The Lady Vanishes

I find myself to be utterly annoyed with reviewers who compare this excellent BBC adaptation with Alfred Hitchcock's 1938 masterpiece. This version is a faithful adaptation of Ethel Lena White's psychological mystery novel, The Wheel Spins; Hitchcock used only the premise of the novel and added his own brilliant (often comedic) touches to make the story cinematically appealing for contemporary movie audiences. This approach is similar to what Hitchcock did in many of his other adaptations, including Rebecca and Suspicion, in which he changed the ending of the story or altered the presentation due to such considerations as audiences unwilling to accept stars like Laurence Olivier and Cary Grant being guilty of murder.

As for this 2013 version of The Lady Vanishes, directed by Diarmuid Lawrence, it is a straight drama, like the original novel. Although many contemporary readers may have overlooked the novel, I highly recommend it, as I do this adaptation.

Sunday night is not the time for invention or challenge or innovation, it is a time for unwinding, for enjoying the last few hours of not working before you have to return to Monday and not relaxing. As such it is the home of things like Marple, Midsummer Night Murders and other shows which provide drama but dress it up with comfortable, non-threatening color and light entertainment. This is what brings us a new version of The Lady Vanishes. It is quite a move to step up to a story that Hitchcock has already told in a manner that has stood as the version since it was made, but in reality this version is happy to focus on fitting the timeslot rather than doing something with the story.

It tells you all you need to know when the things that appear to have been worked on the hardest are the sets and the costumes – very BBC Sunday night, lots of good period costumes and everything has good quality in that regard. It has that proper English feel throughout but the problem is that it doesn't really know what it wants to be other than a rather safe, warm Sunday night slice of easy. I was looking for something in the way of humor, or maybe tension or perhaps even a playful mix of the two, but nothing of the sort ever came. The result is a rather bland and safe TV movie that offers nothing of note but presents it in a very warm and professional way with lots of nice but unmemorable people in it.

Unfortunately the least of these people is Middleton, who is in the lead role. She fails at being distressed, she fails at being playfully sexy and generally she distinguishes herself by how little of an impression she makes. The rest of the cast do little else – the Baroness and those around her are too much pantomime but without the fun and nothing ever really sparks as it should. The chemistry between Middleton and Hughes is not there at all – each do their own version of flirty but it doesn't meet in the middle.

It isn't a terrible film by any means – it does what it does and knows what its target audience wants at the time it was screened. It I hard to avoid how very bland it is – no real lows I guess, but certainly no highs or anything to recommend it for. I worried that it would fall short of the Hitchcock film of the same name – I needn't have though, because it doesn't even really try to get close. Watch it for the warm colors and nice costumes, but there isn't much else here.

There are several versions of the movie and then there is the book it is based on "The Wheel Spins" by Ethel Lina White.

The most popular and the stick by which all others are measured is the Alfred Hitchcock version Eine Dame verschwindet (1938) (The Criterion Collection).

This rendition has quite a few TV actors of the time playing the various characters. One you will recognize right off is Selina Cadell. She plays Miss Froy. She has (102 credits) to her name.

This (2013) version was adjusted to be politically correct so you cannot "fast forward" as the clues and conclusion are different. The politics of the time are not mentioned but the flu is.

One may be put off by the main character being a snot. However, that is necessary to show how she reforms in adversity.

The basic story is of course a lady traveling on a train vanishes. When our heroine inquires as to her whereabouts everyone denies that the lady ever existed.

For comparison, I have always hankered after another, more faithful adaptation of Strangers on a Train. The Highsmith original is on a completely different psychological plane to Hitchcock's superb adaptation, which plays with the banality of evil theme but adds ticking, suspenseful timebombs and a hero who may have moments of weakness but triumphs in the end.

The 2013 version of The Lady Vanishes will have to do instead. It is NOT a remake nor a version of nor even based on the Hitchcock film. Far from it. Bemoaning the absence of Charters and Caldicott misses the point entirely. This film is a much straighter adaptation of Hitchcock's original source material, The Wheel Spins by Ethel Lina White.

Even if this new production were rubbish, as a close adaptation of the original source, it would still offer worthwhile study by providing an illustration of how much craft the master added to create one of the best films of the 1930's. Let's face it, no one has read the novel. Hitch turns an essay in nervousness about more trouble in the Balkans into an appeasement era allegory of the difficulty of shaking people out of an apathetic response to tyranny and the virtues of resistance, all dressed in beautifully tailored cinematic clothes that will last forever.

Diarmuid Lawrence's The Lady Vanishes, however, is very far from rubbish. It has a powerful, beautifully judged central performance from an actress who, unlike Cybill Shepherd in what WAS a remake in 1979, is in the same class as Margaret Lockwood.

In the initial scenes she is part of a group of what the newspapers called Bright Young Things but Evelyn Waugh called Vile Bodies. She is able to stand out from her awful, shallow friends, however, with suggestions of an open mind and a wider view of the world. Without falling into clichés, Middleton distances herself in an afternoon and evening of misbehaviour then separates herself entirely by staying behind when her friends leave.

This turns out to be an empty gesture. After a failed attempt at adventure, she immediately returns to type missing her friends, refusing offers of company, throwing money around at the locals and falling back into the character of a rude, spoilt mademoiselle, shorn of her comforts.

This sets up the irony of her behaviour on the train when she finally discovers what it is that is truly different about her. However now, for a variety of reasons, people who can see the difference can't acknowledge it and people who can't see the difference misinterpret her. The only person who has understood her correctly has vanished. Lawrence's version holds on to this subtle psychological setup much longer than Hitchcock's. Those who think she's hysterical plot to sedate her. Those who know she isn't, hide themselves.

Middleton's work is a real treat. The rest of the cast may not have enough to work with (one of the reasons why Hitchcock conducted a major rewrite). And instead of a graceful denouement, the action does rather hit the buffers at the end of the line. Very nice lwork in the last scene, though, more reminiscent of North by North West.

However, despite a few shortcomings, this is a neat piece of period drama in its own right and casts a bright and valuable sidelight on Hitchcock's work as an adapter.

No one should put off by misguided criticism that it fails to live up to Lockwood and Redgrave. Unlike the 1979 rehash, it has earned its place on the shelf next to the Hitchcock version of the same novel.

Based on the 1938 Hitchcock thriller of the same name (which I haven't seen), this looked like rather a good whodunnit. The cast if full of young up-comers and old stalwarts, many of whom seem to be doing the rounds in British TV at the moment.

The premise: a beautiful young socialite, Iris Carr, is making her way back to England by train after a Balkans holiday and finds herself befriended by a kind older lady who calls herself Mrs Froy. Disorientated by a fall at the station earlier, Iris drifts off to sleep, only to find on awakening that Mrs Froy has disappeared and nobody else seems to have seen her - in fact they don't believe she existed in the first place. Of course there are only two possible outcomes: the woman isn't real and Iris is barking mad, or she has genuinely disappeared and there's some sort of conspiracy going on.

Unfortunately the final hour dedicated to resolving the mystery is slow-paced, boring and ultimately all a bit predictable. Apart from Sandy McDade and Tuppence Middleton, all the other characters are stereotypes who get to do very little with their screen time. Middleton is superb, tackling Iris's transition from petulant snobbery to concern and brave determination with aplomb, but the plodding script can't keep up with her enthusiasm. It's definitely a Sunday afternoon movie, and one you can watch with Grandma - just don't expect edge-of-your-seat thrills.