jaydeetee-19255 During Prohibition, Gold Velvet Beer was a big seller, along with being darn right illegal. But when the Prohibition laws were repealed the beer sales hit rock bottom. The brewery owner, Remy Marco (Edward G. Robinson), can't quite understand why the bar owners (who earlier gladly stocked his beer) refused to continue purchasing his product ('taste the beer Remy, taste it').He asks the brewery's 'managerial team'(a bunch of stumble-bum hoods)to get him the answer to the sudden turn of events ('taste the beer Remy, taste it'). Oh, they know the answer but are afraid to tell the big boss.Marco is forced to sell off all his assets and go into debt to keep the brewery afloat. With only days remaining before the banks would call in his loans, Marco takes his family (along with his 'managerial team') to Saratoga, hoping to get new financial backing. Along the way, he stops at an orphanage to pick-out an orphan, one who would be treated with a short vacation with the Marco family.Once the Marco's and company finally reach Saratoga, things go from bad to worse. The orphan is played by a young Bobby Jordan, one of the early Eastside Kids...and he is a handful...a laugh-out-loud handful. And dead bodies start showing up everywhere, all while poor Remy is desperately trying to get that financial backing.Remy may not have enjoyed the ensuing events, but I sure did...I'm giving it '9 Gold Velvets'...'taste the beer Remy...taste it'

Edgar Allan Pooh . . . makes a nice companion piece to KIDNAPPING MR. HEINEKEN, which I saw a couple weeks ago. In A SLIGHT CASE OF MURDER, Edward G. Robinson's "Gold Velvet Beer" tastes almost as bad as Heineken's. Unlike his Dutch counterpart, Robinson's "Remy Marco" character realizes that brewers of cheap, yucky, vomit-inducing beer require the priciest bodyguards money can buy IF they wish to walk around as free men. When a gang of five lies in wait for Remy, all of them get shot (and four of them die). When a gang of five kidnaps Mr. Heineken for weeks on end, no one gets shot. As Remy says, "Drink Gold Velvet--it's the tops!" Pabst has the Blue Ribbon, and Budweiser is the King of Beers. (Plus, you don't want to mess around with people surrounded by Clydesdales!) It's all enough to make Heineken green with envy.

mark.waltz This is a great spoof of the Edward G. Robinson crime dramas, first given laughs in 1933's "The Little Giant" (a forgotten gem.) He is a former bootlegger who can't believe that no one will buy his beer, which he later discovers is disgusting. Ruth Donnelly is his low-class wife living a high-class existence, and is hysterical. It's great to see this wonderful Warner Brothers character actress from the early 30's finally getting a part to sink her teeth into. She is what Helen Broderick was to RKO. I would have loved to see them play sisters. (Think Elaine Stritch and Eileen Heckart, or Joan Blondell and Ann Sothern together....Similar enough to be siblings, but different enough to be individuals.) Ms. Donnelly gets more to do than the top-billed female lead Jane Bryan, then being groomed by Warners to take over the type of parts that Jean Muir used to play. The basic premise has them moving to the country with orphan Bobby Watson (their guest for the summer) and dealing with other gangsters who have hidden a stash of cash in the mansion. Watson, unfortunately, isn't seen enough; It would be like one of the Dead End Kids interacting with the veteran gangster (as the DE Kids did with Cagney and Bogart), and the passing of the torch. Still, the dialogue is typically Runyon-esquire (think "Guys and Dolls" and "The Big Street" set in the country), but not quite "Capra-Corn" either. Allen Jenkins is typically amusing as Robinson's major sidekick. Willard Parker is the police officer engaged to Bryan whom Robinson keeps trying to get rid of. Margaret Hamilton has a great part as the principal of Watson's school. Toss in character names like Sad Sam, No-Nose Cohen and Blackhat Gallagher, and you've got a period comedy that they don't make anymore. Warners later remade this as a musical "Stop! You're Killing Me!" with Broderick Crawford and Claire Trevor in the Robinson/Donnelly roles which isn't bad, but catch the original first.

bkoganbing A Slight Case of Murder had its origins on the Broadway stage where this play by Damon Runyon and Howard Lindsay flopped miserably with only 69 performances in the 1935 season. It certainly adapted better for the screen when Warner Brothers bought it for one of their gangster stable, in this case Edward G. Robinson.The story concerns a gangster Remy Marko who is trying to go straight and get out of the bootleg beer racket now that Prohibition has been repealed. It was a problem faced by any number of people who were not Lucky Luciano or Meyer Lansky.In Robinson's case he's decided to go legitimate and brew beer legally. Of course no one has the heart to tell him that the stuff he's been peddling for years has been nothing but swill, not even his family, Ruth Donnelly and Jane Bryan, nor his closest associates Allen Jenkins, Harold Huber, and Ed Brophy. While all this is going Robinson and the family and friends go to his summer home near the Saratoga racetrack where a big robbery of the bookie's money has taken place. This was in the days before the para-mutual machines and track bets were taken at the sight by legal bookmakers. The gang decides to hide out in what they think will be Robinson's deserted home.Daughter Jane Bryan is romancing state trooper Willard Parker, a prospect the going straight Robinson still finds appalling. No less so than Paul Harvey, Parker's nervous blue-blood father. All these elements mix well for a very funny screen comedy. Robinson who was really getting tired of all the gangster parts, seems to be enjoying himself, referring to himself constantly in the third person, and earning quite a few laughs and keeping up with some of the best scene stealers around. Ruth Donnelly keeps up very well who most of the time remembers she's now supposed to be respectable, but every so often slips back to her familiar background.The guy who really is funny here is Paul Harvey. He's mixing with people he's not used to and it's putting quite an evident strain on him. One of the running gags in A Slight Case of Murder is how bad the beer Robinson makes. He never drinks himself so he doesn't know and no one is brave enough to tell him. Damon Runyon who probably sampled every kind of illegal liquor available during Prohibition, knew well the kind of rot gut that was peddled. The classier places imported stuff from across the border, but the dives used whatever they could get. Marko's lousy beer was something drinking people during Prohibition knew well from. A Slight Case of Murder is one of the few films that ever dealt with that fact albeit in a comic way.Though the plot situations are certainly dated, the talent of this very good cast is timeless.