Three detectives in the corrupt and brutal L.A. police force of the 1950s use differing methods to uncover a conspiracy behind the shotgun slayings of the patrons at an all-night diner.
Harper is a cynical private eye in the best tradition of Bogart. He even has Bogie's Baby hiring him to find her missing husband, getting involved along the way with an assortment of unsavory characters and an illegal-alien smuggling ring.
Lila, a famous retired singer, loses her memory after suffering an accident, just as she planned her return to the stage.
A French diplomat who's recovered from amnesia is blackmailed over crimes he can't remember.
An investigator for the District Attorney's office quits to open his own detective agency. However, business is so bad that he finally decides to give it up and go back to his old job. As his wife is at his office closing up, a wealthy society matron walks in with a case: she wants to know if her husband is having an affair with his ex-girlfriend, who is now married. The wife accepts what looks to be an easy case, figuring than she can then persuade her husband to re-start the agency. However, when the client's husband is found murdered, she decides to investigate the murder herself. Her husband has also been assigned by the D.A. to investigate the murder, and he doesn't know that his wife is also on the case. Complications ensue.
A diamond is stolen at a houseboat party given by the district attorney. He gives the thief a chance to return it by putting an empty box on a table and turning out the lights. When the lights are turned back on the box is gone, and the district attorney has a knife in his back and is quite dead. The police and the coroner arrive. There are several attempts made on the life of the coroner. Ruth Whitman is found hiding in a grandfather-clock, holding the gem box. She claims the box was pushed into her hands and she was pushed into the clock. The district attorney's butler/valet tells the coroner he saw who killed his employer and a few minutes later he is also murdered. The mystery deepens.
Philo Vance investigates when a murderer preys upon members of a wealthy family on New York's Upper East Side.
A secretary (Gloria Stuart) solves a murder for her boyfriend (Michael Whalen) in the district attorney's office.
A lawyer is framed for the murder of a young party girl and tries to clear his name.
A beautiful showgirl, name "the Canary" is a scheming nightclub singer. Blackmailing is her game and with that she ends up dead. But who killed "the Canary". All the suspects knew and were used by her and everyone had a motive to see her dead. The only witness to the crime has also been 'rubbed out'. Only one man, the keen, fascinating, debonair detective Philo Vance, would be able to figure out who is the killer.
A retiring detective tries to discover the identity of a half charred woman found in front of a District Attorney's boat who is pursuing a child serial killer.
Dan Adams resigns his position as prosecutor on the district attorney's staff and sets out to clean up a gang of fake-accident racketeers. He gets a job with an insurance company, and assures the company president he will get the goods on the gang or die in the attempt. At the company offices, he meets Carol Carter and she, believing he is a shyster (possibly redundant) lawyer in the employ of the racketeers gives him as little help as possible. Dan visits his brother Eddie, who is mixed up with the gang and tries to make him break away. Eddie is belligerent but finally, because of the pressure brought by Dan and his wife Tonia, agrees to go straight. The gang, led by "Duke" Trotti, fears he will squeal and they kill him, plus they make his death look like an accident and plan to collect on it. Dan is closing in on the gang when Carol, who is now his assistant, comes up with some conclusive evidence, but "Duke" has plans to get rid of her before she can give the information to Dan.
This primarily two-set programmer has a has-been criminal lawyer, Anthony Sommers (William V. Mong) wrongly accused of murder and follows the efforts of his daughter, Molly Sommers (Dorothy Revier), a nightclub singer and two newspapers reporters, Ted Palmer (David Newell) and the inaptly-named Drinkwater (Raymond Hatton), posing as a drunk, to clear him.
A series of ghastly murders are being committed. The one similarity in each of the murders is that a strange buzzing sound is always heard right before the murder occurs. Is the killer invisible or possibly some other incredible creature?
A police detective finds himself entangled in the web of the underworld when he falls in love with a nightclub singer accused of murdering a crooked lawyer.
Cleve Marshall, an assistant district attorney, falls for Thelma Jordon, a mysterious woman with a troubled past. When Thelma becomes a suspect in her aunt's murder, Cleve tries to clear her name.
In New York City, a bank robbery of $300,000 goes unsolved for a year, until some of the marked bills are found in a Los Angeles drugstore theft. Police detectives Cal Bruner and Jack Farnham investigate and are led from the drugstore to a nightclub, where singer Lilli is another recipient of a stolen bill. With Lilli's help, the partners track down the remaining money, but both Lilli and Jack are dismayed when Cal decides he wants to keep part of it.
Phil and Claire Foster fear that their mild-mannered relationship may be falling into a stale rut. During their weekly date night, their dinner reservation leads to their being mistaken for a couple of thieves—and now a number of unsavoury characters want Phil and Claire killed.
Bud and Lou are the owners of the amusement park Kiddieland. Bud, a compulsive gambler, gets in trouble with the mob, and Lou finds himself struggling to keep his adopted children. When Bud is forced to make a shady deal, Lou tries to arrange a deal with the DA, but winds up framed for murder.
A legal secretary with a loving family who is happily engaged to a successful young attorney receives a surprise visit from her bad-news former boyfriend, a jewel thief just released on parole who has no intention of going straight. The visit triggers a series of events resulting in a trial for attempted murder.