The Black Abbot

This is one of those British quota quickies in which the only name I recognize is cinematographer Ernest Palmer. It starts out with John Stuart getting engaged to Judy Kelly, some talk about the household ghost, the Black Abbot, then Miss Kelly's father is kidnapped.

It's a lesser variety of the British Locked Room mystery, with silly-ass humor and servants canoodling each other. Palmer's camera-work is wonderful -- lots of moving shots --but the performances are all over the shop, indicating that director George Cooper either couldn't afford to hire decent actors for the smaller roles, or couldn't direct actors for beans. At 54 minutes it's bearable, but I won't be revisiting.

A slight but entertaining quota quickie in which a group of stereotypical upper-class types gather in an old mansion when the owner is kidnapped and held to ransom. The working class comic relief prevent things from being too serious.

This is an archetypal quota quickie made by the studios that specialised in making quota quickies for distribution by American film companies thereby circumventing the protectionist provisions of the 1928 Quota Act.So this film is 56 minutes long which will mean that Twickenham would have been paid £5600 by Radio Pictures.So Twickenhams profit would be that amount less the actual cost of production.So every method that could be used would be adopted to cut costs.These are all evident here.A thriller in a country house where the action takes place at night means that sets used previously can be fertilized.Editing is cut to a minimum.This means that actors are grouped together so when it comes time for them to say their lines they walk towards the camera,say their lines and walk back to their original marks.It is a bonus to add in an American character actor,in this case Ben Welden.This merely impresses the British audience as there is no chance that RKO Radio will release it in the states.The title is the most sinister aspect of this film.

John Stuart doesn't really have much to do in this rather routine, gently comedic, haunted house mystery. His "Brooks" character finds himself trying to identify a phantom that inhabits an old monastery and who has an habit of terrifying - or worse - the other occupants. Those range from the upper class nitwits to the loved-up servants - and he has to get a move on before there is no-one left to help discover who's up to all of this mischief and why? It's all a bit too verbal, and at just under the hour, there is still quite a fair degree of padding too. It's still watchable enough if you like an early example of a British-made thriller that uses the gloominess of the scenario and a minimum of wattage to help present the thinnest of stories in quite an eerie style.

"Ghosts indeed! Servant's talk!" Crooks use the legend of the ghostly Black Abbot at an old mansion near London in order to kidnap its rich owner. In fact there is a former monastery that adjoins the large house - Old Monk's Hall, "It's 'aunted!" The legend says that the old wing of The Grange is haunted by the Black Abbot, who was said to have dabbled in Black Magic. This is a "quota quickie", it runs a mere 56 minutes but even that felt somewhat stretched for what is a very basic plot. Two characters, a gardener and a maid, not only add a comical element but they are obviously there to pad out the run time too. He is constantly talking about his small rare plant (a Saxifrage) and she keeps talking about her heavy cold in a very bunged up sounding nasally voice, this soon wears very thin and they were hardly funny in the first place. Made in 1934 the English spoken is all very jolly, old chap! Indeed, seeing the old fashions and motor cars (Austin) was rather splendid too! It is very talky and with most of the characters being situated in the same areas this looks more like a stage play than a movie set. As a horror fan I found the ghostly Abbot wandering around the grounds and the old building itself to be atmospheric. The plot, well nothing much to say really other than decades later it could have been used as an episode for "Scooby Doo". To top things off there is a silly shootout in the dark at the end. I had never heard of this British film before, despite its age the print that the excellent Talking Pictures TV screened was of a good quality. Worth a look.