Second-tier, but fun triple-twist suspenser apes WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION/’57 with a post-credit request not to reveal its surprise ending, and anticipates PSYCHO/’60 in asking you to see it from the beginning!* Director Michael Anderson, back to earth after saving Mike Todd’s AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS/’56 from a tippling director, is more in his element here, taking everything at face value to hoodwink us into what first seems a ‘Gaslighting’ tale as Richard Todd (with accomplice Faith Brook) convinces everyone except Anne Baxter he’s her ‘dead’ brother. Yes, she identified the body, but Todd knows everything: about his false identity, about her, about the family & its dicey finances! So what could he possibly want? Cash reserves largely gone since Dad died. If only she could prove it to sympathetic local police captain Herbert Lom. Then the story starts to crack. Not his . . . hers! More so when Uncle Alexander Knox identifies the imposter as . . . her brother. Yikes! Maybe she is going insane . . . or maybe the family’s financial ace-in-the-hole, a secret stash of diamonds isn't so secret . . . maybe it involves her brother’s unsolved death. Yikes! And every time you think you’ve got the story figured out, the script pulls the rug out from under you again. Neat, if missing the gloss & pace to hit its potential. (Or perhaps the muddy transfer of Erwin Haillier’s b&w lensing holds it down.) No mind, generally a nice little surprise.
DOUBLE-BILL: Anderson’s next film also something of a find; an effective Irish terrorist drama, SHAKE HANDS WITH THE DEVIL/’59, with James Cagney in good late form.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *The old movie-goer’s phrase, ‘This is where I came in,’ meaningless to streamers.
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