After final credits under Powell/Pressburger & David Lean, cinematographer Ronald Neame became director Ronald Neame with this modest, but savvy ‘wrong man’ thriller. Whipping up a goodly dose of Hitchcockian suspense as Hugh Williams, husband/manager to rising opera soprano Greta Gynt, is charged with murdering former lover Rosalie Crutchley.* As presented in court and seen in tricky voice-over flashback by stout prosecuting counsel Francis L. Sullivan, the circumstantial evidence is overwhelming. And stylishly presented by Neame, working a bit too hard to make a show of this standard, rather implausible material. Little is known of the victim, not even a photo, but plucky Greta, playing amateur detective, makes enough improbable connections & deductions to locate a likely suspect in Edinburgh headmaster Marius Goring. Already showing the sort of confident, faceless professionalism that would carry him thru THE PRIME OF MISS JEAN BRODIE/’69 and THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE/’72 (all well managed, all the same to him), Neame builds up considerable tension without much to work with. The highlight, a nail-biting school tour with Gynt & Crutchley’s creepy secret husband Goring, each of them aware of some nameless imminent threat, but holding back on what they think is going on. Brought off by Neame & cinematographer Guy Green (who’d also turn director) with little more than pacing, shadows & architecture. All debuts should go this smoothly.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: * Character actress Rosalie Crutchley gives a fascinating, if abbreviated portrait of a troubled woman as the victim. Fascinating looking, too. Not quite a beauty, but such an interesting face. She and Marius Goring wiping the nominal leads off the screen.
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