
United ArtistsUnited Artists Entertainment LLC is an American film studio. The current United Artists was formed in November 2006 under a partnership between producer/actor Tom Cruise and his production partner, Paula Wagner, and Metro–Goldwyn–Mayer Studios Inc., an MGM company...
. It is the second film based on the 1920 hit
BroadwayBroadway Theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, is the theatre associated with the 40 large professional theaters with 500 seats or more located in the Theatre District, New York in Manhattan, New York City...
play
The Bat by
Mary Roberts RinehartMary Roberts Rinehart was a prolific author often called the American Agatha Christie. She is considered the source of the phrase "The butler did it", although she did not actually use the phrase herself, and also considered to have invented the "Had-I-But-Known" school of mystery...
and
Avery HopwoodAvery Hopwood , who was born in Cleveland and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Michigan , was one of the most successful playwrights of the Jazz Age, having four plays running simultaneously on Broadway in 1920.Hopwood started out as a journalist for a Cleveland newspaper as its New...
. The first film version of the play,
The BatThe Bat is a silent film based on the 1920 hit Broadway play by Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopwood, directed by Roland West and starring Jack Pickford and Louise Fazenda. The story takes place in an old mansion, where people look for hidden loot while a caped killer murders them one by one...
(1926), was also directed by Roland West. Just as in the play and the first film, people explore an old mansion looking for a hidden treasure while a caped killer picks them off one by one.
It was one of the first films to be shot in
widescreenA widescreen image is a film, computer or television image with a wider and shorter aspect ratio than the standard Academy frame developed during the classical Hollywood cinema era. Silent film was projected at a ratio of four units wide to three units tall, often expressed as 4:3 or 1.33:1...
format in the early days of sound.
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The Bat Whispers (
1930-Top grossing films:-Academy Awards:*Best Picture: All Quiet on the Western Front - Universal Studios*Best Actress: Norma Shearer - The Divorcee*Best Actor: George Arliss - Disraeli...
) is a
mystery filmMystery film is a sub-genre of the more general category of crime film. It focuses on the efforts of the Detective, private investigator or amateur sleuth to solve the mysterious circumstances of a crime by means of clues, investigation, and clever deduction....
directed by
Roland WestRoland West was a Hollywood director known for his innovative film noir movies of the 1920s and early 1930s.-Biography:...
, produced by Joseph M. Schenck, and released by
United ArtistsUnited Artists Entertainment LLC is an American film studio. The current United Artists was formed in November 2006 under a partnership between producer/actor Tom Cruise and his production partner, Paula Wagner, and Metro–Goldwyn–Mayer Studios Inc., an MGM company...
. It is the second film based on the 1920 hit
BroadwayBroadway Theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, is the theatre associated with the 40 large professional theaters with 500 seats or more located in the Theatre District, New York in Manhattan, New York City...
play
The Bat by
Mary Roberts RinehartMary Roberts Rinehart was a prolific author often called the American Agatha Christie. She is considered the source of the phrase "The butler did it", although she did not actually use the phrase herself, and also considered to have invented the "Had-I-But-Known" school of mystery...
and
Avery HopwoodAvery Hopwood , who was born in Cleveland and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Michigan , was one of the most successful playwrights of the Jazz Age, having four plays running simultaneously on Broadway in 1920.Hopwood started out as a journalist for a Cleveland newspaper as its New...
. The first film version of the play,
The BatThe Bat is a silent film based on the 1920 hit Broadway play by Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopwood, directed by Roland West and starring Jack Pickford and Louise Fazenda. The story takes place in an old mansion, where people look for hidden loot while a caped killer murders them one by one...
(1926), was also directed by Roland West. Just as in the play and the first film, people explore an old mansion looking for a hidden treasure while a caped killer picks them off one by one.
It was one of the first films to be shot in
widescreenA widescreen image is a film, computer or television image with a wider and shorter aspect ratio than the standard Academy frame developed during the classical Hollywood cinema era. Silent film was projected at a ratio of four units wide to three units tall, often expressed as 4:3 or 1.33:1...
format in the early days of sound. For many years, it was believed that no complete copy of
The Bat Whispers existed. However, in the late 1990s a widescreen print was discovered and subsequently restored by the
UCLA Film and Television ArchiveThe UCLA Film and Television Archive is an internationally-renowned visual arts organization focused on the preservation, study, and appreciation of film and television, based at the University of California, Los Angeles. It holds more than 220,000 film and television titles and 27 million feet of...
.
This film was remade again in 1959 as
The BatThe Bat is a mystery film directed by Crane Wilbur, and co-starring Vincent Price and Agnes Moorehead. Its tagline was "When it flies, someone dies!" The film was based on the 1920 Broadway play by Avery Hopwood and Mary Roberts Rinehart, which was previously filmed as The Bat and as The Bat...
with
Vincent PriceVincent Leonard Price II was an American actor, well known for his distinctive voice and serio-comic attitude in a series of horror films made in the latter part of his career.-Early life and career:...
.
Cast
- Chester Morris
John Chester Brooks Morris was an American actor, perhaps most famous for his role in the Boston Blackie detective series of the 1940s...
as Detective Anderson
- Chance Ward as Police lieutenant
- Una Merkel
Una Merkel was an American film actress.Merkel resembled the popular actress Lillian Gish, and her resemblance allowed her to begin her career as a stand-in for Gish in 1920's Way Down East...
as Dale Van Gorder
- Richard Tucker
Richard Tucker , was an American actor. He appeared in 266 films between 1911 and 1940.He was born in Brooklyn, New York, New York and died in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles from a heart attack.-Selected filmography:...
as Mr. Bell
- Wilson Benge
Wilson Benge was an English actor who mostly featured in American films from the silent days.Along with actors Charles Coleman and Robert Greig,...
as The Butler
- Maude Eburne
Maude Eburne was a Canadian character actress of stage and screen, known for playing eccentric roles. Born in Bronte-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada, she studied elocution in Toronto. Her early theater work was in Ontario and New York, debuting on Broadway to great acclaim as "Coddles" in the 1914...
as Lizzie Allen
- William Bakewell
William Bakewell , also known as Billy Bakewell, was an American actor, who achieved his greatest fame as one of the premiere juvenile performers of the late 1920s and early 1930s.-Life and career:...
as Brook
- DeWitt Jennings
DeWitt Jennings , was an American film actor. He appeared in 153 films between 1915 and 1937.He was born in Cameron, Missouri and died in Hollywood, California.-Selected filmography:* Little Man, What Now?...
as Police captain
- Sidney D'Albrook as Police sergeant
- S. E. Jennings as Man in black mask
- Grayce Hampton as Cornelia van Gorder
- Spencer Charters
Spencer Charters was an American film actor. He appeared in over 220 films between 1920 and 1943.He was born in Duncannon, Pennsylvania, and died in Hollywood, California by suicide, from a mix of sleeping pills and carbon monoxide poisoning.- Selected filmography :* Silver Queen * The Boys from...
as the Caretaker
- Gustav von Seyffertitz
Gustav von Seyffertitz was a German film actor and director. He appeared in 118 films between 1917 and 1939.He was born in Haimhausen, Bavaria and died in Los Angeles, California, aged 81.-Selected filmography:...
as Dr. Venner
- Hugh Huntley as Richard Fleming
- Charles Dow Clark as Detective Jones