Last night's movie was "The Mysterious Mr. Nicholson"(1947), a murder mystery involving the possible dual identity of the title character, a private detective. As it opens, "Peggy Dundas" (Lesley Osmond), the secretary for a London probate law firm, is sent to deliver a reconfigured will to a Mr. St. James (not shown), who has made the changes to disinherit his nephew. When Peggy enter his garden, she finds St. James' body. Screaming on her way out, she realizes she bumped into his killer moments earlier on the sidewalk, a well-dressed chap in a suit. On the body, the cops find a note from an avenger known as VLS, a French acronym used by a British criminal in Paris during the war. But the police know VLS as a thief, not a murderer. They think the note is a forgery, designed to make it look like VLS killed Mr. St. James on behalf of his nephew.
Intrigued, lead inspector "Morley" (Frank Hawkins) pays a visit to a chap named "Nicholson" (Anthony Hulme), whom he suspects of being VLS, a sort of Robin Hood character who rights monetary wrongs. Nicholson is a chameleon who has worked as an actor and is now a private eye. After some verbal and mental parrying, Morley gets Nicholson to admit he's VLS. "But I didn't kill anyone," he insists, then asks to meet the woman who found the body. But when Inspector Morley takes him to meet Peggy, she says, "It's him! That's the man I bumped into at the garden!" Now it does look like VLS is the murderer, until Nicholson explains that, when he lived in Paris, he once hired an exact double to serve as an alibi in one of his crimes.
Now suspecting that his old double from the war is trying to frame him, VLS joins the case, and here we go into a shell game of doubles upon doubles. Nicholson's double, whose name is "Raeburn", is working for a Nikita Khrushchev lookin' guy who runs an employment agency, but on the side he puts hits out on inheritors, to get their money. His office is right next to Peggy's law firm (it's how he gets his targets) but now, secretary Peggy is causing him problems, with her ID of Nicholson's double, Raeburn. Khrushchev and Raeburn need a separate hitman to neutralize her, which Raeburn arranges at a speakeasy run by "Freda" (Josie Bradley), a middle-aged singer/pianist. Also at Freda's club is an acrobatic dog act that gets a five minute scene in the middle of the movie that warrants Two Gigantic Thumbs Up on it's own. As one reviewer wrote, "This has to be the greatest dog act of all time", and he's right. but back to the plot, Freda sets Raeburn up with an Italian hitman named Perelli, who will kill Peggy for 500 lbs.
But Perelli doesn't trust Raeburn and Khrushchev because nobody seems to know who the real VLS is. Not even Peggy, who is now in love with him, while her boss at the law firm is in love with her.
You've gotta pay attention in these 1940s-era British movies because the diction and rhythmic pattern of speech is different than in later decades and much different than in American movies. There's a politeness to the way everyone speaks, which accentuates the delicacy of the accents, and this makes the dialogue difficult to understand. The "double" aspect is clever, though, and there are many twists. A must-see for the dog act, "The Mysterious Mr. Nicholson" gets Two Big Thumbs Up. The picture is slightly soft. ////
The previous night's film was "No Trace"(1950), written and directed by John Gilling. "Robert Southley" (Hugh Sinclair) is a novelist with an ego to match his book sales. His specialty is crime fiction. He regales his guests at parties with rapid-fire descriptions of impossible-to-solve plots, always the center of attention with his banter. His beautiful secretary "Linda" (Dinah Sheridan) is devoted, efficient, and an amateur sleuth herself. She's seeing a police sergeant named "Harrison" (Barry Morse), who Robert doesn't much like and the feeling is mutual, even though Harrison is a minor fan of his work.
One day, Southley gets a phone call from a stocky old knocker named "Fenton" (Michael Brennan, he of the anvil face and floor-safe build). As Fenton, Brennan's doing an English version of the kind of East Coast accent that pissed McCartney off when Lennon used it the time Paul came calling at the Dakota. Paul rang the buzzer and Lennon spoke like he was from Noo Joysey. "Whattaya wahnt? Why didncha cawl befoah comin' ovah?" Paul said, "Fuck off, Kojak!" and left. That's what kind of accent Michael Brennan uses for Fenton, and, because he's English, it's not accurate. Fenton is calling to blackmail Robert Southley. It turns out that Southley has a shady past and an assumed name. Fenton was his crime partner in America. Fenton got caught after a heist and did prison time. Southly skated and went free, and reinvented himself back in England as an actor, then a novelist. Now, he's even got a weekly radio spot called "The Perfect Murder".
Fenton has a letter Southley wrote "when we was young" about a jewelry job they pulled off. It's in Southley's handwriting, which makes it blackmail material. Fenton wants 500 lbs for it. Southley pays him off, and says "don't contact me again" but Fenton, being a drunken lout, calls him back to tell him, "that letter I gave you was a fake. I've still got the original. I want another 500 lbs."
That does it for Southley, who - being a former actor - buys a fake beard at a Fake Beard Shop, then - being also a crime novelist who knows plots - he sets out to murder Fenton, setting up the perfect travel route as an alibi, disguised as a merchant seaman.
The murder comes off as planned. Southley is seen by a landlady and a tenant wench, but he's disguised, and when he gets back home, the last thing on anyone's mind is Robert Southley the crime novelist. He's friends with the local Chief Inspector, even if Sgt. Harrison, his secretary Linda's suitor, doesn't like him. But it's Linda he really needs to worry about, and this is where John Gilling's script comes in. Because she wants to impress Southley, Linda starts suggesting plot points for his latest novel, which is based on the Fenton murder. Somehow, the details she suggests just so happen to match exactly how he did it. It's like she's psychic. He denounces her suggestions as absurd, but she wants to satisfy her curiosity and show him that she's a good crime novelist too. It's a case of the student one-upping the master, and now she's hotter on his trail than the coppers. When Southley can no longer dissuade her from pursuing the case ("You don't know what you're talking about, Linda!"), he decides to murder her. By now, however, the cops have enough of a description of the merchant seaman to make a composite drawing, which they compare to a photo of Southley with a beard drawn in. When the salesman at the Fake Beard Shop sees it, he and the landlady and the wench all agree, "that's the same man." Southley's nailed, but by now, he's got Linda alone in the woods, and he's gonna kill her. Two Bigs, another good one from John Gilling. The picture is very good but the soundtrack is slightly muffled. ///
And that's all for tonight. We'll have more 1989 homework soon. My blogging music was "Never Never Land" by Pink Fairies and "In the Land of Grey and Pink" by Caravan. My late night is the Deborah Oratorio by Handel. I hope your week is off to a good start and I send you Tons of Love as always.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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