TWENTY PLUS TWO (1961)

Quintessential ‘60s tv actor David (THE FUGITIVE) Janssen (make that Quinn Martin-sential) was just coming off three seasons as Richard Diamond PRIVATE EYE when he returned to the big screen for this nonessential second-feature.  Janssen, in a lot of theatrically released films considering his prolific tv output and early death at 48, somehow made no impression on big screen, as if he shrunk in reverse proportion to image size.*  (On the other hand, a case can be made for SHOES OF THE FISHERMAN/’68 as the worst of all big-budget films.  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2008/06/shoes-of-fisherman-1968.html)  In this Missing Persons Mystery, he’s at pains to tell us he’s not a P.I., but a Missing Heirs investigator.  Currently on the hunt for a daughter not seen in twenty years.  Dead?  Hiding?  Living abroad under an assumed name?  Pulp-scripter/producer Frank Gruber seems convinced he’s got a MALTESE FALCON on his hands: the lying dame; the mysterious fat man; Janssen as low-rent Bogart.  (All those cigarettes.)  And in its cheap manner, it’s sort of fun for a while.  (It’d be more fun if the tv-standard compressed grey-scale weren’t used on the light-flooded sets.)  Listen out for composer Gerald Fried swinging for the fences with unmotivated blasts of faux Henry Mancini cool jazz.)  With second-billed Jeanne Crain gone from the film by the last act.  Dull Dina Merrill stepping in.  William Demerest, Brad Dexter, Agnes Moorehead & Robert Strauss make paycheck appearances, but not much journeyman helmer Joseph M. Newman can do with the coincidences that pass for a plot.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID:  *Perhaps it’s something about Janssen’s concentration, as if he’s running out of gas and on the lookout for an Exit Ramp and a place to refuel.  Breaks provided by Quinn Martin Productions which were always divided its shows into four acts and an epilogue.