The Falcon's Adventure

Tom Conway plays The Falcon , a womanising adventurer with a taste for the high life of night clubs ,fast cars and daring do .He comes to the rescue of a young woman --played by Madge Meredith-who has been entrusted with the formula for synthetic diamonds , invented by her father .The bad guys want the formula and only The Falcon's intervention prevents them from abducting her . They do succeed in killing her father and framing the Falcon for the crime however .He obtains the formula and sets out by train to Miami where he proposes to hand it over to a trusted friend of the inventor .The bad guys try to steal it en route without success and there are further deaths before the lively fist fight climax on board a yacht where Ms Meredith is incarcerated , It passes the time well enough but there is one ludicrous bit of plotting involving an alligator farm ,that is an insult to the intelligence .Get past that and you might well enjoy this vintage B picture . The acting might politely be described as functional

It was the last of the Falcon movies leaving Dick Tracy as the only celluloid sleuth from RKO studios

This is the thirteenth Falcon film. Tom Conway has lost none of his humour and style, and is not showing signs of getting tired. The film has a very satisfying story, with lots of red herrings, suspects, and dames. Madge Meredith is the good girl of the story, she plays it adequately but by no means sets the screen on fire. Myrna Dell is a bad girl, and she puts on an excellent face of stone, with eyes of agate, and you are just waiting for her to kill as many people as possible to cheer herself up. Edward Brophy is back as Goldie the sidekick, but surprise surprise, his manic over-acting has stopped, and he is actually under control. This is a fine tribute to the directorial skills of William A. Berke, who had done so many Westerns he probably was not prepared to take any nonsense from a Brooklyn dummy. The result is that for the first time, possibly in his career, Brophy was toned down enough actually to add something to a film rather than try the viewer's patience with the irritating behaviour of a retarded but unruly six year-old. It all goes along very well, and is thoroughly entertaining.

The Falcon RKO film series is mostly very enjoyable, with both George Sanders and his brother Tom Conway who took over from him being great in the title role.

Reiterating somewhat what has already been said in my previous Falcon film reviews (due to that a fair few have similar strengths and flaws), admittedly, some are better than others. For examples there are some particularly fun entries such as 'The Gay Falcon', 'A Date with the Falcon', 'The Falcon Strikes Back', 'The Falcon and the Co-eds', 'The Falcon in Hollywood' and 'The Falcon in San Francisco', while others while still very much watchable disappoint a little such 'The Falcon's Brother', 'The Falcon in Danger', 'The Falcon Out West' and 'The Falcon in Mexico'.

On the most part, while not fitting among either extreme of whether among the best or weakest Falcon films, 'The Falcon's Adventure' is solid fun and works well. It is agreed that 'The Falcon's Adventure' does start off a little contrived and routine, that the ending is rushed and abrupt (not an uncommon problem in this series, due to the films being very short) and that the villains are not that memorable or interesting with little menace.

Much can be recommended however. The music is lively and haunting, and on the most part the production values are slick and atmospheric with particularly nicely done photography and eye catching fashions and cars. The script is humorous, there is a good deal of atmosphere and intrigue and the story is absorbing once it gets going with bright and breezy pacing and enough twists, turns and suspense to keep the mystery diverting. Direction is competent.

Conway, in his swansong performance in the title role, is dapper, suave and charismatic, uttering cutting lines with aplomb. Edward Brophy is amusing, and gives a performance not out of control or too low-key, while Madge Meredith allures in her charming if standard role. The cast generally are solid enough.

In summary, Conway's swansong in the Falcon series is a good, solid one. 7/10 Bethany Cox

BBC2 have been showing several Falcon movies recently in the afternoons and I have taped most of them. They are worth having as they are not available on VHS or DVD anywhere. The Falcon's Adventure was the 13th and final Falcon movie.

In this one, The Falcon rescues a woman from kidnappers who want her father's secret formula for making diamonds but he gets blamed for his murder. The pair of them then flee to Florida where he gets blamed for another murder! He is cleared at the end though.

Tom Conway plays the Falcon well and is joined in this one by Madge Meredith, Edward Brophy and Ian Wolfe.

Though not brilliant, This and all of the Falcon movies are worth watching and are not too long either.

Rating: 3 stars out of 5.

Both the Falcon series and the Boston Blackie series are guilty of re-using a plot more than once - I wouldn't be surprised if that were true of many series.

In this one, the MacGuffin is the formula for industrial diamonds which I am pretty sure was used before. The Falcon (Tom Conway) saves a kidnapped woman and winds up being framed for the murder of her uncle, who owns the formula and is trying to get it to someone in Miami that has arranged for backers.

Some clever moments, one regarding a blonde the Falcon saves from someone harassing her on the train.

Tom Conway does a good job - it was his last foray as the Falcon. He's charming, but this wasn't very exciting.

Of interest, pretty Madge Meredith's career was derailed a bit when she was sentenced to five years in prison on an assault charge - it turned out that in fact she had been framed and was released. She worked into the '60s.