El club de medianoche

Cast and crew clearly had fun putting together this tale of a gang of ingenious jewel thieves in foggy London. A perfect pace keeps the action and humor flowing, and the cast is spot on.

Clive Brook, Helen Vinson and Alan Mowbray all play their own doubles as the gang who goes out on midnight runs to steal diamonds while their look-alikes stay at the night club under the watchful eye of the police. Sir Guy Standing is the frustrated commissioner who brings in George Raft as an undercover American cop to infiltrate the club and discover the secret of their success.

Humorous all around, and the construction of their hideout is brilliant with hidden doors and secret alarms. Of note are the special effects in the "doubles" scenes. We see this so frequently, and yet here in 1933, it becomes a fascinating piece of work, with actors handing objects to themselves in the split screen.

The cast already mentioned as well as Alison Skipworth as a potential victim of thievery are a kick. Raft is a wise guy and even briefly throws in a bit of the coin-flipping that made him famous. It's too bad the studio did not more fully explore the idea of him as an undercover cop in later films. As Sir Guy points out, no one would suspect a man with a face like that of being a detective. As one not familiar with Brook or Vinson, this was a delightful discovery in that regard as well.