The French Key is a 1946 American mystery film directed by Walter Colmes and written by Frank Gruber.

The film stars Albert Dekker, Mike Mazurki, Evelyn Ankers, John Eldredge, Frank Fenton and Selmer Jackson.

[1][2][3] The French Key is an adaptation of Gruber's novel of the same title, one of more than a dozen in a series featuring detective Johnny Fletcher.

[4] In this film Fletcher and his partner return to their hotel room and find a corpse clutching a gold coin.

Attempting to solve the case, they deal with coin collectors and a pool room fight in addition to spending a night in jail.