Although "The Night of January 16th" was based on a play by Ayn Rand, it's pretty much typical of the murder mystery B-movies of the era...with most of the usual cliches.
The head of a big company has been apparently embezzling, as the books are short more than $20,000,000! One evening, he's apparently being attacked and his faithful secretary returns to work to help him. But she's too late...and he's apparently tossed out of his skyrise penthouse...and, oddly, the police assume she's responsible. First, she has no motive. Second, they expected this lady to overpower her boss, drag him to the ledge and then toss him over in only three minutes time?! The only person (other than her) to doubt this narrative is an odd character played by Robert Preston and they both play amateur detectives to solve the case and keep her out of prison. To do this, they make an escape from the courtroom (huh???) and travel to Cuba to wrap things up...ridiculous, of course, but no more so than the typical film in the genre!! Decent acting...otherwise not much to distinguish this one.
The head of a big company has been apparently embezzling, as the books are short more than $20,000,000! One evening, he's apparently being attacked and his faithful secretary returns to work to help him. But she's too late...and he's apparently tossed out of his skyrise penthouse...and, oddly, the police assume she's responsible. First, she has no motive. Second, they expected this lady to overpower her boss, drag him to the ledge and then toss him over in only three minutes time?! The only person (other than her) to doubt this narrative is an odd character played by Robert Preston and they both play amateur detectives to solve the case and keep her out of prison. To do this, they make an escape from the courtroom (huh???) and travel to Cuba to wrap things up...ridiculous, of course, but no more so than the typical film in the genre!! Decent acting...otherwise not much to distinguish this one.