Home Sweet Homicide

Home Sweet Homicide is a 1946 comedy-mystery from 20th Century Fox. Marian Carstairs, a widowed mystery writer, is trying to finish her latest novel, but her three children have found a diversion of their own: a killing that has taken place in their own neighborhood. As they collect clues and follow the investigation, the children also set their sights on the detective leading the case, hoping to match him up with their mother.

The film was directed by Lloyd Bacon, whose long career had already included Kept Husbands, 42nd Street, Footlight Parade, Frisco Kid, Marked Woman and Brother Orchid; Home Sweet Homicide sits between that run and I Wonder Who's Kissing Her Now, which followed in 1947. F. Hugh Herbert wrote the screenplay, and Louis D. Lighton produced. Lynn Bari plays Marian, with Peggy Ann Garner, Dean Stockwell and Connie Marshall as her children, Dinah, Archie and April. Randolph Scott appears as Lieutenant Bill Smith and James Gleason as Sergeant O'Hare.

On IMDb, the film holds a rating of 7 out of 10 from 411 votes, a modest but favourable showing for a comedy-mystery of its period. Running just 90 minutes, it blends the family's amateur sleuthing with the lighter business of steering their mother toward the detective, keeping the mystery and the comedy in roughly equal measure.