They Can't Hang Me

Unable to sleep, I decided to give this film a look, just to see how bad it was, and, although I wasn't pleasantly surprised, at least it wasn't dreadful! It has the typical style of a 50s British patriotic thriller, the effete British accents, the working class accents cliched, the gentlemen villians. What made this film bad was in fact Yolande Donlan, the hero's fiance. Her dreadful overacting with that irritating American accent was enough to make me cringe, and very happy when she left her scenes. Obviously thrown in to appeal to the American audiences of the day, she has the acting ability of a dormouse! I could forgive the gun scenes (no blood, no gunsmoke, just a stationary gun making noise!), but that acting.....

Mr. Pitt is sentenced to death for having strangled a prostitute, but he claims they can't hang him since he is in possession of state secrets concerning the security of the nation and possibly of the world. It's a grand opening of a very hot thriller, and in charge of the investigation with heavy loads of responsibility and under the constantly exacerbated stress of time is inspector Terence Morgan, who admirably succeeds in playing it cool all the way, in spite of gunfights with intents to kill and the threat of death of the key witness. The action is very fast, the dialog is like crossfire all the way, and the plot constantly thickens. Meanwhile, the condemned prisoner is vexed by the police officers and guards who disturb him while he is listening to piano music. The realism is convincing enough, the Poles even speak Polish (which is not translated), and the story is well contrived under the circumstances of the case of Klaus Fuchs (mentioned once) and the extreme most paranoid secrecy around the development of the absurdity of the terror balance.

This film would appear to be inspired,if that is the word,by the defection of Burgess and MacLean to the Russians in the 1950s.Terence Morgan plays a special branch officer who has a butler,the inimitable Reginald Beckwith.He also is lumbered by having Yolande Donlan as his girl friend by virtue of the fact that she was married to the director Val Guest.The best part of the film is the opening two minutes,after that it rather drags.To my mind there is a basic flaw.Why would the murderer wait till he was sitting in the condemned cell before trying to make a deal.This makes no sense whatsoever.It is not till near the end that we learn who is the escaping secret agent.However the climax is very disappointing.

They Can't Hang Me is directed by Val Guest and adapted to screenplay by Guest and Val Valentine from the novel written by Leonard Mosley. It stars Terence Morgan, Yolande Donlan, Andre Morell, Anthony Oliver and Reginald Beckwith.

When Robert Pitt (Morell) is convicted of murder and sentenced to death by execution, he offers the state a bargain. Grant him a reprieve and he will reveal the name of the master spy known as Leonidas before he leaves the country with some atomic secrets.

Thus it's a race against time thriller as the coppers follow the various leads while Pitt grows ever more frantic in his cell. Ideally the police want to find Leonidas without Pitt's help, he is after all a murderer and the state officials are reluctant to grant the requested reprieve. The usual quota of suspects are thrust into the story at regular intervals, giving us a "who is it" thread, while Morgan's head copper tries to keep his lover happy as the search for Leonidas constantly drags him away from planned romantic evenings with her. This is actually a fun thread that's not played for marital drama, as is the byplay between Morgan and Oliver, two intrepid Inspectors who exchange banter and quips even as the pressure mounts.

Enjoyable without ever reaching great heights as a spy thriller, They Can't Hang Me is cautiously recommended to fans of such genre fare. 6/10

Civil Servant Andre Morrell is to hang for uncivilly strangling a prostitute. He tells "Special Services" Inspector Terence Morgan that he knows the identity of a top spy who is about to smuggle a major secret out of the country, and will trade the information for commutation of his sentence to life imprisonment.

This start leads Morgan on a high-speed investigation that mostly proceeds at a good clip, impeded by a few red herrings, an awful soundtrack, and fiancée Yolanda Donlan, sounding as if she is still decompressing from her lead in the London production of BORN YESTERDAY. Morgan's role is written as the Man Who Gets Things Done, mostly by lying when appropriate. Morrell only has a few scenes, but he's quite good in them, as a man trying to play his last card. The production is cheaply done, but nicely tangled.