Charlie Chan: TCM Spotlight (Dark Alibi / Dangerous Money / The Trap / The Chinese Ring) (4-DVD)

This 4-DVD collection of Charlie Chan pictures includes:

• Dark Alibi (1946), starring Sidney Toler, Benson Fong and Mantan Moreland.
• Dangerous Money (1946), starring Sidney Toler, Gloria Warren and Victor Sen Yung.
• The Trap (1946), starring Sidney Toler, Mantan Moreland and Victor Sen Yung.
• The Chinese Ring (1947), starring Roland Winters, Warren Douglas and Mantan Moreland.

Over the years, many different distinguished actors portrayed writer Earl Derr Biggers's fictional Chinese detective Charlie Chan, in a series of features that extended from the 1920s into the late 1990s. The majority of the Chan films, however, emerged in the 1930s and '40s. This collection from the Turner Classic Movies cable network presents four memorable Chan movies, originally released between 1946 and 1947. It begins with the 1946 DARK ALIBI, with Sidney Toler starring as Chan, in a story that finds the detective racing against time to prevent the execution of a Death Row inmate. The second feature, 1946's DANGEROUS MONEY, again stars Toler in the tale of Chan investigating a homicide on an ocean cruise to Samoa. The third film, also from 1946 and entitled THE TRAP, stars Toler (in his last portrayal of Chan) in a story involving the murder of Malibu showgirls. Finally, 1947's THE CHINESE RING witnesses the debut of Roland Winters as Chan, in a story that involves the murder of a famous Chinese princess in Chan's house.