The Ghost Camera

This is a truly solid early British thriller attempt. It might not be as good as the German and American work from the same period but overall it's a solid, original and interesting enough movie.

The concept and overall story of the movie are great- and original thriller material. The movie is however really short and therefor some elements in the story felt rushed. It didn't took enough time to build its tension and mystery.

The main character of the movie, played by Henry Kendall, is at times hilarious, at other times he's borderline annoying and at times he's just plain irritating as an over-the-top English-gentleman. So no, not a great consistency of the main character. It doesn't always help to make the movie and its story enjoyable and interesting to watch.

The movie screams for a remake really. The concept and story of the movie are good, mysterious and tense enough to make a real solid thriller, by todays standards, with. The movie its story really deserves a modern update.

As a whole is a quite solid early British take on the thriller-genre, which is still enjoyable and interesting enough to watch by todays standards, mainly thanks to the really original concept of the movie that is executed well enough but not to the max. I can however still really recommend this movie to the fans of early cinema and to those this movie is perhaps even a bit of an must-see, also a bit due to the very solid and at times quite revolutionary original editing, from none other than David Lean!

7/10

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Driving back from a holiday, a man finds a camera in his car. Developing the negatives, he discovers a photo which shows a murder and others offering clues to the location. He identifies a young girl in another photo and she joins him on the trail.

Low budget second feature which has grown in reputation, with interesting locations and a script to make it worthwhile. Henry Kendall leads with early appearances by Ida Lupino and John Mills. Some scenes with Miss Lupino now feel uncomfortable given her age.

"The Ghost Camera" is a very early but nifty British mystery with a rudimentary screenplay but also a surprisingly sinister premise. The intelligent but lonely chemist John Gray returns from another unexciting holiday and notices there's an unknown camera on the backseat of his car. The development of the film results in photo-evidence of something that strangely looks like murder, but then the camera and negatives are stolen from his practice. The boring chemist quickly turns into an adventurous detective as he and gorgeous Mary track down the origin and location of the other photographs on the film. For obvious time and budget-related reasons, this film hasn't got any special effects or famous stars and thus it completely relies on the its compelling storytelling and great use of sophisticated British humor. John Gray is a typically nervous and talkative character and his clumsy interactions with his female counterpart are genuinely pleasant. Another joy to behold is Victor Stanley as Gray's honest but very simple-minded assistant. The whole story, including the little twist at the end, isn't all that overwhelming or extraordinary but the pace is good and the settings are very original and beautiful. A fun trivia element is that director David Lean, one of the greatest filmmakers of all time with pure classics on his repertoire like "Doctor Zhivago" and "Lawrence of Arabia" did one of his very first editing jobs for this film. Recommended!

The Ghost Camera (1933)

I had my hopes up for this movie for three reasons. First, it was pre-code (though only in American years--this is a British movie). That always adds hope. Second, it had a young Ida Lupino. Third, it was about photography, or at least hinted at it, and I'm a photographer. All of this is to say, I assumed the movie would be nothing much, and was watching just for kicks.

I was pleasantly surprised in several ways. It is a cute story with some simple twists that only go so far, but it is told really well--the camera-work and the editing are adventurous and loose and downright inventive. You can't miss it. The cameraman Ernest Palmer I've never heard of (and looking at his movies, there's nothing the jumps out there). But the editor? You won't believe it--none other than David Lean. Makes me want to watch it again. Lean was in fact an editor before becoming a star director.

"The Ghost Camera" is a thoroughly British movie, even though Palmer is American and in fact so is the director here, not the very British Lean but Bernard Vorhaus, who made his reputation in England. And the two leading characters are both British. Yes, Ida Lupino for all her hard luck urbane American reputation was born and raised in England. Here she's plays a common type well, a girl with a heart who's in a little trouble. The other lead, Harry Kendall, is a kind of British Harold Lloyd, and he takes some getting used to but in the end he's really rather funny and fun. He's famous at home for his work on stage, and was always dismissive of his movie career, but the movies are all we have now, so the irony of that must irk him in the grave.

The story? A classic idea not far off from Antonioni's "Blow Up"--a camera accidentally gets in the hands of a pair of goofy innocent types who develop the film in it and discover a crime. Using clues in the negatives, Kendall bumbles his way into a comic and silly mess, filled with great camera-work and that fast, creative editing. There is subjective camera (from Lupino's eyes) and wobbly hand-held camera, and a series of wipes following a series of opening doors that will blow your mind. Or your eyes. It's genius, even if it's low budget stuff. It even has the elements of a screwball comedy, where two unlikely leads are destined to fall in love after all.

You can find a free stream or free download of this non-copyrighted movie on line easily. The quality is passable on a computer screen, but little else. But it's worth it!

A unique opening sequence: a camera tumbles over a rocky ledge and lands in a car passing along the road below. The car's owner discovers the camera on arriving home; as he happens to have a darkroom, he decides to develop one picture from the camera in the hopes that it will lead him to the camera's owner. Instead he develops what appears to be a photo of one man stabbing another.

It's an unlikely scenario, but this picture is so well staged and performed that we hardly notice; the pace never lets up in this very entertaining mystery with excitement, romance and humor.

Henry Kendall is wonderful as the slightly nerdy hero who dives rather playfully into his investigation but displays both wits and persistence as the case develops in unexpected directions. He finds an additional clue when he develops the remaining pictures—a young woman standing under a street sign. He speaks with delicious irony to his assistant as they study the photograph: "The heroine of a mystery drama is always a ravishing creature." And eventually he tracks down….

Ida Lupino, the young woman in the photograph. They strike up a quick rapport and banter easily; but does she know more than she's telling about the brother who owned the camera and has seemingly disappeared? Lupino is truly excellent—bright, charming, deceitful, worried all at once. Not a bad leading lady performance from an actress who was only fifteen years old!

The dialog is good, the delivery perfect. Some neat camera work is also worth mentioning, especially the tense scene where the brother is finally tracked down—flashlights in the dark dart back and forth, eventually finding his form and then his frightened face. John Mills, also very young, is the brother in trouble.

A very stylish and witty production.