TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Adeel Hail Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Hitchcoc This is one of those eleventh hour, he's going to be executed, thrillers. A man who spent time in prison is railroaded for murder. Somehow, his fingerprints were found at the scene and he has been sentenced to die. His daughter knows her father and because his alibi can't be confirmed, there is little hope. Charlie comes to the rescue. He can't resist a pretty face. Soon he is embroiled in an effort to find out how to leave false fingerprints. As is usually the case, Birmingham Brown and Tommy Chan do everything they can to mess up the case. I suppose if these were serious mysteries, their actions would be deplorable. Mantan Moreland gets tons of screen time, and though he represents a black stereotype, he is really quite funny. The best is when he encounters his friend played by Ben Carson and they do their famous vaudeville bit. This is pretty entertaining and allows for levity. The last minute is a lot of fun.

Panamint Usually films with this much activity are cluttered and over- plotted, but it all works reasonably well in "Dark Alibi". It needed padding but rather than slow it down, the producers wisely just kept adding filler bits, so there is a lot going on. The film's basic frame-up concept is good. The police, warden, prosecutor are blended and balanced expertly by the director to advance the plot.Teala Loring is attractive and a good actress, well suited for this b-movie. The old gent who portrays her father does a good job, too. I can live without the Birmingham and Benjamin corny old vaudeville bit but it was popular in the 1940's era and it is a better filler for padding purposes than most routines (filler was probably necessary due to Toler's health). Benson Fong is inconsequential, he just moves along and tries to keep up with the pace. Janet Shaw delivers one of her insouciant tough girl performances that always keep her watchable in films.Sidney Toler gets the job done but he really looks ill at times. He manages valiantly to stay active enough to stride across a room now and then, but he is sitting down in some scenes, obviously for health reasons.Good work by the director, good red herrings, and lots of somewhat overloaded activity provide us with an OK low budget b-movie in "Dark Alibi".

tavm This is my twelfth review of a Charlie Chan movie in series chronological order on these consecutive days. In this one, a man who's been out of prison for twenty years is suddenly arrested for a recent robbery at a bank he claims he's never set foot in. His daughter and lawyer are on the verge of giving up until Charlie overhears and offers his services...Directed by Phil Karlson who had previously helmed The Shanghai Cobra, he once again provides an exciting beginning and ending sequence for a Chan entry. While I admit to not understanding everything that is going on concerning the case, it was still interesting to hear Charlie's analysis, as always. And despite the now-not-very-acceptable stereotype of a scared black man with bulging eyes in these modern times, Mantan Moreland is still funny to me when he does what he does here. His comedy is perfectly aided, once again, by Benson Fong as "No. 3 Son" Tommy, and Ben Carter in a reprise of his and Mantan's "interrupted talk" from The Scarlet Clue. Even Charlie joins in this routine at the end. Incidentally, Carter would pass away not long after appearing here. Good atmospheric touches throughout. So on that note, I recommend Dark Alibi. P.S. Joyce Compton, who's Emily Evans here, was a native of Lexington, Ky. where I lived as a child from 1974-75 during which my youngest sister was born. Ray Walker, who's Danvers here, was another character actor who appeared in my favorite movie-It's a Wonderful Life-as Joe, a luggage handler who gives the adult George Bailey his suitcase with his name on it as we see James Stewart as the lead character for the first time. Also, on a personal note, I started watching these Monogram Chan movies (usually starring Roland Winters) on my local station here in Baton Rouge on Channel 2, WBRZ-TV, in the late '70s during the late night lineup of movies on Saturday morning on "Charlie Chan Cinema". The wraparound open and closing sequence had someone banging a gong before we dolly to a silhouette of a Chinese man speaking in Pidgin English introducing the movie and mentioning the next week's title, respectively, while the country's type of music played in the background. Actually, since we only see his shadow, I don't know if he was actually Asian or some other race but that was my memory of that sequence...

jknoppow A bank is robbed, and a guard is shot to death. Clues lead the police to the Foss Family Hotel where we meet a varied group of unsavory suspects.Thomas Harley, who resides at the hotel along with his beautiful daughter June, is the one that the police are after-- it was his fingerprints left on the safe that led the police to the hotel.He claims that he was locked up in a theatrical warehouse, but he has no witnesses. Even more suspicious is his story that he had received a letter from a man he hadn't seen for many years, asking him to a meeting at the warehouse; but the prosecutor can prove that the man had been dead for eight years.Chan thinks the set-up is much too pat, and he doesn't give up on Mr. Harley when Harley's daughter June makes an appeal to him to help free her innocent dad. But how can he account for those fingerprints?