Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise is a 1940 murder mystery film starring Sidney Toler in his fifth of many performances as Charlie Chan. It is based on the Earl Derr Biggers novel "Charlie Chan Carries On". The famed detective seeks to unmask a killer on a voyage across the Pacific Ocean. As has been mentioned elsewhere, this story is primarily a remake of the (now) lost movie, "Charlie Chan Carries On," (1931) starring Warner Oland. The story has been updated to include more Charlie, but it would be nice to have the missing movie to compare against.
Charlie Chan in an American film, a departure from the sinister East Asian stereotypes in earlier movies like "Thief of Baghdad" and "Welcome Danger", which incited riots that shut down the Shanghai theater showing it." Oland's visit to China was reported extensively in Chinese newspapers, and the actor was respectfully called "Mr. Chan". In Neil Simon's "Murder By Death", Peter Sellers plays a Chinese detective called Sidney Wang, a parody of Chan. In 1980, Jerry Sherlock began production on a comedy film to be called "Charlie Chan and the Dragon Lady". A group calling itself C.A.N. (Coalition of Asians to Nix) was