Excellent, Without a doubt!!

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

For a run-of-the-mill 'B' picture with barely an hour to do its work this entry has lots of talent going for it beginning with director Gordon Douglas who went on to shoot several prestigious films not least a handful - Young At Heart, Tony Rome, Robin And The Seven Hoods, The Detective - starring Sinatra whilst many members of the cast, including the eponymous cueball, Esther Howard, Byron Foulger etc racked up over one hundred credits apiece. The plot is mostly ho hum and Tracy's celebrated wrist-watch radio was never mentioned but Douglas keeps the pace moving along and mostly glides past any risible moments so that the 60 minutes pass fairly painlessly and there is a brilliant send-up of Jack Barrymore by Ian Keith who has not only the voice but also the mannerisms of Barrymore down pat.

Decent B picture.Was never a huge fan of Dick, but I have to say these RKO pictures are rather alluring.Surprised there weren't more.The Plot.Expensive diamonds are stolen. Before the thief can fence them he is strangled by ex-con Cueball. He then takes the gems and continues murdering people he believes are trying to swindle him. Dick Tracy allows his girlfriend Tess to act as a buyer for the gems but his plan backfires when she is captured by the homicidal Cueball.

So where else would viewers see a friendly neighborhood dive called The Dripping Dagger, replete with a gleaming graphic of blood falling from a wicked-looking stabber. Sort of whets the old desire to drop in for a drink and maybe a piece of unelective surgery. Pretty good Tracy tongue-in-cheek. These programmers were always played straight, but the outlandish names tip off the real intent. Tracy's trying to track down a murderous jewel thief whose shaved head resembles that of a new-born. In those days, pure baldies were a rarity unlike today's hairless male fashion. Great cast that includes such visual eccentrics as the sepulchral Milton Parsons and the unfortunate Skelton Knaggs whose cratered face peering through a magnifying lens would frighten Frankenstein. But stealing the show is blowzy old Esther Howard who looks like she's been on a 60 year bender, and acts like a 60-year old Mike Tyson. So when she backs down even the burly strongman Cueball, we believe it. Actually, these entries get their appeal from the parade of human eccentrics that populate them. To me, however, the biggest mystery is why Tracy doesn't spend more time at home with the very uneccentric looking Tess Trueheart (Anne Jeffries) who is enough to turn any man's head, square-jawed cop or not.

"Dick Tracy Vs. Cueball" does a fairly good job of creating a semi-comic book style "Tracy" atmosphere, but the story itself is largely routine. It moves fairly quickly, and has enough entertaining parts to keep your attention, but there's not really that much to the story.Tracy and assistant Pat Patton have to investigate a diamond theft and a murder connected to it. Morgan Conway makes a decent, if uninspired, Tracy, and things move along quickly most of the time. Most of the details and characters are reasonably Tracy-like. As the villain behind the crimes, though, "Cueball" is not much of a foe - while menacing, he's an unimaginative bumbler, and most of what happens is routine and somewhat predictable.Overall, the movie is a mostly average crime film of the era, worth watching for those who are fans.