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At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Probably the most interesting thing about this entry is a premise borrowed years later by 'Adam's Rib'; in the latter Spenser Tracey who has just lost a case in court to his wife and fellow lawyer Katherine Hepburn purports to shoot himself via a gun made of toffee (unknown to Hepburn and David Wayne who witness the scene) Hepburn begs him not to do it on the grounds that no one has such a right - a reverse stance from the one on which she won the case. In Midnight (the original title) a juryman more or less solely responsible for a guilty verdict and who lives by the tenet that justice is everything is faced with the fact that his own daughter, who has opposed his stance throughout, becomes a murderess herself on the very night the first woman is due to be electrocuted. Incredibly this was Bogie's twelfth movie and he had already appeared in better fare such as Three On A Match yet he is the least 'stagey' of the cast who were, in fact, all Broadway actors. The direction is trance-like, the acting stilted and the only reason to see it is if you happen to be a Bogie completist.

(There are Spoilers) " Call it Murder" is an overly sanctimonious film about how the justice system works only for the rich and well connected among us. As for those of us who're just barley making it in this cold cruel and unjust world tough luck and take whatever you can get, or not get, from the system if your to stand trail before it. This is what happens to housewife Ethel Saxton, Helen Flint, who was convicted for the murder of her philandering husband and is to be executed by the state at the stroke of "Midnight"; Which is the original title of the movie.As the minutes tick away until Ethel is strapped into the electric chair an unruly crowd assembles in front of the home of the jury foreman Edward Weldon, O.P Heggie, who was instrumental in convicting Ethel of first degree murder. Inside Weldon's house newsman Noland, Hery Hull, had got Weldon's sleazy son in-law Joe Bigger, Lynne Overman, to secretly help him install a radio broadcasting system to broadcast the reaction of Weldon and his family members as soon as the news of Ethel's execution is made public on the radio.Weldon's free spirited and ultra, or bleeding heart, liberal daughter Stella, Sidney Fox, always felt that Ethel Saxton was innocent in the murder of her husband since it was an crime of passion not premeditated murder. Stella is very much against what he father did in sending Ethel to the electric chair who's so strict in his views of law and order that he, in the way he talks, would even send a family member to death if in fact the law justifies it. By the time the movie ends Weldon would in fact get his chance to prove if his actions matches his words with his beloved daughter finding herself in the same situation that poor and condemned Ethel faces now with death just minutes away!***SPOILERS*** The film is about as convoluted as it can get in showing us how those like the well connected Edward Weldon can grease the wheels of justice to have things come out in his, or his family's, favor. With Weldon's daughter Stella openly admitting her responsibility for the murder of her hoodlum boyfriend Gan Boni, Humphrey Bogart, Weldon gets his good friend and city District Attorney Plunkett, Moffat Johnston, to make her change her mind with his usual shyster like double-talk and brain twisting psychological explanations that no one, not even Pluckett, could quite fully understand! This is the same Plunkett who's hair splitting and full of hot air shyster tactics, in reverse, sent the poor and knowing one one in high places, like Edward Weldon, Ethel Saxton straight to the Sing Sing electric chair!Even though future Hollywood superstar Humphrey Bogart was given top billing in the Video Tape release version of "Midnight", which was called "Call it Murder", his biggest contribution to the film was getting himself shot and killed off camera. Were in fact never shown who exactly rubbed Bogart, or Gar Boni, out but made to think that it was his girlfriend, whom he just dumped, Stella Weldon who did it. It's after Plunkett's long and confusing explanation of what were the circumstances that lead to Gar Boni's murder that you, as well as Stella and everyone else in the movie, aren't quite sure who did Gar Boni in! It may have even been the luckless Ethel Saxton who, despite being executed at the exact moment of Gar Boni's murder, somehow from beyond her grave, or the city morgue, got to him!

Midnight was a film shot in New York by a whole bunch of Broadway players who had nothing else to do during afternoons when there were no matinees. By coincidence nearly the whole cast went on to Hollywood and appeared in productions better than this.O.P. Heggie plays the foreman of a jury that convicted a woman of first degree murder, thereby advancing the career of the District Attorney. On the night that the convicted woman is to die, in fact at the stroke of midnight, Heggie's daughter, Sidney Fox, kills her gangster boyfriend Humphrey Bogart who's running out on her.It's a crime of passion, just like the one that Heggie and the jury he led convicted that other woman for. I don't want to spoil the ending of this film if you're interested in seeing it. Let us just say that a District Attorney is a good friend to have.Fans of Humphrey Bogart will of course want to see this. Right after this Bogey appeared in The Petrified Forest on Broadway and came to Hollywood to do the film version. The rest is history, but if Bogey hadn't scored such a hit in The Petrified Forest, Midnight might well have been his screen epitaph. What a horrible thought.

Based on an original Theater Guild production entitled "Midnight" (which is what the title of this movie was upon its initial release; it was later re-issued as "Call It Murder"), the interesting though far-fetched premise has a staunch, law-abiding jury foreman (O.P. Heggie) who once swayed a jury into giving a woman (Helen Flint) the death penalty for killing her boyfriend in an act of passion, now finding the same scenario rearing its ugly head in his own personal life. Unfortunately, this piece of hokum (which desires to call itself film-noir but I beg to differ) is woefully melodramatic and never finds any kind of selling point or payoff. What could have been a strong examination on the subject of capital punishment simply dissolves into a superficial piece of claptrap with indifferent directing, bad production values, overbaked acting, and a movie that moves at a snail's pace. As most of the proceedings happen in the home of the foreman, the whole movie has the claustrophobic feel of a staged play.As mentioned in other reviews posted, the package re-issued "Call It Murder" spotlights Humphrey Bogart as the star, but his part is at best a featured role. However, even in this secondary bit of casting, he easily outshines and outclasses the rest of the principals. Bogie, in his pre-stardom days, plays Gar Boni, a gangster about to go on the lam, who takes up with the jury foreman's daughter (Sidney Fox) and unknowingly ignites the deja vu proceedings.The movie sags and wilts any time Bogie isn't on screen. It also shows why he was a star in the making. His brief scenes, in which he both comes on to the girl and then gives her the brush off, are indicative of the style and 'stuff' that would make him a legend.However, there is simply nothing else to recommend. A tormented stentorian O.P. Heggie (later the hermit in "Bride of Frankenstein") gets to grandstand outrageously on his , and poor quivery-voiced Sydney Fox as his daughter and Bogie's overly smitten girlfriend falls into the sea of melodrama hook line and sinker. On a sad note, this proved to be one of Fox's last ingénue roles. Her career quickly disintegrated and she eventually committed suicide. The rest of the cast fails to register or inspire one way or the other.The movie goes from bad to worse when it takes a highly implausible Perry Mason-like twist at the end right in the living room. Well, suffice it to say, its all for naught. What might have been a better way to go would have been to throw out the script and focus instead on a Helen Flint's Death Row dame a la Susan Hayward in "I Want to Live." It might have made for better viewing.