British journeyman helmer Val Guest, just off THE DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE/’61, seasons this propulsive police procedural with a few attention grabbing stylistic touches (even Hitchcock’s famous jump cut from shouting victim to shrieking train whistle . . . naughty, naughty!), but in general holds to the main quotidian purpose of giving actor Jack Warner a proper swansong playing the same police officer he’d been portraying at various ranks & billings of importance on big & little English screens for decades. (Not quite retired after this, but nearly so.) It’s a good example of the form, too. Lots of grubby locales to visit after the dismembered body of a luckless lover is discovered in a lonely one-month rental. The crime a big priority for a medium-sized department. Visual flourishes aside, we follow along as the department meticulously, and frustratingly, follow one dead-end path after another, with obvious suspects proved innocent while the police wait for a bit of luck to reveal all. The restored print on Cohen Media looks surprisingly washed out in the first few reels (try taming your brightness level), but slowly improves. And it’s still fun to watch old-fashioned competent character actors playing old-fashioned competent coppers, and to see Warner incorporate a slight limp (probably the real thing) into his characterization. Nice little light-bulb moment of an ending, too.
DOUBLE-BILL: Guest’s influential QUATERMASS Sci-Fi films (1955; ‘ 57) and DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE show the imaginative side that’s properly tamped down here.
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