NAVY SPY. Grand National Pictures, 1937. Conrad Nagel, Eleanor Hunt, Judith Allen, Jack Doyle, Phil Dunham, Don Barclay, Howard Lang, Crauford Kent. Directors: Crane Wilbur & Joseph H. Lewis (the latter uncredited and unconfirmed, according to IMDb).

   According to the American Film Institute, Joseph Lewis was the director of retakes. I haven’t checked it out any further than this, so if anyone knows more, you can tell me about it in the comments. The reason it is worth mentioning is that if so, this movie would be Lewis’s first director’s role.

   But it isn’t much of one, I have to admit, the movie, I mean. I enjoyed Yellow Cargo, the first of four low-budget films starring Conrad Nagel and Eleanor Hunt as a pair of federal agents.

   In that one their task was bringing to justice an illegal immigrant racket, and reviewed here, but while the two stars do their best, there’s not much they can do with a story as weak as this one is, the second in the series.

   Which has to do with a scientist with a formula for a new advanced fuel, for airplanes, I believe, who is lured off a ship by a femme fatale and straight into the arms of a gang of bad guys. Problem is, the formula exists only in the head of the kidnapped scientist, and nothing is going to make him talk. And what kind of security would allow a note from the lady to be brought in, and the doctor be allowed to walk right off the boat?

   Part of what was intended to make this amusing and fun to watch is that Nagel’s character is determined to keep Hunt’s character off the case, simply because she’s female. Bobbie Reynolds is not a woman to be denied easily, however, and at every stage of the way, she’s there before Alan Reynolds (Nagel) or just behind him, ready and able to lend more than moral support.

   But otherwise the chase is dull and uninteresting, and not even the witty byplay between the two leads can make a souffle out of nothing more than good wishes.