The bunco squad deals with confidence tricksters and fraudsters. In this movie they are trying to bring down a big time phoney fortune telling racket. Robert Sterling was just finding his feet in better films (“Two Faced Woman” (1941) and “Johnny Eager” (1942)) when the war intervened and by the time he returned he was never able to regain his footing. Perhaps he was too much like William Lundigan. After a couple of roles in films like “Bunco Squad” he turned to television where he was in great demand. “Bunco Squad” was also one of Ricardo Cortez’s last appearances. He had a fantastic career going back to the silents, where he was the only actor whose name appeared above Garbo’s in a film. He never gave a bad performance.

Anthony Wells (Ricardo Cortez, doing what he does best!!!) is trying to get friendly with a rich widow, Mrs. Royce (Elisabeth Risdon), who is still grieving for her son Phillip, who was killed in the war. He tries through her secretary Barbara Madison (Marguerite Churchill) who is unaware of his connections. When she tries to warn the police – her car is in a mysterious accident and she is killed.

He brings in all his phoney fortune telling friends and they get to work on Mrs. Royce’s friends and servants who fill them in on Phillip’s young life. When Mrs Royce visits Princess Liane (Bernadene Hayes) she is able to tell Mrs Royce little stories about her son that the widow thought were known only to her. When persons unknown, tamper with Det. Steve Johnson’s brakes, he sends his long suffering girlfriend, Grace Bradshaw, undercover. She is an actress and her assignment is to pose as a phoney medium to lure the other “fakes” into a trap. Grace was played by the lovely Joan Dixon, in her first film appearance – unfortunately, she didn’t make many more!!!

I quite liked this movie – it is all about phoney fortune tellers – not the usual cops and robbers story. Dante the Great was a genuine magician who made an appearance as himself, in order to instruct Grace in the art of being a medium!!!