Best Thriller Movies of 1936

Gabby, the waitress in an isolated Arizona diner, dreams of a bigger and better life. One day penniless intellectual Alan drifts into the joint and the two strike up a rapport. Soon enough, notorious killer Duke Mantee takes the diner's inhabitants hostage. Surrounded by miles of desert, the patrons and staff are forced to sit tight with Mantee and his gang overnight.

After three British agents are assigned to assassinate a mysterious German spy during World War I, two of them become ambivalent when their duty to the mission conflicts with their consciences.

When a friend of Charlie's is found kicked to death by his own race horse on board a Honolulu-bound liner, the detective discovers foul play and uncovers an international gambling ring.

Allen Colby, heir to a huge fortune, is presumed drowned after an ocean liner sinks off the coast of Honolulu. Mysteriously, Colby reappears at his mansion only to be murdered soon after. When his body is discovered during a seance, everyone in attendance becomes a suspect, and it's up to Chan to find the murderer before he or she strikes again.

A dangerous amnesiac escapes from an asylum, hides in the opera house, and is suspected of getting revenge on those who tried to murder him 13 years ago.

After Police Captain Dan McLaren becomes police commissioner, former detective Johnny Blake publicly punches him, convincing rackets boss Al Kruger that Blake is sincere in his effort to join the mob. "Bugs" Fenner, meanwhile, is certain that Blake is a police agent.

While visiting the circus with his family, Charlie is recruited by the big top's co-owner to investigate threatening letters that he's received.

A Swedish princess boards an ocean liner in Europe en route to an acting career in America, and finds herself getting inconveniently attached to a bandleader returning home. To complicate matters, a blackmailer on board apparently knows she is not who she claims to be - and he has his sights set on other passengers with secrets of their own. In the meantime an escaped killer has stowed away under someone else's identity, and is killing again to cover his tracks; five international police detectives on board are heading the investigation to find him. When evidence points to the princess and bandleader, they must find the killer themselves - before he finds them.

Dr. Janos Rukh discovers a certain type of radium that has almost magical healing properties. But the element has a dangerous side, too, and it has already started affecting Rukh. Consumed by paranoia, he begins to suspect that his wife is having an affair. Wild for revenge, Rukh hatches a deadly plot...using his own poisoned body as a weapon to kill.

China, 1930s, during the ravaging civil war. General Pen entrusts O'Hara, an intrepid American adventurer, with the mission of providing a large sum of money to Mr. Wu with the task of buying weapons in Shanghai to help end General Yang's tyranny that keeps an entire province under his ruthless iron boot.

Postal inspectors track down money stolen from a railroad car.

When an ex-dancer marries a man for his money she is suprised find he is a real skinflint. She owes a lot of money to a loan-shark who is after her. However, her husband does carry a lot of insurance

Betrayal and espionage abound as an experimental aircraft is readied for its maiden voyage.

The star of "Song of the Toreador" receives threatening messages that he will not survive the preview screening of the film. The studio publicist works with the Director, the Producer and the police, to discover who is behind the threats.

Ed Harwood, a wisecracking private investigator from New York, discovers a crime at an hotel in Nice during a carnival. The unraveling of the mystery which lies behind will lead him and Caryl Fenton, a female insurance agent, who will become his companion, first to Paris, then to London, later through the English countryside and finally to Southampton, in search of a criminal train wrecker.

Explorer Sir Clive bets that he can spend the night alone in Madame Tussauds Chamber of Horrors. Meanwhile, crooks hope to exploit his ward, Carol, for her fortune.

A radio commentator named Perry Travis fancies himself a brilliant amateur detective. The cops wish he’d stick to his microphone and let them do the detecting. This proves impossible when a famed scientist is murdered in Perry’s studio, right in the middle of the interview. All evidence points to Perry, and he sets out to clear his name before the Shadow-like villain roaming the hallways of the radio station gets away with murder.

A mad killer is on the loose in a hotel on a dark, gloomy night.

Joyce Reid (Fay Wray), a wealthy young debutante, stows away on a cargo ship to China, carrying as passengers her dashing aviator sweetheart, Dan Bailey (Ralph Bellamy) and and her munitions-producing father, E. J. Reid (Thurston Hall) and an assortment of the usual south-seas characters along with some orientals with varying agendas...and some plot-lines straight out of "Terry and the Pirates." The cargo included a shipment of bombs and machine guns. She soon finds herself being held hostage by some wily orientals who will free her only if dashing Dan agrees to pilot a bombing plane for some Chinese bandits.

The story, starring Constance Bennett and Douglass Montgomery, involves a Canadian POW being hidden by a German citizen during World War I.

The screenplay for this mystery is based upon a story suggested to Liberty Magazine by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. It is the tale of a prominent lawyer who shocks his snooty friends, family and colleagues by abruptly abandoning his successful practice and his wife to find true happiness. He soon falls in love with another woman and continues to keep a low profile until he learns that his first wife stands accused of murdering him

Two men stumble into an old mansion, and get involved with a crazed scientist, torture chambers and sinister medical experiments.

Womanizer and airline pilot Jack Gordon must fly the world's fastest airliner from New York to California while dealing with dangerous jewel thieves on the run from the law.

Ellery Queen solves a mystery involving a valuable stamp.

Gangster tries to censor a crusading radio station by jamming its signal.

When Sally inherits a country house, her young brother Ronald, an aspiring journalist, hits on a sensational way to make his first big scoop: Sally will 'disappear', and he will be arrested for her murder! At his trial she will reappear, his acquittal will follow, and he will be able to supply his paper with an exclusive story. Sally and her fiance, Bill, fall in with the scheme. However, there are complications which they had not foreseen.

A couple of naïve girls get themselves unwittingly involved in the gambling racket in this Poverty Row production directed by the redoubtable Phil Rosen.

Publisher John Gillespie faces a financial crisis after his business partner skips town with all the firm's assets. Facing ruin, he reluctantly approaches a wealthy aunt for assistance but is met with a stony-faced refusal.

Jeeves tries to keep his young master out of trouble.