Last night's murder mystery had a hint of black comedy, even a touch of farce. Think "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" in terms of style. It was all veddy Brrrittissh and entitled "Dilemma"(1962), the story of "Harry Barnes" (Peter Halliday), a schoolteacher who comes home to find a dead man in his bathroom. As the movie opens, we hear a scream coming from his house. The neighbor lady looks up from her gardening, shrugs her shoulders and gets back to pruning her roses. What did she see, if anything?
Mr. Barnes arrives home a while later. When he enters his house, he sees disarray. The door is left open, a potted plant is knocked askew. Something's burning in the oven - a casserole dinner - and his wife is nowhere to be seen. He goes back outside to talk to the neighbor lady (Patricia Burke), who's still working in her garden. "Excuse me Mrs. Jones, but have you seen my wife"?. "Why yes, I saw her hurry out about an hour ago". "Hmmm.....I only ask because she left our dinner in the oven and the front door was open". "Perhaps she went down to the hairdresser? I shouldn't worry about it, in any case". "Well, thank you Mrs. Jones. I'll keep looking". "Why of course. If there's anything I can do to help, don't hesitate to ask".
I'll say in advance that Barnes will not ask for her help, but it won't matter because she'll keep offering it anyway. You see, Mrs. Jones is the quintessential Nosy Neighbor. That's why she's forever out gardening; so she can see and hear what's going on next door.
After speaking with her, Barnes re-enters his house and goes upstairs. Calling out for his wife, he receives no answer. Perhaps she's just fallen asleep? (oh, wait a sec - Mrs. Jones saw her leave). He checks the bathroom, but the door won't open. Something heavy is blocking it. Harry gives it a shove and stumbles in. My God, man! There's a body on the floor! Here's where the farce begins, because Harry has no questions about what has happened or what to do about it. He's a bit shocked but not puzzled in the least. Seeing the dead man, and the bloody mess around him, Harry starts immediately to clean up. He inspects the spilled makeup kit, observes the scissors (covered in blood), sees the other knicknacks lying around, and knows exactly what has taken place. His wife killed the man, whoever he is. He knows what must be done and sets out to do it : to bury the body under the floorboards. What, do you think he should've called the police?
Harry pulls aside the living room rug and goes to work on the floorboards, prying them up with a clawhammer. He's interrupted every few minutes by the eavesdropping Mrs. Jones, who knocks and then enters without waiting. "Hello! Hellooo? Oh, hello Mr. Barnes! I was just wondering if you'd found your wife yet"? "No I haven't, Mrs. Jones, but it's quite alright. You needn't worry yourself about it". "Oh, Mr, Barnes, but it's no trouble at all. I'm always glad to help. I was also worried because I heard such a racket over here". "Oh, that was just me, doing a little repair work". Harry wipes his sweaty brow. He's wishing Mrs. Jones would go home but she doesn't. Finally he ushers her out by the shoulder, never losing his friendly English manner (musn't be rude, even when disposing of a body). "Thanks very much, Mrs. Jones, but everything's okay. I'm not worried about my wife. She'll be home any minute, I'm sure". Of course, he hasn't seen the last of Mrs. Jones, not by a long shot. She'll return to bring him dinner, then to "help tidy up", then to ask again about his wife. Harry's at his wits end, trying to keep her out of the living room.
When the gravesite is ready, he leaves the house (with Mrs. Jones watching, naturally). He's heading over to the local Builders Emporium (Brit version, but surprisingly similar) to buy quik dry cement to cover the body. The owner of the Builders is a crook, which will figure in the police investigation later. The script is tight like a stage play, but does involve a few red herrings.
Eventually we see Harry's wife. She's at the hospital, getting her hand tended to in the emergency room. It's cut across the palm and needs stitches.
The movie plays almost like an English Roger Corman film, albeit one with better production values. But the obvious black humor : man comes home, finds a dead body and, instead of calling police, hatches a surreptitious plan to bury it, even though he didn't commit the murder - that's the same kind of black humor Corman would use, but he'd take it to a level of Total Farce. The Brits love to change tone, to go back and forth stylistically (the music changes, too) from comical to suspense, and so here we go from the improbable (the burial) to the irritable (the neighbor) to the official (the inspector who investigates the Builders Emporium owner) to a standard mystery format (where's the wife?). Then there's an interloper - a nerdy boy who's come over for a piano lesson (Harry teaches piano in his spare time). By now, he's got the body in the ground and cemented in. The kid hears him nailing back the floorboards but goes on practicing his piano scales. Then the inspector knocks on Harry's door. "Hello, I'm Detective Murray with the London police. Did you buy three bags of cement from the Builder's Emporium"?
