FOREIGN INTRIGUE

US, 1956, 100 minutes, Colour.

Robert Mitchum, Genevieve Page, Ingrid Thulin, Frederic O'Grady, Eugene Deckers.

Directed by Sheldon Reynolds.

A colourful thriller from the mid-1950s, written and directed by Sheldon Reynolds, his career was principally in television series. He has very attractive colour photography with his locations, the Riviera (at much the same time as Hitchcock’s To Catch a Thief), Vienna but mainly in dark locations at night, reminiscent of The Third Man, but very colourful Swedish sequences, the city of Stockholm, the waters and islands.

The film opens with a wealthy man collapsing and dying, many interrogating whether he said anything before he died. There is his trophy wife, detached from her husband, Genevieve Page, introduced here but having made many films France before this. Later, in Ingrid Thulin will appear in the Swedish sequences, also introduced but having made many films in Sweden, the next year to appear in the first of her nine collaborations with Ingmar Bergman).

Robert Mitchum plays the American who handles the rich man’s business affairs.

There is secrecy about the dead man and Mitchum  follows clues, a lawyer in Vienna who has a secret document, inquiries by reporters, collaboration with friends, the visit to the dark Vienna sequences and discovery of a Swedish link, a visit to Sweden, a connection with a man blackmailed by the wealthy man, and secrets from his wife and daughter – and some instant romance!

Then the film has international connections, 1938, Hitler and connections around Europe with men who could become governors when the Nazis conquered their countries.

Some murders, Mitchum under suspicion, a stranger following him, collaborating with him, the revelation of international powers, the testing of Mitchum, the unmasking of the trophy wife, and the possibility of a happy ever after.

Visually attractive with its locations, a foreign intrigue in the style of the 1950s.