Displaying items by tag: DA ClarkSmith

MURDER BY ROPE

UK, 1936, 64 minutes, Black-and-white.

D.A.Clark-Smith, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Sunday Wilson, Dorothy Hamilton, Guy Bellmore, Donald Reed, Albert Conway.

Directed by Geoffrey Pearson.

One of the many brief supporting features from the 1930s, murder mysteries, detection, black-and-white photography… But, while so many of them were American, this one is English, very British in style and manner.

It has the advantage of several subplots throughout the film, opening with a mad killer in the dock and condemned to death, the meetings of the jury and discussions, the condemnation by the judge.

Then, there are anonymous notes pieces of rope sent to the executioner, to the judge, warning of revenge. There is a British government concerned, and their calling in an expert on writing. There is also a novelist who was written about the case and seems to have a cheerfully morbid approach to crime (and he is played by Wilfrid Hyde-white in jovial form, but 28 years before he was to achieve immortality singing The Rain in Spain with Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady).

Then there is a gathering at a stately mansion, a judge invited, a popular actress, the judges nephew and his wife, a suspicious other guest, as well as the Butler and the maid – which leads into a crime subplot and the theft of a necklace.

And, then the expert goes to the mansion, the playwright suggesting a scenario that they re-enact, lights going out, lights coming on and the judge did. The expert then takes over the investigation, interrogating everyone.

All kinds of suspicions, the judges nephew with a money problem, suspicions on the playwright, phones cut, cast disabled, miles from the police and a phone…

And, the solution which most people would never have guessed and Agatha Christie and her fans would be very pleased.