Harry's sweating bullets with that question. He doesn't know - yet - that he isn't being investigated; it's the owner of the building store, who's suspected of selling black market merchandise. Others will knock, too. A group of nuns, the piano tuner, who enters the living room! (thank goodness he's blind). Then there's the everpresent Mrs. Jones, who by now is certain Harry murdered his wife. We should all have a neighbor like her, don't you think? Someone so "concerned" with our well being? ;)
The one caveat I'd offer for "Dilemma" concerns it's ending. Through all the movie's twists and turns, and the sheer torture of watching Harry cringe every time there's a knock at the door, the viewer will come to expect a big payoff. I mean, what's the deal already? Did his wife kill the dead guy, or what? Or maybe the guy was a hoodlum, involved with the building store crooks, and that's how he met his demise. As the suspense tightens, you guess and guess again.........and then when the ending does come.......it feels a little small. Not that it isn't clever, or a logical conclusion to the clues presented; it just isn't given the whammo! it deserves, in my opinion. But it's still a solid ending, even if revealed with little fanfare, and my complaint is therefore a minor one. Two Big Thumbs Up for "Dilemma", which has a razor sharp print and is highly recommended. Watch it for Mrs. Jones' sake, or she might ring your doorbell. ////
We've also got a fast talking espionage flick with a Noirish title : "They Can't Hang Me"(1955). British regular Andre Morrell, who usually plays police inspectors, finds himself on the other side of the law this time, as a condemned man, sentenced to hang for the murder of a woman in her apartment. He's got just a few days to live, so he plays the only card available to him by offering Top Secret information in exchange for a reprieve. When Scotland Yard (pr.Skoartlnd Yearrd) arrives at the prison, Morrell tells the detectives he's got the lowdown on a foreign agent, still in the country, who's stealing nuclear secrets. "How do you know this man"?, they ask him. "Because I'm the one who passed him the documents"!, Morrell shouts. He's adamant about a change of sentence. "I'll not give out his name until you agree to my terms. They've got to call off the execution, and not simply for my sake but for that of the entire world. If this man leaves the country, and I'm not here to help you, it could lead to World War 3".
The agents explain that it's not their decision. "We'll talk to the judge, but it might help if you give us a little background. You see, you're not the first prisoner to try and bargain his way out of a death sentence. For all we know, you could be making this up. Give us something more to go on and we'll work with you". With that, Morrell reluctantly spills his guts. "I'm a physicist by trade, though more recently I was employed as a civil servant, as you know. But after the war, I worked with men associated with the Manhattan Project. One of them was an anti-communist Pole. My wife and I became sympathetic to the Polish resistance and set up a plan to provide them with nuclear triggers, or rather the documents for their manufacture. However, our group was infiltrated by a spy. We knew him by the name of Leonidas. I've known his real name since before I was imprisoned, but I won't give it to you until you can guarantee me a commutation".
The detectives huddle outside his cell for a quick tete a tete. "I believe he's on the level", says one. "Perhaps, but we cannot under any circumstances take his demand to a judge. Can you imagine the headlines? "Murderer Barters His Way Off Gallows"! The press would have a field day and we'd likely be looking for new jobs. No, I'm afraid we'll have to lead him on, fib a little about our intentions, but we'll tell him we agree to start with".
From that point, the detectives attempt to identify the spy Leonidas from a number of possible suspects, including other nuclear physicists, the man from the Polish resistance, and even Morrell's wife, who turns out to be the Pole's lover. Things are almost reduced to a Ten Little Indians level, but we aren't trapped in one location and director Val Guest keeps the plot moving fast and furious. And that - rather than any cliches in the format - was the major problem I had with this movie. When you have screwball-speed dialogue, uttered in oft-unintelligible Britspeak accents (including slang), you'd better be fully alert and preferably with a mug of hot coffee in hand. I watched it late at night when I was yawning to stay awake, so a lot of the English yammering went right by me. It would've been nice if they slowed down the repartee a little bit, not just for Yours Truly but because this is a spy movie and you're supposed to build tension, which is hard to accomplish when you're rapping a mile a minute.
Anyhow, in reading the fan reviews at IMDB, I don't think my sleepiness caused me to miss any plot points. It was actually a decent picture, to which I'm ready to award Two Thumbs. But they're gonna have to be Two Regulars instead of Two Solids or Two Bigs, which it perhaps might've merited had the pace not been the speed of light. Still, I recommend it if you like British Crime Movies in general. An interesting note about Val Guest : he was a B-level director of some note, having specialised in sci-fi and horror for Hammer Studios, for whom he made fourteen pictures. He was at the helm of the first two "Quatermass" movies, and "The Day The Earth Caught Fire", classics all (and I own all three on dvd). He also wrote a ton of other films and was quite talented overall. I mention this as noteworthy because "They Can't Hang Me" was made in the same year (1955) as "The Quatermass Xperiement". The latter is tremendous and belongs on the list of sci-fi masterpieces, while the former is okay, but feels like a toss-off. It doesn't have the production qualities of the other Guest films I've seen. Perhaps it was a contractual obligation. ////
That's all I've got for this evening. I hope you had a nice day and listened to some Egg or some Beach Boys. As always, I send you tons and tons of love. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
No comments:
Post a Comment