Despite having found The Night My Number Came Up (1955-also reviewed) to be wonderfully creepy, I've never got round to looking at the other supernatural class slices from Ealing.
Aware of the title since Edgar Wright shared Martin Scorsese's list of the 50 British films that inspired him, I was happy to see it appear on Talking Pictures free online catch-up service, leading to me visiting a house halfway.
View on the film:
Making her English language debut after doing incredible work with her husband Jacques Feyder on titles such as Le Grand Jeu, (1934-also reviewed) Francoise Rosay gives a haunted performance as Alice, whose sorrow over the death of her son, is carried by Rosay across Alice's agonized face, as Tom Walls plays Alice's husband becoming increasingly downcast and abrasive, with each attempt made by his wife to speak to their son from beyond.
Greeting all the guests arriving at their new house, Glynis Johns gives a finely balanced turn as Gwyneth, which walks between a youthful innocence and an enticing, ghostly presence.
Looking to the grounds outside the family house where his daughter Gwyneth is playing, Mervyn Johns gives a marvelous performance as Rhys, with Johns delivering the dialogue with a real relish as he shakes everyone's hand, that are released with Johns holding Rhys with nervous, concerned body language when major revelations begin to land in the household.
Halfway between life and death, the screenplay by regular Ealing collaborators Angus MacPhail,Diana Morgan, Roland Pertwee and T. E. B. Clarke welcome all the guests to the old dark house, (or in this case,inn) and thoughtfully adapt Denis Ogden's original play with a supernatural twist, which instead of going for ghostly Horror chills, instead leans more towards the reflective, as all the guests open up about the losses they have suffered during the war.
Dropping a time loop twist into the middle of the inn, the writers brilliantly loop it into their warm character drawings, who along with taking digs at those profiting from arming the other side and the position Ireland took during the war, also find in their shared grief a bond which helps them to find light in their darkest hour.
Taking a casual approach to revealing the ghosts, director Basil Dearden (and un-credited co-director Alberto Cavalcanti & Stage Fright (1950-also reviewed) cinematographer Wilkie Cooper record the spirits making no shadows under wide-shots of a burning hot sun, which melt into beautiful dissolves, face match-cuts and refine long panning shots down the corridors of the halfway house.
Aware of the title since Edgar Wright shared Martin Scorsese's list of the 50 British films that inspired him, I was happy to see it appear on Talking Pictures free online catch-up service, leading to me visiting a house halfway.
View on the film:
Making her English language debut after doing incredible work with her husband Jacques Feyder on titles such as Le Grand Jeu, (1934-also reviewed) Francoise Rosay gives a haunted performance as Alice, whose sorrow over the death of her son, is carried by Rosay across Alice's agonized face, as Tom Walls plays Alice's husband becoming increasingly downcast and abrasive, with each attempt made by his wife to speak to their son from beyond.
Greeting all the guests arriving at their new house, Glynis Johns gives a finely balanced turn as Gwyneth, which walks between a youthful innocence and an enticing, ghostly presence.
Looking to the grounds outside the family house where his daughter Gwyneth is playing, Mervyn Johns gives a marvelous performance as Rhys, with Johns delivering the dialogue with a real relish as he shakes everyone's hand, that are released with Johns holding Rhys with nervous, concerned body language when major revelations begin to land in the household.
Halfway between life and death, the screenplay by regular Ealing collaborators Angus MacPhail,Diana Morgan, Roland Pertwee and T. E. B. Clarke welcome all the guests to the old dark house, (or in this case,inn) and thoughtfully adapt Denis Ogden's original play with a supernatural twist, which instead of going for ghostly Horror chills, instead leans more towards the reflective, as all the guests open up about the losses they have suffered during the war.
Dropping a time loop twist into the middle of the inn, the writers brilliantly loop it into their warm character drawings, who along with taking digs at those profiting from arming the other side and the position Ireland took during the war, also find in their shared grief a bond which helps them to find light in their darkest hour.
Taking a casual approach to revealing the ghosts, director Basil Dearden (and un-credited co-director Alberto Cavalcanti & Stage Fright (1950-also reviewed) cinematographer Wilkie Cooper record the spirits making no shadows under wide-shots of a burning hot sun, which melt into beautiful dissolves, face match-cuts and refine long panning shots down the corridors of the halfway house.