Inquest

This early Boulting brothers film is a low budget quickie based on a stage play with an axe to grind on the role of the Coroner's court.

However the Boutlings turn this into superior courtroom drama with some comedy presided over a fussy, supercilious, biased and officious Coroner.

A gun is found hidden behind a wall in an attic with what looks like a bullet being fired. A young woman who was the previous occupier of the house ends up being accused of killing her husband who was previously labelled as dying of heart failure. The Coroner's inquest will decide the actual cause of death and his verdict could lead to the young woman being sent to stand trial for murder in the Old Bailey.

A distinguished King's Counsel who is a family friend is acting for her, but the widow wants to maintain her silence and is fatalistic. It seems she is protecting somebody and her case is also hampered by the attitude of the Coroner.

This is actually a rather enjoyable yarn, the denouement was slightly complicated and unlikely. The setting kind of gives the film's stage bound origins away.

Although short in duration this is distinctly a cut above a "quota quickie". Hay Petrie, who seems to have later been consigned to many small but distinctive supporting roles, here is centre stage in the court-room scene, gives a very spirited and dominating performance and makes the most of, for once for him, a very good role. Opposite him is a worthy foil both in terms of script and actor in the shape of (and here is a very rare thing) a comic Coroner with only too obvious human failings. The quotations in the opening credits questioning the purpose of a Coroner suggest that someone might have been grinding an axe in this intelligent and entertaining legal/crime-comedy.

'The office of Coroner is of great antiquity and no satisfactory account of its origin can be given.' Halsbury's "The Laws of England."

'It is even more difficult to give a satisfactory reason for its continuance.' 'English Justice.'

Those are the opening titles of this movie a mystery largely set at such a court produced and directed by the Boulting Brothers. A formerly rich man has died, and village gossip won't let his corpse lie easy. When the gun of his widow, Elizabeth Allan, turns up with an empty chamber, the body is exhumed, and the missing slug is found at the base of the corpse's spine.... and evidence of poisoning.

It's a tour de force for the Boultings in their efforts to make you dislike everyone. Miss Allan does everything she can to make you think she is guilty of.... well, if not of murder, of something. Herbert Lomas, as the pompous, bullying and out-of-control coroner makes you hope that he trips over his own feet and fails to convict her, and it's only Hay Petrie, in an uncharacteristically urbane role as her defense attorney, who bullies everyone, including his unwilling client, to stand between her and the hangman's noose.

It's based on a stage play by Michael Barringer and has clearly been opened up only minimally from what could have been presented in two acts on one set and a bit of lighting. However, its powerful performances by Petrie and Lomas make it transcend its cheap production value.

Modest crime thriller held together by a winning performance from diminutive Hay Petrie, and enlivened by his clashes with excitable coroner Herbert Lomas.

INQUEST is a short, early effort from the famous Boulting brothers, a film that was originally based on a stage play which becomes apparent in the single location nature of the proceedings. And what a delight it is to watch. Initially when I read that this was a courtroom drama exposing the workings of the coroner's court, I thought it would be dry beyond belief and more than a little dull given the era.

Not at all. In fact, this is almost a comedy, with the cast giving occasionally histrionic turns as the script requires, and it's certainly very funny despite the deadly serious nature of the narrative. In essence, a young woman is accused of her husband's murder when her gun is found hidden behind a wall and missing a bullet that was lodged in her husband's back.

The rest of the story is made up of the court trial as the facts of the case go back and forth. And what this all boils down to in actuality is a battle of wits between the fussy and old-fashioned coroner, played by Herbert Lomas, and the idealistic KC, played with relish by Hay Petrie. These two guys argue their points, engage in shouting matches, and overact with relish. They alone are responsible for much of this film's entertainment value, such as it is, and both actors deserve commendations for making the antics of their characters so enjoyable to watch.