Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Derrick Gibbons An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Lela The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Scarlet The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Rainey Dawn All assassinations that happened in this "episode" happened over a diamond. Bulldog must find who is killing them.A real yawn. A very weak plot, poorly filmed. Nothing special, very average and basic. The plot is an over used plot that has nothing new to bring us to the table of 1930s crime films. How this one plays out is not all that grand either.Seems to me they could have put Bulldog in films that will bring a new story or at least find a good way to change up an over used plot to make it more interesting.I'm sorry but this one is the worst of all the 6 Bulldog films I have in the Mill Creek Mysteries 50-pack.1/10

blanche-2 Hugh Bulldog Drummond (John Howard) is about to marry his great love, Phyllis, when the wedding has to be delayed.One lovely wedding gift they received was a beautiful diamond, which turns out was created by the father of Phyllis' friend Gwen. He is very excited about presenting a paper at a conference and to be the first one who has created the gem. He's interested in credit, not money; in fact, he plans on giving the formula away.At the party to celebrate the upcoming nuptials is Sir Raymond Blantree, a jewel magnate. He wants the formula and Gwen's father, Professor Goodman to sink the invention before it wrecks the value of jewels everywhere. The oil companies have done this for years with alternate fuel patents.Professor Goodman isn't inclined to sell. Everybody wants this formula, and in fact, a detective at the party is found murdered as a result of the diamond itself being stolen. When Blantree finds out that Goodman is going to borrow equipment from a gemologist, Dr. Botulian, he devises a plan to steal the invention.Little does he know that Dr. Botulian has a plan of his own. Well, this is where the movie goes off the rails. Blantree is having someone impersonate Dr. Botulian and show up at 9 p.m. Botulian himself plans on showing up earlier. Unfortunately I just couldn't tell who was who and before you knew it, I was totally confused.John Howard is a dapper and charming Drummond, and Algy (Reginald Denny) and Tenney (E.E. Clive) are on hand to help him do what he can to catch the criminals. Not on board and mad as hell and not going to take it anymore is the Colonel (John Barrymore) who is sick of Drummond's machinations. He's great. Phyllis (Louise Campbell), who thought her future husband was retiring, at one point tells him she never wants to see him again. We know she doesn't mean it.Of course today we have all kinds of lab-created diamonds: Brilliant Earth, Moissanite, Affinity, etc. Brilliant Earth and Moissanite cost a fortune. I would have told Blantree, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

bkoganbing Another trip to the altar for Bulldog Drummond is averted when at a pre-wedding gathering in Switzerland a Swiss detective is murdered and an artificial diamond, courtesy of its inventor Halliwell Hobbes to bride and groom John Howard and Louise Campbell. That sets off a round of a little over an hour of fast paced adventure as Drummond once again shows up Scotland Yard.Bulldog Drummond's Peril steps into the realm of science fiction with Halliwell Hobbes inventing a machine that can create diamonds, a process we know takes millions of years of geologic pressure. The gizmo he has looks like it was made from spare parts in Dr. Frankenstein's laboratory.The film is blessed with two villains, industrialist Matthew Boulton and rival scientist Porter Hall both of whom want to get their hands on that formula and profit off it in some way. One way that wasn't even considered was that very few diamonds are used as jewelry. The majority are industrial strength and used for things like oil drill bits. A way to manufacture those babies on the cheap would yield someone a lot of money.John Barrymore plays the Scotland Yard inspector and by dint of his name is top billed over John Howard as Drummond. It's a sad come down for Barrymore who reminds me of J.D. Cannon as Chief Clifford in the McCloud series, the way Drummond constantly shows up the Yard. He also has a little bit of Perry White thrown in as he constantly is telling people 'don't call me inspector'.The science is a bit bizarre and the plot has way too many holes in it. If you're expecting something as good as when Ronald Colman was Bulldog Drummond, you won't find it here.

classicsoncall Miss Phyllis Clavering (Louise Campbell) is oh, so close to getting married to Captain Drummond this time out; they've made it all the way to the Clavering Villa in Geneva, Switzerland for the ceremony. However one of the wedding gifts gets it the way, a synthetic diamond that looks just like the real thing. It was made by Gwen Longworth's father, Professor Bernard Goodman (Halliwell Hobbes), and it appears so genuine, Sir Raymond Blantyre (Matthew Boulton) wants to steal it's secret formula to prevent the worldwide decline in value of real diamonds. I wonder what he would have thought of cubic zirconium? The plot relies on the theft of the fake diamond in the early going, though the whole lights out trick and murder of the detective assigned to guard the wedding presents seems to have been a bit much. Couldn't the bad guys have waited till everyone was asleep? Speaking of wedding presents, the Longworth penguin seemed a fitting touch. He winds up knocking over a statue of a cherub that Drummond and Tenny conspired to have fall victim to an accident.One of the highlights of the film is the rather elaborate looking lab used by Professor Goodman. There's a great long shot with a view of all the impressive equipment, with glowing tubes and sparking wires to lend credibility to the professor's experiments - Dr. Frankenstein would have been envious.The story may have taken on a bit too many twists and turns by the time it really got going in the second half. A rival scientist Dr. Botulian (Porter Hall) is introduced, performing the same kind of synthetic gem experiments as Goodman. His presence turns out to be a wedge between the original villains and good guys, hoping to cash in on the the whole fake diamond thing himself.Drummond's regulars are all on hand here. His associate Algy (Reginald Denny) doesn't have as much to do in this adventure, while butler Tenny's (E.E. Clive) role gets more physical. One of the more humorous scenes involves a frantic Tenny aboard a motor bike chasing down a van. Tenny must be in his sixties, but he's as agile as Yakima Canutt climbing aboard the speeding vehicle. John Barrymore reprises his role as Scotland Yard's Colonel Neilson, with repeated warnings to Drummond to mind his own business, and falling victim to a crooked tie gag twice.More so than most Drummond adventures, you'll really have to pay attention once the plot thickens with the real and fake Dr. Botulian. As usual, good guys and bad guys trade the upper hand repeatedly until Drummond's side achieves victory. The film probably could have used the penguin for a humorous send off, however by the time it's all over you get the feeling that Drummond and Miss Phyllis are one step closer to the altar.