Nancy Drew: Troubleshoot and The Hidden Staircase (1939)

There were two more movies starring Bonita Granville as Nancy Drew from 1939.  I liked the first one, Detective, ok but the rest quickly got on my nerves.  Nancy is an idiot, Carson Drew is overbearing and mean, the police chief is a condescending ass, and there is no Hannah or Bess or George.  Though I really like the Ted Nickerson character for some reason.  The resemblance to the books is negligible.  Normally, I like old movies and can make allowances for certain eccentricities of the time period, but not these.  While not the worst movies ever, I found myself saying Nancy Drew you are an idiot over and over and I'm not happy about that.


Nancy Drew: Troubleshooter
Nancy goes with her father to help out an old friend who has been accused of murder.  She meets up with Ted who is down at the lake with his family.  Of course, she ropes him into helping her solve the mystery and clear her family friend's name.  Of all the movies, this was my least favorite.  Nancy is most annoying and she is mean to Ted and there is the casual racism of this era on display in the character of Apollo, the handyman on the farm.  I hate seeing African-American characters like this.  It is one of the main reason I didn't like this movie.

Nancy Drew: The Hidden Staircase
While you would think that this would have some relation to the book it is titled after, you would be wrong.  There are two sisters named Turnbull and that's about where the similarities end.  Because of some weird stipulation in their father's will, at least one of the sisters has to spend every night in the house for 20 years before they own it.  Nancy sticks her nose where it doesn't belong when a man is murdered at the Turnbull's place.  She blatantly meddles in a police "investigation" when she makes Ted write a suicide note so the sisters will stay in their mansion and not give up their eligibility to outright own it and then give it up for a children's hospital.  She gets Ted in trouble a whole lot and, in the end, he is the one who rescues them both with his cleverness.

cross posted The Little Bookworm